"If": The Various Conditions Conveyed By Its Use
This Is Appendix 118 From The Companion Bible.
- ean = if haply, if so be that, from ei (No. 2) and an, haply, perchance. The exact condition is shown by the Mood of the verb with which it is used :
- Followed by the Indicative Mood (with the Present Tense), it expresses the condition simply; without any reference to its being decisive by experience, or by the event, as in 1John 5:15, elsewhere, and in the Papyri.
- Followed by the Subjunctive Mood, it expresses a hypothetical but possible condition, contingent on circumstances which the future will show (John 7:17).
- ei = if. Putting the condition simply.
- Followed by the Indicative Mood, the hypothesis is assumed as an actual fact, the condition being unfulfilled, but no doubt being thrown upon the supposition (1Corinthians 15:16).
- Followed by the Optative Mood, it expresses an entire uncertainty; a mere assumption or conjecture of a supposed case (Acts 17:27. 1Peter 3:14).
- Followed by the Subjunctive Mood, like No. 1. b; except that this puts the condition with more certainty, and as being more dependent on the event (1Corinthians 14:5).
For two illustrations, see Acts 5:38, 39. "If this counsel or this work be of men (1. b, a result which remains to be seen) ... but if it is of God (1. a, which I assume to be the case)", etc.
John 13: 17. "If ye know these things (2. a, which I assume to be the fact) happy are ye if ye do them (1. b, a result which remains to be seen)".
Note four "ifs" in Colossian's, "if ye died with Christ" (2: 20); and "if ye were raised with Christ" (3:1), both of which are No. 2 a (assuming the fact to be true); "if any man have a quarrel" (3:13); "if he come to you" (4:10), both of which are No. 1. b, being uncertainties.
One other "if" in Colossians is 1: 23 : "If ye continue in the faith" (eige = if indeed, a form of 2. a), which ye will assuredly do.
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