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Searching BDAG


Rod Decker

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I'm trying to devise a search of BDAG that will allow me to identify at least some of the verb entries for which BDAG notes a dative direct object. There are several ways BDAG does that, but if I can figure out one, the search should be easily adaptable to the others. There won't be a perfect search, but even one that provides data for manual revision would help.

 

What I've tried (unsuccessfully) is a two-field search in the BDAG module:

 

1. "foll. by dat."

2. (*ω,*ομαι)

- - -

#1 is in the Greek entry field to limit the search to the most common verb entries.

#2 is in the English content field to search for any comments BDAG makes about the dative--which in these cases is usually a dative direct object (though not always; might be a dat. comp., etc.).

 

I've also tried #1 and #2 in reverse order, but no change.

 

This search throws an error on field 1 about a missing quote mark, though the search is balanced with a quote mark at beginning and end. (I've also tried adding an = but it doesn't help.) My guess is that the periods are messing up the search? (I've also tried searching without the periods ("foll by dat")

 

I'm obviously doing something wrong. Any suggestions?

 

Thanks,

 

 

 

 

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Rod, I believe the issue is since the period is a separate word, you actually need your english content search to be:

 

foll * by dat

 

Then it should all work properly.

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Hi Rod, the other issues are:

 

I would construct the greek field search like this.

 

(*?ω, *ομαι)

 

as this then excludes the interjection/vocative ὦ

 

and, BDAG is somewhat inconsistent with its language

 

I can't find a place where "foll. by dat." occurs, and Joel's example brings lots of spurious hits, and if you use "foll* by dat" or "foll* by dat*" you get no hits at all.

 

So I went to πιστεύω and saw that the terminology he used there was "by means of the dat." in entry δ. So I tried that in my English content field and got 6 hits, which feels like too few.

 

προστασσω has the terminology "w. dat." so I tried that by typing it (with or without the *) and it failed as well.

 

So, here's how I finally did it.

 

I opened BDAG and found προστασσω

 

I selected the text "w. dat." and then right clicked and selected "search word"

 

this put "w * dat" (without quotes) into the English content field and found 954 hits. That obviously included prepositions etc.

 

so then I added the extra term "Greek entry" with (*?ω, *ομαι) and this found 834 hits

 

I have not looked at all the results (obviously) but the first few seem legit.

 

If you were looking for verbs that only took the dative, that's a different issue.

 

This does omit πιστεύω which has the terminology differently expressed.

Edited by Ken Simpson
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Rod, I believe the issue is since the period is a separate word, you actually need your english content search to be:

 

foll * by dat

 

Then it should all work properly.

Thanks Joel. That's progress. I no longer get an error message. But I only get one Greek entry. I think Ken's reply has some helpful additional tweaks.

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Hi Rod, the other issues are:

 

I would construct the greek field search like this.

 

(*?ω, *ομαι)

 

as this then excludes the interjection/vocative ὦ

 

and, BDAG is somewhat inconsistent with its language

 

I can't find a place where "foll. by dat." occurs, and Joel's example brings lots of spurious hits, and if you use "foll* by dat" or "foll* by dat*" you get no hits at all.

 

So I went to πιστεύω and saw that the terminology he used there was "by means of the dat." in entry δ. So I tried that in my English content field and got 6 hits, which feels like too few.

 

προστασσω has the terminology "w. dat." so I tried that by typing it (with or without the *) and it failed as well.

 

So, here's how I finally did it.

 

I opened BDAG and found προστασσω

 

I selected the text "w. dat." and then right clicked and selected "search word"

 

this put "w * dat" (without quotes) into the English content field and found 954 hits. That obviously included prepositions etc.

 

so then I added the extra term "Greek entry" with (*?ω, *ομαι) and this found 834 hits

 

I have not looked at all the results (obviously) but the first few seem legit.

 

If you were looking for verbs that only took the dative, that's a different issue.

 

This does omit πιστεύω which has the terminology differently expressed.

 

Ken, That's very helpful. I'll play with it some more as I go along. You're right that BDAG is not consistent on terminology. Some entries have "w. dat." others have "foll. by dat." and others use τινι. So I'll have to explore the range and test it against the list in Robertson (pp. 539ff); I don't think ATR is exhaustive which is why I'd like to try and expand the list with BDAG's entries--but I surely don't want to do it by reading through BDAG manually! (If anyone knows of any other lists of verbs which take dative direct objects, I'd be glad for the reference/s.

