elocutionary and syntactical commas

[Steven Avery]

elocutionary and syntactical commas

Are often the same thing, since the pause is commonly caused by phrase syntax

Here is an interesting discussion in modern times.

Extreme punctuation pedantry
http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=1024

The AV 1611 comma usage is little changed (I did a test looking at Romans 1-5.)

Why? elocutionary commas (excluding extreme usages like poetry) are often identical to syntactical commas. Brian wants to change the meaning of the AV text, so he promulgates bogus ideas about the AV commas.

Brian got tripped up by the faux idea that there was some radical quick change.

 

[Steven Avery]

Originally discussed here.
https://www.purebibleforum.com/inde...on-and-text-punctuation.2267/page-2#post-8875

 

[Brianrw]

Encyclopedia Britannica says of commas around the 1600s that "their purpose was elocutionary, not syntactic" and that "Excessive punctuation was common in the 18th century: at its worst it used commas with every subordinate clause and separable phrase." Further, that,

​

It was the lexicographers Henry Watson Fowler and Francis George Fowler, in The King’s English, published in 1906, who established the current British practice of light punctuation. Punctuation in the United States has followed much the same path as in Britain, but the rules laid down by American authorities have in general been more rigid than the British rules.​

What that means is commas were more frequently utilized to express a pause in speech. Many of the commas in the AV 1611 were removed by 1768 while usage was becoming more standardized. Even that edition is considered overpunctuated by modern standards. No assertion was made concerning a sudden rapid change, but that the comma usage was standardized over a long period of debate and completed, essentially, in 1906.

Mr. Avery (familiar with the post 1906 rules of comma usage) asserts that elocutionary pauses in speech are syntactic, therefore elocutionary commas are syntactic. He cannot fathom how the English commentators of the 17th century could see a comma after God in Titus 2:13 (it has since been removed) and still understand the passage speaks of Christ as God, so now it's a crusade to prove comma usage then is the same as it is now to preserve an argument in Titus 2:13. My response was that commas behaved differently back then.

So, according to Mr. Avery, commas have always been syntactic and the Encyclopedia Britannica is wrong in saying they were not.

 

[Steven Avery]

What that means is commas were more frequently utilized to express a pause in speech. Many of the commas in the AV 1611 were removed by 1768 while usage was becoming more standardized. Even that edition is considered overpunctuated by modern standards. No assertion was made concerning a sudden rapid change, but that the comma usage was standardized over a long period of debate and completed, essentially, in 1906.

Have you done any checks yourself?

Very easy to compare the 1611 to the PCE (update c. 1900) Pure Cambridge Edition.
PCE is available on PDF by BibleProtector (Matthew Verschuur) and SwordsSearcher software from Brandon Staggs.

Maybe also a 1769 edition could be included.

If you have not checked yourself, your comments are essentially worthless.

========

Do you really believe there is too much punctuation in our edition today?
PCE is a good example.

Give some examples whee my PCE is errant with over-punctual=ion. I have seen none.

 

[Steven Avery]

Mr. Avery (familiar with the post 1906 rules of comma usage) asserts that elocutionary pauses in speech are syntactic, therefore elocutionary commas are syntactic. He cannot fathom how the English commentators of the 17th century could see a comma after God in Titus 2:13 (it has since been removed) and still understand the passage speaks of Christ as God, so now it's a crusade to prove comma usage then is the same as it is now to preserve an argument in Titus 2:13. My response was that commas behaved differently back then.

‘You are fabricating again.
I barely mention the 1611 comma, much less a crusade.

Try to write honestly and accurately.

 

[Steven Avery]

CARM
https://forums.carm.org/threads/trinitarian-confusion-at-romans-9-5.8316/page-19#post-656499

You have claimed that the AV is 100% accurate to the Greek text. Then you tried to claim that the commas were not really correct, because they were originally done as elocutionary, not syntactical.

So I have one simple request for you.

Translate the Greek text to English using your preferred modern syntactical commas.

Thanks!

============================

This will tell us nicely whether all your English comma claims are substantive, or phony baloney diversion .

 

[Steven Avery]

A quick comparison of numbers of commas

Romans verses -

1611

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