One reason they aren't responding to your arguments might be because your understanding of the Greek language appears to have some issues.
Where have you learned Greek? To try to use grammer to prove your points, you really need a good understanding of the Greek language as a whole.
You've
said elsewhere, "
I'm not very knowledgeable in Greek grammer (sic)." Yet you're comfortable asserting that I misunderstand the language, without offering a single example or counter-argument?
The problem isn't my Greek; it's that those making this claim have demonstrated elementary misunderstandings of it themselves. I've pointed this out.
NewLifeInChristJesus confused participial aspect between narrative and gnomic contexts (post
#10), treating temporal reference as if it were inherent to the participle rather than context-determined.
BNR32FAN has likewise apparently denied the inherent logic of the perfect tense (a completed act with continuing results) and seems unaware of the difference between assertion and argument. These are basic errors.
Let the record of our discussion stand: no one has yet engaged the actual argument of 1 John 2:29, 4:7, and 5:1. The argument rests on the repeated syntactic pattern: a present substantival participle functioning as subject of a perfect indicative in gnomic statements. The
ordinary sense of that construction is that the state expressed by the perfect
grounds the action denoted by the present. The perfect highlights a completed act whose results persist; the present participle expresses the ongoing manifestation of that result. Hence, "
the one who believes" is so characterized because he "
has been born of God."
This is the
normal and natural sense of this construction in most contexts. Does that mean the relationship is
always causal? No, and I have never said otherwise. But exceptional cases, where context alters the logical force, do not overturn the ordinary usage.
My critics pretend that because I didn't explicitly mention exceptions, I therefore denied their existence. That is both an argument from silence and a misrepresentation. The argument does
not claim that grammar
requires one fixed meaning. It rests on the fact that the
ordinary usage of the perfect + present participle, especially in gnomic or didactic statements, is that the perfect grounds the action or quality expressed by the present.
The syntax of 1 John 5:1 is straightforward. There should be no need for further argument to see that it fits this ordinary usage. But for those who wish to contest it, John himself confirms the same pattern in 1 John 2:29 and 4:7, where the identical construction clearly conveys logical order: the state described by the perfect (being born of God)
grounds the activity described by the participle (doing righteousness, loving). It's telling that the argument is being dismissed rather than addressed. It would appear that
BNR32FAN in particular believes that regeneration
is not necessary for the sinner to practice righteousness or engage in godly love, since he/she has denied logical sequence in those verses. What, then, is the purpose of regeneration?
NewLifeInChristJesus and
BNR32FAN's reasoning depends on a twofold caricature:
- That the existence of exceptions erases any ordinary usage, and
- That my argument supposedly requires the grammar to entail a single, invariable meaning.
Neither is true.
John 3:18 and 1 John 5:10 do
not reverse the grounding of the perfect. They simply
shift the relationship according to what is being asserted. In 1 John 5:1, the perfect expresses the
foundational act that gives rise to the ongoing activity; the logic moves from cause to effect.
By contrast, in John 3:18 and 1 John 5:10, the grammar expresses
corresponding condition, not
causal grounding (in either direction). The participle doesn't function as the
basis for the finite verb (or vice versa); it
characterizes the subject whose state the finite verb describes. The perfect or present indicative is not
grounded in the participle; it
corresponds to it.
This is why their objections miss the point. They treat my observation of a
logical relationship between participle and finite verb as though I had claimed the two are
always temporally or causally linked the same way. I made no such claim. The participle-finite verb pairing indicates a logical relationship, but the
type -- causal, resultative, or corresponding -- is determined by further syntax and context.
In the vast majority of cases, especially in gnomic contexts, the relationship is causal or at least logically progressive, because that is
natural to the perfect tense's encoding of a completed act with abiding results, and it is therefore most common for the participle to describe what those results look like. That doesn't exclude other nuances; it simply establishes the ordinary, expected usage.
The proof that my opponents are clinging to a technicality while ignoring the substance is simple: had I opened the OP with the very parallels John himself provides (1 John 2:29; 4:7; 5:1), their comments would not yet have contributed anything to our discussion. It's doubtful they would even be participating, given their inability thus far to engage that argument.
So I'll simply ask again:
Is regeneration necessary for one to practice righteousness (1 John 2:29) or to love in the manner John describes (1 John 4:7)?
If not, what is the purpose of regeneration at all?
But if so, how do you deal with the grammatical parallel in 5:1?
That's a simple challenge. The fact that no one will answer it is telling.