Can Someone who knows Biblical Greek help me understand this?

Cynthia in Florida

I am looking at Colossians 1.  I am looking at the word Saints and under the morphology it says that saints is an adjective.  Specifically, adjective, dative, plural, masculine.

I understand a LITTLE Latin, so I understand dative in THAT sense, but can't wrap my brain around how Saints is an adjective in the Greek when I always thought that it was a noun that defined the position of God's people as "holy, set apart."

Can someone help me understand this, specifically how can the word Saints be an adjective? 

Thanks in advance for your help.

Joe Mayden

Hope this helps

(3) Finally, as in English, the Greek adjective may serve as a noun (i.e., as a substantive): “only the good die young,” “a word to the wise is sufficient,” etc. This use is called the substantival adjective. In Greek, this function of the adjective is considerably more common than in English, and Greek can use its endings to make distinctions that are impossible with English adjectives. Hence the masculine οἱ ἀγαθοί means “the good men” or “the good people,” but the feminine αἱ ἀγαθαί, and the neuter τὰ ἀγαθά, mean “the good women” and “the good things,” respectively. Likewise, an adjective may be used substantivally in the singular, as in ὁ ἀγαθός, “the good man,” or ἡ ἀγαθή, “the good woman.” Some words, among them ἁμαρτωλός (“sinner”), were originally adjectives but were used so frequently as nouns that they are normally regarded as both. A New Testament example of a substantival adjective is found in Matthew 13:19: “the evil one [ὁ πονηρός] comes and snatches away what has been sown.”

Black, D. A. (2009). Learn to read New Testament Greek (3rd ed., pp. 44–45). Nashville, TN: B&H Publishing Group.

Keith Larson

In Greek adjectives can be used as nouns when they have an article before them.

Keith Larson

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/632402#Comment_632402

I see Joe beat me to it.

Cynthia in Florida

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/632401#Comment_632401

Thanks Joe and Keith:

The above did help, but I think what really brought it home is the article in front of the adjective.  I now understand it to the extent that it is like saying "only the good die young."  Good is an adjective, but with the article "the" in front of it, it takes the place of a noun.

Thanks for your help.  It was an interesting, but perplexing, discovery in my time of study.

Blessings to you and yours, and thanks again,

Cynthia