Gnomon 35(1963) 677-680 -- 
Review by Robert A. Kraft of

KLAUS BEYER: <gn>Semitische Syntax im Neuen Testament</gn>. Band 
1: Satzlehre. Teil 1. Go%ttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht 1962. 
324 S.(<gn>Studien zur Umwelt des Neuen Testaments</gn>, hrsg. 
von K. G. Kuhn. 1.) 

     This volume both initiates a promising new series, and is 
itself only the first installment of the author's projected 
investigation of Semitic influence on the syntax of the Greek NT. 
Although the problem with which B. deals has often been treated 
in the past, it has never been attacked in such minute detail or 
with such disciplined strategy. B. writes with full awareness of 
the previous conflict between those who would tend to explain 
deviations of NT Greek from recognized Greek "norms" as 
"Semitisms" (e.g. Wellhausen, Torrey, Burney), and those who 
argued that such "deviations" were simply features of the koine 
(e.g. Deissmann, Moulton, Radermacher). Despite the unfortunate 
excesses of the former (esp. Torrey) and the prevailing mood of 
skepticism towards any large-scale attempt to throw light on NT 
passages by appeal to "Semitisms", B. feels that a careful 
reexamination of this vexed subject is needed. 

     His investigation builds from two widely accepted tenets of 
modern Biblical studies: (1) the vernacular of Palestine during 
the time of Jesus (and thus, Jesus' mother tongue) was Aramaic, 
although not the same dialect as the literary "Reichsaramaic" 
which was still in use (Hebrew also was used in scholarly 
theological and legal discussions and literature); and (2)as we 
now have them, the NT writings are <gn><<rein griechische 
Texte>></gn> and cannot be treated in the same way as, e.g. the 
translation Greek of the LXX. Thus, even in the portions of the 
NT which deal most directly with the life of Jesus and of the 
Palestinian community, we must expect to find the entire range of 
possibilities between literal translation (esp. in sayings of 
Jesus) and completely reworked contexts (esp. in narrative). 
Unfortunately, because of our limited knowledge about Palestinian 
Jewish Aramaic vernacular in the 1st century, the approach to NT 
Semitisms must come through careful use of comparative Semitic 
grammar, with special attention to the developing Aramaic 
dialects. 

     B.'s general treatment of the Semitic languages is not above 
criticism -- note, e.g. the distinction made between 
"Reichsaramaic" and "Western Aramaic". Similarly, the evidence 
from Qumran and the Bar Kochba letters suggests that at least in 
some Palestinian circles Hebrew may have had a wider use than B. 
assumes, and prevalent views regarding the emergence of 
New/Mishnaic Hebrew may need significant modification. B. is not 
unaware of such problems, however (see 12-17), and his basic 
methodology is not seriously affected thereby. 

     In order to give his investigation as firm a foundation as 
possible, B. imposes on himself the following rigorous 
methodology: (1) he will deal only with matters of <e>syntax</e> 
which, because they are common either to all Semitic languages or 
(when Semitic languages differ among themselves) to the Aramaic 
dialects, may safely be treated as constructions used in the 
Aramaic vernacular of 1st century Jewish Palestine; (2) he will 
organize the material in accord with <e>modern logical linguistic 
categories</e>, paying attention both to the psychology of 
language and to the historical development of the languages under 
consideration (thus exposing any coincidental [Page 678] 
"parallels" arising from the parallel development of Semitic and 
Greek); and (3) for any given construction, he will reproduce 
<e>as wide a range of examples as possible</e> from the Semitic 
languages/dialects in which it occurs (also noting the 
corresponding LXX renderings of OT passages), followed by a 
complete listing of parallel constructions in the NT (including 
manuscript variations!). 

     The values of such an approach are manifold. Far from simply 
dealing with miscellaneous possible "Semitisms" in the NT, B. is 
actually compiling a comparative <e>Semitic grammar</e> from 
which he may analyze comparable NT constructions in general -- 
whether they are obviously "Semitic" or not. Further, by 
including LXX renderings of OT examples, B. has also provided 
materials for a similar analysis of LXX syntax. Since the present 
volume has only a "selective" index for OT passages (and the 
principle on which the selection is based is not immediately 
apparent), it is to be hoped that ultimately such incidental 
value of B.'s work will be increased through the inclusion of a 
<e>complete</e> OT/LXX Index. B.'s attention to details of NT 
textual criticism also is welcome, for it enables one to see at a 
glance which MSS preserve a more (or less) Semitic flavor in a 
particular passage. Only rarely has a significant variant been 
overlooked; e.g. Acts 2,17 <gk>kai\ e)/stai e)n tai=s e(sxa/tais 
h(me/rais</gk> (D om. <gk>kai/</gk>, B 072 <gk>kai\ e)/stai meta\ 
tau=ta</gk> = LXX) on p. 64. The same attention to textual 
variation, however, is not present in B.'s treatment of LXX -- a 
shortcoming for which he may easily be forgiven! 

