Mark 9:11 and 28, Interrogative Direct Discourse and Apparent Textus Receptus Editing Error

Mark 9:11 makes λέγουσιν an interrogative clause, with a question mark according to all the editions except the Patriarchal. The clause has ὅτι and is controlled by the participle λέγων which depends on the interrogative verb ἐπερωτάω. This analysis will show that this editing indicates an interrogative direct discourse subordinator clause but there is not even an interrogative subordinator clause of any kind in Greek.

A. A Declarative Interpretation?

Theoretically the sentence could be indirect declarative discourse “And they inquired of him saying that the scribes say that Elijah must come first.” This interpretation would have the advantage of preserving the usual meaning of ὅτι as an indirect speech complementizer that, but it would still confirm that the TR question mark is wrong.

This interpretation is not compatible with the question mark, and, even though this looks like a possible translation of the Patriarchal text, the Patriarchal text also takes it as a question in spite of the period. First, the accompanying modern Greek translation has a why and a question mark. Second, the comma after λέγοντες is the Patriarchal way of punctuating the start of a direct quote as opposed to indirect discourse. So all editors and most translators agree that this is a question that the disciples ask, not a declarative statement.

B. The Question

The question is why the Textus Receptus (TR) (and the Byz 2005, which generally follows the TR punctuation and capitalization) leave ὅτι lower case and Λέγουσιν upper, as if ὅτι were a subordinator on an interrogative direct discourse on a subordinate clause instead of being an interrogative word in a direct quote. The short answer is that it appears to be a TR punctuation error.  There are many main-clause questions that contain ὅτι on some subordinate clause, but not on the main clause of the question, because main clauses do not have a subordinator by definition. The only time ὅτι may appear in the main clause is when it is not a subordinator.

The same error occurs again in the TR in verse 28 

Mark 9:28

καὶ εἰσελθόντα αὐτὸν εἰς οἶκον, 

οἱ μαθηταὶ αὐτοῦ ἐπηρώτων αὐτὸν κατ’ ἰδίαν 

ὅτι Ἡμεῖς οὐκ ἠδυνήθημεν ἐκβαλεῖν αὐτό;

And when he came into the house,

his disciples asked him privately

“Why couldn’t we cast it out?”

The lower case complementizer ὅτι is followed by the upper case Ἡμεῖς ending in an incompatible question mark.

C. Types of Dependent Discourse

Λέγω and ἐπερωτάω are discourse-control verbs. There are 96 discourse-control verbs for communication and perception, almost a quarter of verb occurrences. There are three kinds of dependent discourse: (1) direct main discourse (58%), (2) indirect subordinate clause discourse (31%) and (3) indirect infinitival discourse (11%).

D. Subordinator Clause Direct Discourse is Not Interrogative

Direct discourse (DD) are mostly main clauses, but a few are fragments or subordinator clauses (a non-English construction), but none of these is interrogative. The probable reason that Scrivener made this ὅτι lower-case error is from the analogy of declarative DD subordinator clauses that have ὅτι as a subordinator.

An example of this non-English construction is Mark 2:12b

καὶ δοξάζειν τὸν Θεὸν λέγοντας ὅτι Οὕτως οὐδέποτε εἴδαμεν

and they glorified God saying “We have never seen such a thing.” 

Notice that this direct discourse subordinate clause is declarative. 

We know that this is direct discourse in spite of the subordinator because ἠδυνήθημεν is second person instead of the indirect third person. There are about 100 such constructions in the GNT, but they are not interrogative. Notice also that these properly punctuated declarative verses look like Mark 9:11 and 28 except for the question mark. The ὅτι is not translated. This declarative similarity suggests the origin of the TR editing error on the interrogative verses.

E. Not Interrogative Indirect Discourse

About 6% of discourse is indirect interrogative, which always contains an interrogative marker like τί. “He asked why you came” is indirect discourse; “He asked, ‘Why did you come?’” is direct discourse. Direct discourse is main with a question mark and quotes, but indirect discourse is subordinate with no question mark or quotes. Mark 9:11 is not indirect interrogative because ὅτι is not an interrogative subordinator, and because there is a question mark.

F. Interrogative Direct Discourse

About 14% of sentences are interrogative. About 8% of main clauses are interrogative. About 11% of discourse is interrogative. All interrogative DD is main-clause except one interrogative fragment. About 60% of questions are independent and about 40% are DD. From this we conclude, because of the question mark, that Mark 9:11 must be a main direct-discourse clause in spite of the question about ὅτι.

No interrogative discourse is indirect relative or subordinator clause or direct subordinator clause. Mark 9:11 is not a direct subordinator clause, even though ὅτι is usually a subordinator, because no direct subordinator clause is interrogative. 

G. Interrogative Words

I have coded 181 DD questions. About 78% of discourse questions have interrogative words, and the other 22% are semantically interrogative by the verb. There are 26 interrogative words that are always interrogative, plus 12 others including ὅτι that are sometimes interrogative. Usually, the interrogative verb leads, as in English. 

H. ὅτι is an Interrogative Word in Mark 9:11, not a Conjunction

Ὅτι is normally a subordinator (and occasionally a main conjunction), but neither of these grammatical relations fits in Mark 9:11 or 28, so these verses are exceptional. Could this be an exceptional interrogative DD subordinator clause, as the TR punctuation implies?   