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Hi Rod, glad to be of (some) help.
i looked at L-N and it was useless for this. Doesn't note when the verb takes a dative or not.

 

However, LSJ was overwhelming! The terminology there seems to be c. dat. so I did the search c * dat with (*?ω,*ομαι.,*μι) and got 4250! Way too many to be of use, and LSJ doesn't have προστασσω!

 

P.S. Don't forget you can cut down the noise in the results by show text as => paragraphs in the gear menu at the top right of the pane

Edited by Ken Simpson
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Hi Rod, glad to be of (some) help.

i looked at L-N and it was useless for this. Doesn't note when the verb takes a dative or not.

 

However, LSJ was overwhelming! The terminology there seems to be c. dat. so I did the search c * dat with (*?ω,*ομαι.,*μι) and got 4250! Way too many to be of use, and LSJ doesn't have προστασσω!

 

Right on LN. It's a specialized tool that is only concerned with defs.; it can never serve as a standard lexicon. My present concern is only the NT, so I'll skip the mass of data from LSJ! Just in the last few minutes I've been able to confirm my guess that ATR's list isn't complete; I've already added 3 verbs and I'm not out of alpha yet. But I am past p. 90--and I'd still be reading/skimming rapidly if I had to do it without Accordance (and hoping I wasn't missing any entries).

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It's probably not what you're after, but b-greek has a list - looks way too short to me

 

AKOLOUQEW (EX-, EP-, PAR-, SUN-)
ANTILAMBANOMAI
APEIQEW
APISTEW
ENECW
BOHQEW
ARKEW (EP-)
DIAKATELEGCOMAI
DIAKOVEW
DOULEUW
EGGIZW
EMBPIMAOMAI
EPIPLHSSW
EPITIMAW
EUXAPISTEW
KOINWNEW
LATPEUW
EPITUGCANW
PARENOCLEW
PEIQAREW
PEIQOMAI
PISTEUW
PROSKARTETEW
PROSKUNEW
PROSOACQIZW
PROSYAUW
SUNEUDOKEW
hUPAKOUW
COLAW
CPAOMAI

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Good. You're right that it's not complete, but there are some there not on ATR's list. I'll eventually (I hope) be able to compile a more complete list and post it on my blog.

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Excellent! Love those resources!

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This is an excellent question for the syntax database, by the way. Of course, it's not complete yet so you might have to use the lexicons to supplement.

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This is an excellent question for the syntax database, by the way. Of course, it's not complete yet so you might have to use the lexicons to supplement.

Perhaps I just don't know how to use the Syntax search to its potential. One problem that is immediately apparent is that Syntax doesn't tag for D.O., only "complement"--which is not equivalent to a D.O. Complements also include objects of prepositions (and perhaps other things as well), which dramatically increases the number of hits. Is there any way to narrow such a search so that it only gives dative complements of verbs? That would still not distinguish between dative D.O.s and dative complements (assuming someone makes that distinction; some just lump them all together as complements), but at least it would yield the relevant data. I'd like eventually to compile a list of verbs that take dative complements in addition to the dative D.O.s that I'm working on now.

 

Any ideas anyone?

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Yes, the complement is not a direct object. The syntax tagging is based on a view of syntax which posits, among other things, a hierarchal relationship within the phrases and clauses of a sentence—not a linear relationship. The relationship a complement has to its predicate is an interpretive decision the syntax does not superimpose on the user (whether it's pragmatics or semiotics). You can still delimit the data by overlapping morphological conditions on the complement insofar as requiring the dative case. You can also adjudicate between some false results by using certain morphological markers as arguments for the morphological parameters allowed as it relates to the predicate (e.g., exclude passives would thus mean excluding the tradition indirect object).

 

You can see how I used the syntax search to hone in one example under discussion by Robertson on Moulton's observations of πιστεύω. Such an example shows the importance and power a syntax search has over against mere morphology.

 

 

Edited by James Tucker
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  • 6 years later...

Was wondering, if anyone knows how to search in accordance mobile a scripture within a specific Greek entry?

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Which mobile platform ? I cannot see how to do this on Android yet, but I don't know anything about the iOS app.

 

Thx

D

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