Tree's Walking
Can someone more learned make comment on[most translations are fairly similar]:
….Βλέπω τοὺς ἀνθρώπους ὅτι ὡς δένδρα ὁρῶ περιπατοῦντας.” (Mark 8:24, SBLGNT)
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From a common sense perspective, I would think it means the features of people are indistinct. I don't think the Greek would help much here.
"For the kingdom of God does not consist in words but in power"
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Jerry M said:
From a common sense perspective, I would think it means the features of people are indistinct. I don't think the Greek would help much here.
True, but how could he know to be distinct, by using δένδρα ?
****************maybe I need to be more specific, what determines that he knew what he was seeing from this:
“καὶ ἐπιλαβόμενος τῆς χειρὸς τοῦ τυφλοῦ ἐξήνεγκεν αὐτὸν ἔξω τῆς κώμης, καὶ πτύσας εἰς τὰ ὄμματα αὐτοῦ, ἐπιθεὶς τὰς χεῖρας αὐτῷ, ἐπηρώτα αὐτόν· Εἴ τι βλέπεις; καὶ ἀναβλέψας ἔλεγεν· Βλέπω τοὺς ἀνθρώπους ὅτι ὡς δένδρα ὁρῶ περιπατοῦντας.” (Mark 8:23–24, SBLGNT)
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I read a few others from BW8 and Pradis where they associated δένδρα and ἀναβλέψας in that he had at one time the ability to see…….which defines the question: Εἴ τι βλέπειςAnyone else get this?
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What are you looking for commentary on? On translation or on meaning?
On translational questions, one of my favorite resources is the UBS Translation Handbooks (a great justification for upgrading your library to Gold or higher if you don't have it already). Here is the entry for Mark 8:24:
blepō tous anthrōpous hoti hōs dendra horō peripatountas literally ‘I see men, for I see (them) walking around like trees.’ As the Greek text stands the statement is none too logical: clearly the meaning of the blind man’s answer is, ‘I see men, because even though the things I perceive look like trees, they are walking around,’ i.e. the fact that they were in motion told him they were men, not trees. The meaning will be more clearly brought out by a free paraphrase than by a word-for-word translation. Cf. Manson (and Williams) ‘I see men: they look to me like trees walking about’; Lagrange Je vois les hommes, car j’apercois comme des arbres qui marchent. Cf. Vincent Word Studies I, 206. Black (Aramaic, 36f.) conjectures that the underlying Aramaic emphatic form of statement meant ‘I see men like trees walking,’ and the Vulgate and Syriac versions translate a text identical with this, ‘I see men like trees that are walking’ (omitting the hoti ‘because’ and horō ‘I perceive’ of the critical Greek text).
dendron (only here in Mark) ‘tree.’
peripateō (cf. 2.9) ‘walk,’ ‘walk about.’
Translation Looked up must not be taken in the sense of ‘looking up to heaven’ or ‘looking up at the sky.’ Either the man’s head was lowered and he looked up, or as is equally possible the Greek verb may mean ‘regained his sight’ (see above). ‘Looking up’ should not be, however, any higher than horizontal (in some translations the misunderstanding which follows, in which men are said to look like trees, has been attributed by the readers to the fact that the man looked up toward the sky, and, of course, all he could see would be trees).
Unless one is quite careful the difficult reply of the man is made more complicated by an awkward grammatical arrangement. For example, a number of renderings have meant ‘I see men walking like trees.’ Of course, trees do not walk, and the meaning of the passage is completely lost. Renderings which have attempted to convey the meaning of the original while remaining as close to the Greek as the receptor languages in question will allow, include ‘see men that are walking, they are like trees’ (Tzeltal), ‘see men like trees, they are walking’ (Zoque), ‘I see men like they are trees; I see them as they are walking’ (Trique).
Bratcher, R. G., & Nida, E. A. (1993). A handbook on the Gospel of Mark. UBS handbook series; Helps for translators (258). New York: United Bible Societies.
Jacob Hantla
Pastor/Elder, Grace Bible Church
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I think that the contrast could come from understanding ἀναβλέψας in that he had to be looking around his location at ground level, as if ‘regaining sight’. I know some blind people and if you watch their eyes they tend to wonder, not being fixed or focused.
Τι can be misread since it is to possibly indicate many[some], even being related to ‘something’. Βλέπεις would lead to being able to perceive, or to having an understanding of what he is vaguely beginning to see. So that when he looked up he could ‘see’ something but was not able to distinguish what exactly he was ‘seeing’. From the rest of his statement he would have to previously had sight, in that he understood ἀνθρώπους [men, man, people, a bodily shape or figure] relating to δένδρα - περιπατοῦντας [trees - imitate men walking]. Why use a word that could relate to a 'tree' if he had never seen one?
v25 – the use of ἀπεκατέστη [reestablish, restore, return to]. So there is some difficulty, agreeable that there resides some ‘non-logic’ in the two verses, but looking ahead the non-logic fades into logic.
I think it can be said that he did at one time have sight...............I am open to criticism....
thanks.
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