Expositor's Greek Testament
The former treatise have I made, O Theophilus, of all that Jesus began both to do and teach,
Acts 1:1. τὸν μὲν πρῶτον λόγον, a reference beyond all reasonable doubt to St. Luke’s Gospel. Not merely the dedication of both writings to Theophilus, but their unity of language and style is regarded by critics of all schools as convincing proof of the identity of authorship of Acts and the third Gospel; see Introd. and Zöckler, Greifswalder Studien, p. 128 (1895). In the expression πρῶτος λόγος Ramsay finds an intimation from St. Luke’s own hand that he contemplated a third book at least, otherwise we should have had πρότερος λόγος, St. Paul the Traveller, pp. 23, 27, 28; see to the same effect Zahn, Einleitung in das N. T., ii., 371 (1899), Rendall, Acts of the Apostles, in loco, and cf. comment. on Acts 28:31. So, too, primus is used in Latin not simply as former but as first in a series, Cicero, De Invent., ii., 3. On the other hand, Blass, Grammatik des N.G., p. 34, Acta Apost., p. 16, and more recently Philology of the Gospels, p. 38, maintains that πρῶτος simply = πρότερος (so also Holtzmann and Felten). But Ramsay, whilst pointing out instances in which St. Luke apparently uses πρῶτος differently from this, p. 28 (cf. also Zahn, u. s., p. 389), admits that we cannot attain to any absolute certainty in the passage before us, since no instance occurs of the use of πρότερος by St. Luke.—λόγον: frequently used by classical writers in the sense of a narrative or history contained in a book; see instances in Wetstein. The passage in Plato, Phædo, p. 61, ., is valuable not only for the marked contrast between λόγος and μῦθος, ποιεῖν μύθους ἀλλʼ οὐ λόγους, but also for the use of ποιεῖν (Wendt). Amongst other instances of the phrase ποιεῖν λόγον cf. Galen, De Usu Part., ii., περὶ πρώτων τῶν δακτύλων ἐποιησάμην τὸν λόγον. St. Chrysostom sees in the phrase a proof of the unassuming character of the author: St. Luke does not say “The former Gospel which I preached”. For the anomalous μέν, “solitarium,” without the following δέ, frequent in Luke, see Blass, Grammatik des N. G., p. 261, cf. Luke 8:5, Acts 3:21; Acts 28:22, etc., and several times in St. Paul. μέν occurs thus six times in the Acts without οὖν—on μὲν οὖν see Acts 1:6.—ὦ Θεόφιλε: the interjection used here simply in address, as common in Attic Greek, cf. Acts 18:14, Acts 27:21, 1 Timothy 6:11; without the epithet κράτιστε, as in Luke 1:3, and without ὦ, Θεόφ. alone would have seemed too bold, Winer-Schmiedel, p. 258. It has been suggested that the omission of the epithet κράτιστε, Luke 1:3, denotes that St. Luke’s friendship had become less ceremonious, just as a similar change has been noted in the dedication of Shakespeare’s two poems to the Earl of Southampton; cf. also Zahn, Einleitung, ii. 360. The way in which the epithet κράτιστε is employed elsewhere in the book in addressing Roman officials, Acts 23:26, Acts 24:3, Acts 26:25, has been thought to indicate that Theophilus held some high official post, or that he was at least of equestrian rank (Ramsay, St. Paul the Traveller, pp. 388, 389, and his inferences as to the date of Acts). Ramsay is of opinion that the name was given at baptism, and that it was used or known only among Christians, and he infers that this baptismal name is used in Acts because the book was probably written at a time when it was dangerous for a Roman of rank to be recognised as a Christian. But Theophilus was by no means uncommon as a Jewish name; cf. B. D.2, i., p. 25, and also article “Theophilus,” B. D.1 (see also Deissmann, Bibelstudien, p. 19). The epithet κράτιστος was peculiarly appropriated to Romans holding high office, and actually became during the second century a technical title to denote equestrian rank; and from its use here Zahn maintains not only that Theophilus was a man of some social position, but that he was, when Luke wrote his gospel, not a nember of the Christian Church, since there is no instance in the first two centuries of a Christian addressing his fellow-Christians in a title corresponding as it were to “your Excellency” (Einleitung in das N. T., ii., 360, 383). The instance of the address of the Epist. ad Diognetum, κράτιστε Διόγνητε, is alleged by Blass as an instance that the epithet is not always used in the technical sense mentioned; but to this Ramsay replies that if Diognetus was the friend and teacher of Marcus Aurelius, the emperor might well raise his teacher to equestrian rank; Septimius Severus raised his sons’ tutor to the high dignity of the consulship. Ramsay discusses κράτιστος at length in Was Christ born at Bethlehem? (1898), pp. 65, 71, 72, as against Blass, Philology of the Gospels, p. 19. Blass fully recognises that Theophilus held a high position, and that the title in question would naturally occur in a book dedicated to a patron; but it must be borne in mind that Blass regards Theophilus as of Greek extraction, possibly a fellow-citizen with Luke of Antioch, whilst Ramsay sees in him a citizen of Rome and a resident in the imperial city. Theophylact asks why Luke should have cared to write to one man only and to value him so highly, and makes answer that it was because the Evangelist was a guardian of the words spoken by the Lord: “It is not the will of my Father that one of these little ones should perish”. There seems no great reason to doubt that Theophilus was a real personage, and the epithet κράτιστε, at all events in its technical significance, is hardly consistent with any other supposition (see Sanday, Inspiration, p. 319, note). The recent attempt to identify Theophilus with Seneca, referred to by Zöckler, Apostelgeschichte, p. 163, must be dismissed as equally groundless and fanciful as the former conjecture that he was no other than Philo.