     The present volume deals with the following aspects of 
<t>Synthetic Syntax</t>: the introductory clauses ( 1) <gk>kai\ 
e)ge/neto</gk> (29-62) and ( 2) <gk>kai\ e)/stai</gk> (63-65) 
with time designations; ( 3) the use of <gk>kai/</gk> to connect 
a subordinate clause with a following main clause (66-72); and, 
at great length, ( 4)conditional clauses of various sorts (75-
292). In subsequent volumes, B. plans to complete the discussion 
of Synthetic Syntax by treating the remaining constructions 
involving coordinate and subordinate clauses (concessive, 
temporal, causal, asyndeton, etc.) as well as the various kinds 
of simple sentence; then to treat <t>Analytic Syntax</t>; and 
finally, to deal with certain <e>Stylistic</e> peculiarities in 
Semitic narrative. Thus the present contribution contains only 
about 1/5 of the promised total (see 17 Anm. 2). 

     In practice, each of the constructions is examined in 
roughly the following manner: (1) relevant sections from Semitic 
and Greek grammars are listed; (2) then various forms of the 
construction in Semitic are described, followed by extensive 
lists of examples from each of the Semitic languages/dialects in 
which the construction occurs; (3) brief comments are made on the 
occurrence (or lack of occurrence) of the construction in 
classical and papyri Greek; (4) the NT evidence is listed and 
classified; and finally (5), B. draws the material together, 
often with the help of statistical charts and tables. 

     In these more or less mechanical aspects, B.'s presentation 
usually proves to be quite useable (one could not expect it to be 
"readable"!). Most NT students will be pleased to find that 
quotations from the various Aramaic dialects have been printed in 
the standard square characters also used for Hebrew (OT texts 
also include vowel points), and that Semitic passages usually are 
given also in translation. The text is organized and sub-divided 
in such a way that it is relatively easy to follow (on p.217, 
<<b>> has been omitted from its paragraph> The extensive 
bibliography of <gn> <<die wichtigste Literatur>> </gn> (19-27) 
has few serious omissions -- the English reader will be 
especially surprised to find no reference to the treatment of 
"Semitisms in the NT" by W. F. Howard (Moulton-Howard, Gramm. of 
[Page 679] NT Greek II 3, 1929); other literature which may have 
appeared too recently for incorporation by B. includes new 
editions of Moule's Idiom Book (1959) and the English Blass-
Debrunner by R. Funk (1961; see this Journal 35, 1963, 360 ff), 
as well as F. Rosenthal's Gramm. of Bibl. Aramaic (1961). 
Confusing, however, is the following situation: in the text, B. 
uses extremely cryptic abbreviations to refer to the grammatical-
lexical literature (e.g. GKa = Gesenius-Kautzsch, Heb. Gramm.; 
BLA = Bauer-Leander, Gramm. Bibl. Aramaic), but in the 
bibliography, this literature is organized rather loosely 
according to the language (dialect, type of literature) with 
which it deals. Alphabetic order is not followed within the sub-
groupings, and the abbreviation symbol is simply tacked onto the 
end of each bibliographical entry (not even set off by heavy 
type!). Thus the user must scan the entire bibliographical 
section to locate a single book. Furthermore, the order in which 
Semitic literature is listed in the bibliography (Accad. Ugar. 
Heb. New-Heb. Reichsaram. W. Aram. E. Aram. [Syr. Bab. Talm. 
Mand.] N. Arab. Ethiop.) differs considerably from the order in 
which it is presented in the text (Accad. N. Arab. Heb. Ugar. 
etc.) for no apparent reason. 

     As far as the NT student is concerned, the heart of B.'s 
work lies in his interpretation of the statistical analyses (see 
esp. 17 f. 297 ff), and in his classification of each NT 
construction with reference to the degree of Semitism or non-
Semitism it exhibits. The detailed results of this procedure are 
embodied in the Index to NT passages (296-318), where the follow-
ing shades of possibility for any given passage are indicated: S 
5=Semitic construction foreign to Greek; S 4 = almost never in 
Greek; S 3 = seldom in Greek; S 2 = much more frequent in Semitic 
than in Greek; S 1 = more frequent in Semitic; G 1 = more 
frequent in Greek; G 2 = seldom in Semitic; G 3 = Greek 
construction foreign to Semitic. In addition, Hebraisms (Sh = 
Hebrew construction foreign to Aramaic) are distinguished from 
Aramaisms (Sa = Aramaic construction foreign to Hebrew) whenever 
possible, and various degrees of "Septuagintism" (LXX 1-3) are 
noted. These individual classifications are generalized in the 
statistical summaries. For the very limited amount of material 
with which this volume deals, B. concludes that the greatest 
amount of Semitic influence is reflected in the Synoptics, the 
Johannine literature (including Rev.) and James, while Lk-Acts 
also contain frequent "Septuagintisms." Interestingly enough, the 
Johannine Gospel and Epistles and James also show the highest 
percentage of "Graecisms" (i.e. G 1-G 3 above), and the Johannine 
writings show a clear tendency to Hebraisms rather than 
Aramaisms. If such a situation appears to be confusing, it also 
illustrates the futility of translation hypotheses which fail to 
recognize the genuine Greek character of the NT documents, and 
proves that ultimately, each particular passage and construction 
must be assessed on its own merits. It will be of great interest 
to see whether identical results emerge from B.'s analysis of the 
numerous constructions yet to be examined. 

