A Corpus Linguistic Verb Analysis of the Pauline Letters: The Contribution of Verb Patterns to Pauline Letter Structure

Abstract

This dissertation addresses the question of whether the empirical data gathered from an analysis of verb categories within the primary clauses of the Pauline corpus reveals letter structure. It begins with a discussion of the classification and structuring of the ancient Greek letter, with focus on the New Testament Jetter tradition. It shows that no real consensus has been reached concerning the classification and structure of ancient letters, especially the New Testament letters. This lack of consensus serves as the impetus for attempting a different approach for the description of Pauline letter structure. After providing a brief description and history of corpus linguistics and its application to New Testament studies, a corpus linguistic application similar to one presented by Douglas Biber is suggested to analyze the verb patterns within the Pauline letter corpus. This is accomplished by analyzing and describing the patterns revealed in each of the letters of the Pauline corpus and then comparing them with attempts made within Greek texts, Bible translations, and commentaries at structuring the letters. This analysis not only reveals verbal patterns but also discovers other key features found within the primary clauses that seem to contribute to the structure of the letters, such as conjunctions, formulaic verbs, and vocatives/nominatives of address. The combination of the verb patterns and the occurrence of these features leads to the presentation of structural outlines for each of the letters within the Pauline corpus according to a five-part (letter opening; thanksgiving; body; parenesis; and letter closing) letter structure. With these structural parts established, the verb occurrences within each part are counted to test whether the verbal categories of mood, person-number, and aspect contribute to the structuring of the Pauline letter. The tracking of these occurrences reveals a statistically significant shift between the body and parenetic section of the letters. This further validates the assumption that verb patterns contribute to the structuring of Paul's letters.