The answer is no, it is impossible. The only way to make an interrogative clause is with an interrogative word word like τί or with the subject-verb inversion (in English). If ὅτι is a subordinator, there is no interrogative word. And semantically the question is not “Do the scribes say that Elijah must come?” That is probably not what the disciples are asking because they already know that. 

A few translators translate the sentence as declarative, but they are doing their own editing and not following the texts. They confirm that the TR question mark is incompatible with the TR lower case ὅτι. The NU version of Mark 2:16 also uses ὅτι as interrogative why in a DD interrogative clause. The 3 instances of ὅτι as why are all in Mark. If the why idea does not come from ὅτι, there is nowhere else for it to come from.  Clearly this Markian compound ὅτι is used as a variant of the component τί.

I. The Proper and Improper Way to Make ὅτι an Interrogative Word in the Text

So if ὅτι means why and is part of the disciples question as translated by KJV, the TR/Byz 2005 edition should have capitalized ὅτι  as the NU edition does. The UBS does not ever have ὅτι followed by upper case unless the lemma is upper case, but such capitalization is common in the TR, as for example in Mark 1:27, 1:40, 2:12, 3:11, 9:23 14:72, but not with interrogative.

The TR/Byz 2005 punctuation appears to be a mistake because it fails to include ὅτι in DD. It mistakenly suggests that the disciples’ DD question did not start with ὅτι, which is a form word in TR rather than part of the quote. The Patriarchal text (also Byzantine) makes the DD quote start with ὅτι, as the NU does and all the translations do, by putting a comma before ὅτι (its punctuation for the quote mark), although the Patriarchal text does not capitalize the DD the way NU and TR do. This shows that the TR editing is not necessary for the Byzantine text, and that the Byzantine text with the KJV meaning should be punctuated like the NU (or Patriarchal), not as TR. TR and KJV are incompatible here.

J. Summary of the main facts that lead to the conclusion that the TR editing is mistaken:

1. Question marks appear only on main interrogative clauses that are independent or DD. Main clauses may not have subordinators. Clauses with subordinators are subordinate, not main. Question marks on subordinate clauses are impossible. Subordinate clauses never have question marks. There are no examples of subordinate clauses with question marks in any sentences in any editions except these two sentence in TR.

2. The TR capitalization of Λέγουσιν indicates that that word starts the direct quote and that ὅτι before it is not part of the quote but a complementizer on the interrogative subordinate clause with a question mark, which is an impossibility.

3. Interrogative words are markers that start the interrogative clause. The semantics of the sentence require an interrogative why word, but the TR editing mistakenly makes the only why candidate a complementizer rather than interrogative. The KJV and TR are incompatible here.

K. The tale of the two false editorial consistencies

Historically the TR preceded the NU (and the Byz 2005 and the Patriarchal). The NU and Patriarchal editions follow some of Scrivener’s conventions and depart from others. All these editions strove to achieve editorial consistency in punctuation and capitalization. An editorial problem is that there are many potential standards of consistency; sometimes they conflict with each other, and the editor may not impose the best one over the less important one. In fact, this happened to both the TR and the NU.

The goal of the TR was to make the first word of the direct discourse upper case in place of the modern start quote. This is a good goal because it helps the reader distinguish between the direct and indirect discourse, so that the reader will know whether it is a quote in the original speaker’s own words, or an indirect repetition in the writer’s words. 

The test cases are the exceptional direct discourse in subordinator clauses, especially with the complementizer ὅτι, which is strictly not a grammatical English construction. Scrivener followed a useful, consistent rule that every DD, whether main or subordinator clause, was upper case. We see this rule applied in Mark 1:27, 1:40, 2:12, 3:11, 9:11, 9:23 14:72. There are probably about 100 such non-English DD in the GNT.

L. The TR False Consistency

The error in 9:11 and 28 was that the upper case went on the wrong initial word of the quote. The false consistency rule trap that Scrivener fell into (because there were only two exceptions) was that every DD that started with ὅτι should have ὅτι lower case and the next word upper. This was consistent, but it was a false consistency because it conflicted with his first-word rule when the DD had an explicit question mark (only one such exception). In that case the ὅτι is part of the quote and should be upper case, contrary to the general pattern. The consistent lower-upper rule is a false consistency rule.

M. The NU False Consistency

Generally the NU tried to follow the NU rule that DD should be capitalized. They did so for the 95% of DD that are main clause. However, inconsistently, they abandoned the upper case DD principle in the 100 declarative subordinate clause DD. They chose two inferior consistency rules instead. First, they made the main DD have the first word capitalized, but the subordinate DD did not have capitalization, so that the reader is left confused as to whether these are DD or indirect discourse. 

Second, they made all subordinator clauses lack the upper case whether they are DD or indirect discourse. These two NU editorial principles both achieve consistency, but it is an inferior consistency that leaves the reader the poorer. It is likewise hard to admire the Patriarchal editorial principal of using the comma for the start quote because the comma already has so many other uses. Putting the period instead of the question mark on questions only adds to the confusion rather than resolving it.

—Dennis Kenaga, March 2020