Shlama Akhi Iakov, As a student of the Greek of the New Testament, many of the following points in this first example should be familiar to you. In all Semitic languages, as opposed to Greek, there is a preference shown to beginning a thought, or introducing a new development by the phrase 0whw (in Hebrew, wayyehi), which literally means:
- 'And it came about that....'
....then follows an indication of time, which is generally an infinitive introduced by the preposition "in" B, the sentence is usually continued with another verb being preceded with an "and" w. This turn of phrase is found no less than 300 times in the Hebrew Old Testament. The Septuagint, then, literally translates this:
- Kai egeneto en to ("and it happened in the doing....")
....then it usually expresses the indication of time by an infinitive, followed by its subjects/objects, then it continues the sentence with "Kai" (and) followed by another verb in the indicative. The result, as bizarre in Greek as it is in English, is as follows:
- "and it happened in the doing of {whatever} and {someone} said...."
However, it is pure Semitic speech. Open up your favorite GNT and look for it. This turn of phrase is found twice in Marqus, six times in Mattay, and thirty-two times in Luqa. Why? The most important point to remember here is: this is in the commentary portion of Luqa. I'm not quoting Messiah's words, or any dialogue involving the Aramaic-speaking characters. This is Luqa himself writing.
Fk^rwbw 0ml4
| 
