But he said, Yea
rather (μενουν), blessed are they that hear the word of God, and keep it. (Luke
11:28)
Some have tried to downplay Jesus’
response to the woman who gave high praise to his mother (v. 27). The argument is
that the particle μενουν is not always adversative (“nay, rather”) but can be
affirmative (“indeed”) and corrective (“yes, but rather”) in the sense of
agreeing with what has been said but it alone has not gone far enough.
To support such interpretations, Fitzmyer,
Thrall, and others point to Phil 3:8 and Plato, Republic, 498D. However,
both these examples do not support such an interpretation of the particle.
In Phil 3:8, we read:
More than that, I
regard everything as loss because of the surpassing value of knowing Christ
Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and I
regard them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ (NRSV)
In this verse, the particle μενουν is
coupled with the construction αλλα και ("but also"). When this combination
occurs, the meaning is "not only this, but also." However, Luke 11:28
does not use this construction, but only the bare term μενουν, so it is a false
comparison, as the normal usage of the bare term, as admitted by all parties,
is adversative. The unique meaning in Phil 3:8 is due to αλλα και, and not anything
inherent in the meaning of the particle μενουν itself.
Plato, Republic 498D reads as
follows in the (Classical, not Koine) Greek:
φίλους γεγονότας, οὐδὲ
πρὸ τοῦ ἐχθροὺς ὄντας. πείρας γὰρ οὐδὲν ἀνήσομεν, ἕως ἂν ἢ πείσωμεν καὶ τοῦτον
καὶ τοὺς ἄλλους, ἢ προὔργου τι ποιήσωμεν εἰς ἐκεῖνον τὸν βίον, ὅταν αὖθις
γενόμενοι τοῖς τοιούτοις ἐντύχωσι λόγοις.
εἰς μικρόν γʼ, ἔφη,
χρόνον εἴρηκας.
εἰς οὐδὲν μὲν οὖν,
ἔφην, ὥς γε πρὸς τὸν ἅπαντα. τὸ μέντοι μὴ πείθεσθαι τοῖς λεγομένοις τοὺς πολλοὺς
θαῦμα οὐδέν· ουʼ γὰρ πώποτε εἶδον γενόμενον τὸ νῦν λεγόμενον,
who have just become
friends and were not enemies before either. For we will spare no effort until
we either convince him and the rest or achieve something that will profit them
when they come to that life in which they will be born gain and meet with such
discussions as these.” “A brief time your forecast contemplates,” he said.
“Nay, nothing at all,” I replied, “as compared with eternity. However, the
unwillingness of the multitude to believe what you say is nothing surprising.
For of the thing here spoken they have never beheld a token, (Plato, Plato in
Twelve Volumes & 6 Translated by Paul Shorey [vol. 5; Medford, MA:
Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd., 1969])
As Eric Svendsen noted:
In this passage,
Socrates is debating with a Sophist who mockingly comments on the amount of
time it will take Socrates to convince Thrasymachus of his concept of how government
should be structured: “A brief time, your forecast contemplates.” Socrates
answers, “Nay [μεν ουν], nothing at all [εις ουδεν], as compared with
eternity [ως γε προς τον απαντα].” Though she does not explicate, Thrall apparently sees in the phrase “as
compared with eternity” justification for her understanding of μεν ουν as “what
you have said is true as far as it goes, but . . . “ . . . However, this is to misunderstand
Plato’s intent. Socrates does not mean to agree that his opponent is correct in
his understanding “as far as it goes”; rather he means to convey his opponent’s
entire perception is faulty because it is measured by the wrong standard.
Socrates’ opponent measures the time it will take Socrates to persuade his
friend in terms of the usual amount of time such an activity takes.
Socrates rejects that measurement altogether and compares it instead with
eternity. This is just what Jesus seems to do in Luke 11:28; he rejects the
woman’s praise of Mary altogether because it is based on the faulty perception
that being biologically related to Jesus entails a state of blessedness. Hence,
both Plato and Luke use the word μενουν in the same adversative sense that it is
used everywhere in the NT, with the exception of Phil 3:8 [discussed above]. (Eric
D. Svendsen, Who is My Mother? The Role and Status of the Mother of Jesus in
the New Testament and Roman Catholicism [Amityville, N.Y.: Calvary Press,
2001], 155-56)
In an endnote, Svendsen noted the
following:
Thrall’s observation
that when Luke wants to express contradiction he uses ουχι, λεγω υμιν, αλλ’ (as in
12:51; 13:2μεν ουν-5) does not account for every instance. In Luke 7:24-25, Jesus asks his
hearers about John the Baptist: “what did you go out to see? “To the first
suggestion (“A reed swayed by the wind”) he answers αλλα. To the second
suggestion (“A man dressed in fine clothes?) he answers ιδου (lit., “behold”).
Both answers are intended to convey contradiction: “On the contrary, those who wear
expensive clothes and indulge in luxury are in palaces.” Luke’s use of μενουν in 11:28, therefore,
it best accounted for by stylistic variation rather than a difference in
meaning. (Ibid., 310-11 n. 142)
In this light, Luke 11:28 remains strong
biblical evidence against Marian devotion, something which is said to be
“intrinsic to Christian worship” (CCC § 971).
Further Reading