—περὶ πάντων ὧν: the use of πᾶς (mostly after a prep., as here) followed by an attracted relative may be classed amongst the mannerisms of St. Luke (Simcox, Writers of the N. T., p. 24, where other instances are given); see also Friedrich, Das Lucasevangelium, pp. 1, 2.—ὧν: in St. Luke’s Gospel and in the Acts the frequency of the attraction of the relative again specially characterises him amongst the N.T. writers, Friedrich, u. s., pp. 36 and 100.—ἤρξατο: often regarded as simply pleonastic, but sometimes as emphatic, to intimate that the work which Jesus began on earth He continued in heaven, or that He began the work of the Gospel and committed its continuance to His followers; Zahn, u. s., p. 366 ff. In Winer’s view to regard ἄρχεσθαι as pleonastic is a mere subterfuge to avoid a difficulty, and he renders the passage “what Jesus began both to do and to teach, and continued to do until,” etc. (see also Grimm-Thayer, sub v.), treating it as an example of breviloquence (Winer-Moulton, lxvi., 1). On the whole it is perhaps best to consider the phrase ἤρξ. ποιεῖν with Bengel (in loco) as equivalent to fecit ab initio, although no doubt there is a sense in which, with every Christian for nineteen centuries, St. Luke would regard the whole earthly life of Jesus as a beginning, a prelude to the glory and mighty working to be revealed and perfected in the ascended Lord. The verb is of frequent use in St. Luke’s writings (Friedrich, Zeller, Lekebusch), although in St. Mark’s Gospel it is also constantly found. In the LXX it is often found like חָלַל hi., and also in Apocr. ποιεῖν τε καὶ διδάσκειν, “Scilicet prius fecit, deinde docuit; prius docuit exemplo, deinde verbo. Unde prius non docuit, quod prius ipse non fecit” (Corn. à Lap.).
To continue reading the book go here
Scroll down till you see this paragraph heading: Acts 1:2
If you were to find 4 of the 5 volumes at your local Goodwill for 1.99 apiece I am sure you would be delighted, I sure was when I did. The inside of each one is stamped like this.
"Property of Desert View Baptist Church"
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| http://www.desertviewbaptistchurch.com/ Desert View Baptist Church 17610 S La Canada Dr. Sahuarita, AZ 85629 (520) 625 - 6114 desertviewbaptistchurch@gmail.com |
The value of these 4 books is way more than the 1.99 apiece price I paid at my local Goodwill
Here is what Alibris has in the way of market value:
The above link is for 307 price quotes in descending order, The top price for all 5 volumes is $200.52
The very last entry of the 307 price quotes is $5.00 for VOLUME 3
This is how I found the book on BibleHub.com.
I opened up volume 2 and began reading aloud with my smartphone microphone clicked at the Google Search screen. After I read some words, Google Search found the words on BibleHub.com
49.99 Collection value: $122.40 Save $72.41 (59%)
If you want to purchase a digital set of the books from Wordsearch.com go here. They go for Sale: $49.95 Reg: $99.95 Save $50.00 (50%)
If you want to purchase a physical or digital set of the books from https://www.eerdmans.com/ you won't find them there which explains why they are being given away free at BibleHub.com.
Here is the menu path to the books at bible hub
while you have that page going, select the commentary drop down
and drop down to Expositors Greek from the available list of Commentaries
You can navigate all the way from Matthew to Revelation from the column 1 drop down which includes all the old testament books. You just need to skip through the OT items and select the NT items to study all the Expositors Greek Commentaries that Bible Hub has available
here is the screen shot for the column 1 dropdown
{That would save me the work of taking photos of the pages I wanted to blog about like I have to now with my BDAG since the third edition is only available as a digital download from Logos.com for 119.00 and Wordsearch.com for 150.00 still and I bought my physical copy of the second edition used online for 50.00 which I found out later is higher than I could have bought it for if I had shopped for it longer.}
Getting back to the Expositors Greek Testament:
I found that Alibris offers the 1900 version (not just the 1960 edition.)
Hardcover, Good
1900, Hodder and Stoughton
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Wilmington, DE, USA
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$11.59
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Choose your shipping method in Checkout. Costs may vary based on destination.
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In conclusion I wish to say I am grateful to Google for giving me the search results that included the one to the website Bible Hub so I can not only enjoy owning 4 physical books but having access to all 5 online books as well for free.
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