Question
Hi Dennis,
I’m wondering why ἐλέγετε is imperfect here? Is Imperfect + av a formula?
Luke 17:6 (NA27 with Mounce-Koivisto Morphology)
εἶπεν δὲ ὁ κύριος· εἰ ἔχετε πίστιν ὡς κόκκον σινάπεως, ἐλέγετε ἂν τῇ συκαμίνῳ [ταύτῃ]· ἐκριζώθητι καὶ φυτεύθητι ἐν τῇ θαλάσσῃ· καὶ ὑπήκουσεν ἂν ὑμῖν.
Response
You spotted an unusual tense pair in a contrary to fact construction. Good spotting. It might be a unique construction in the GNT (I don’t find any others in the 1/3 of the Greek New Testament (GNT) I have coded).
ἂν as a contrary to fact particle in the main clause always goes with past tense.
Normally the conditional and main verb are both past indicative tenses (If you had had, then you would have had). However, the conditional here in this instance is an unusual present (If you have, although the story makes it plain that they don’t have faith. So it is actually contrary to fact). So with this unusual present contrary to fact conditional, I don’t think the speaker had any choice to put the main clause in imperfect, the closest past tense to present. It is probably very good Greek and belies the popular notion that the GNT is rough.