     In general, B. shows a real awareness of the dangers of the 
statistical method he employs. It can provide us with a 
generalized impression, but its accuracy is very much dependent 
on the quantity of material included (in this case, perhaps too 
little) and in the quality of the individual judgments on which 
the charts are based. Thus he admits, e. g. that Acts 
<e>seems</e> to have a high percentage of Hebraisms mainly 
because of the frequent occurrence of <gk>e)ge/neto de/</gk> (or 
<gk>kai\ e)ge/neto</gk>) to introduce sentences (noted as LXX 3 
or Sh5 in the Index); this construction is even more frequent in 
Lk -- between them, Lk-Acts account for 85% [Page 680] of all the 
NT examples! (Although statistics are an easy source for 
mechanical error, B. and the printer have had a high degree of 
success in avoiding such -- I have noted only two: p. 77 col. 4-5 
"Rom" should read 11 for 10 [thus 18% not 16,4%], and p. 295 col. 
3 "Summe" should read 790 not 776.) The NT Index is easy to use 
and its infrequent omissions are quite minor (e.g. Mt 28,11 ff = 
81 A. Lk 14,32 = 191 A1. Jn 5,19b-20 = 81A. NT peshitta passages 
are not included.) Rarely the Index seems seriously misleading in 
its classification of Semitisms/Graecisms, as when the several NT 
passages listed on p. 208 note 1 are classified as G3, and when 
no passage from 2 Tim is designated as a Semitism despite the 
fact that the tables on pp. 230 ff and 294 f indicate a Semitic 
construction in that epistle. Finally, the somewhat mechanical 
approach used by B. can obscure as well as illuminate a passage. 
An example of how B.'s approach applies in detail, and of how it 
can confuse some issues, is his treatment of Jn 15,2 <gk>pa=n 
klh=ma e)n e)moi\ mh\ fe/ron karpo/n, ai)/rei au)to/, kai| pa=n 
to\ karpo\n fe/ron, kaqai/rei au)to/</gk>.... For B., the 
construction <gk>pa=n kl. ... au)to/ / kai\ pa=n ... au)to/</gk> 
is a 4th class Hebraism because it follows the Hebrew (but not 
Aramaic) pattern of <hb>kol</hb> ("all, every") + substantive + 
conditional ptcp. in place of a protasis with an indefinite 
substantive for subject ("if any"), and because such 
constructions are very rare in classical and papyri Greek; 
furthermore, the substantive here acts as "casus pendens" to the 
main clause, where the resumptive pronoun <gk>au)to/</gk> occurs 
-- an additional mark of strong Semitic influence. Nevertheless, 
the <e>negated</e> conditional ptcp. construction (<gk>mh\ 
fe/ron</gk>) is impossible in any Semitic language, and thus is a 
3rd class "Graecism" (which does not necessarily mean that it is 
good Greek, but that it is non-Semitic). Moreover, the fact that 
<gk>e)n e)moi/</gk> and the second <gk>karpo/n</gk> 
<e>precede</e> their respective conditional ptcps. is a mark of 
non-Semitic construction (G3) -- in Semitic they would follow the 
ptcp. Taken as a whole, however, the passage exhibits certain 
poetic characteristics (balance,repetition) which also would 
affect the above constructions -- quite possibly so as partly to 
overrule grammatical considerations (whether Semitic or Greek). 
Thus B.'s generalizations can point in a certain direction (or in 
opposite directions, as here!), but factors other than syntactic 
probability must also be considered when one attempts to deal 
with any given passage. 

     On the whole, B. has provided a very valuable tool for 
students of Biblical literature. In addition to the complete NT 
and selective OT Indices mentioned above, B. includes brief 
Indices of the most important words and subjects treated. 
Understandably, no attempt has been made to index the numerous 
non-Biblical (esp. Rabbinic) examples cited in the volume. For a 
book which contains so many sources of potential typographical 
error, the standard of printing and proof-reading is remarkably 
high. To the author, his collaborators, and the publishers alike, 
a sincere vote of thanks is due for this first-fruits of what 
promises to be a rich harvest. 

University of Pennsylvania              Robert A. Kraft