Book Review/Synopsis: Voice and Mood: A Linguistic Approach, by David L. Mathewson

Essentials of Biblical Greek Grammar, Stanley E. Porter, Series Ed.; Baker Academic, 2021, 191 pages.

David L. Mathewson’s Voice and Mood: A Linguistic Approach inaugurates a new series on Biblical Greek Grammar. Mathewson (with Elodie Ballantine Emig) previously co-authored Intermediate Greek Grammar: Syntax for Students of the New Testament (Baker Academic, 2016), and this new volume both expands on and sharpens the related material from that earlier work. As one would expect by its subtitle, Voice and Mood provides a linguistic framework within which to systematically exegete.

After a brief introduction, Voice and Mood divides into two sections, one per subject. The first is Voice, which begins with a brief survey of recent intermediate-level grammars (S. Porter, K. L. McKay, D. Wallace, D. A. Black, Mathewson/Emig, Köstenberger/Merkle/Plummer) and other recent works discussing voice. The author then reveals his approach using New Testament (NT) examples.

Mathewson grounds his methodologies in adaptations of M. A. K. Halliday’s Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL). Among other things, SFL posits that when a choice is made between available options—e.g., passive voice over against middle or active—a meaningful distinction is indicated (p 26). For the author, “SFL has proven a powerful descriptive model for interpreting…the New Testament” (p 25).

Voice is conceptualized through the lens of causality and agency/medium. In the active voice the subject functions as agent. In the passive and middle voices the subject functions as medium. Thus, the active indicates direct causality, the passive indirect–external causality, the middle indirect–internal causality (p 36). Similar to the method Stanley Porter applies to aspect (see Porter’s VAGNT, p 90), Mathewson views direct causality—morphologically conveyed in the active voice—as the default in a choice between the three causality types. The author illustratively (fig. 2.2, p 38) pairs direct causality with indirect causality as the first option, signified as +Active (direct causality) or –Active (indirect causality). The latter must then be further subdivided as a choice between +Passive (external causality/external agent) or +Middle (internal causality).

Choosing passive or middle over against the default active voice should be seen as exegetically significant, with the middle the weightiest. Yet one must bear in mind the special case of so-called deponent verbs, which lack active forms (e.g., –ομαι endings). Mathewson believes (as others) these should be better termed “middle-only verbs” (pp 70-72). Extrapolating from this, these middles should not be deemed as possessing the same weight as middles within the typical three-voice trinary.

In some contexts, middle-voiced verbs are transitive; that is, there are accusatives following. These accusatives should not be understood as “direct objects” (the “goal” in active contexts) but as the Range, functioning to further define the verbal action or process (pp 65–66).

Mathewson’s approach provides a more precise and internally consistent explanation for the middle voice compared to other works. In short, when viewed through the lens of causality and agency/medium, the three voices can be individuated by the characteristics each expresses—and, correspondingly, does not express—relative to the others.

As with Voice, the section on Mood (Modality) begins by surveying related material. Also like Voice above, Mathewson adapts Halliday’s SFL English modal system. But the Biblical Greek Modal system is necessarily more complex than Voice, given the larger number of and the myriad pragmatic functions for the moods.

Mood is defined as the speaker’s attitudinal, subjective portrayal of the verbal action or process relative to reality (pp 87, 89, 170–171). This portrayal may or may not reflect objective reality or factuality. This is so even in the indicative (which could be expressing the speaker’s misunderstanding, hyperbole, sarcasm, etc.).

Mathewson conceives the Greek Modal system as comprised of either assertive (indicative) or non-assertive (imperative, subjunctive, optative) moods. Similar to Voice, Mood is illustrated (fig. 5.1, p 96) as a choice between Assertion and Nonassertion, with Assertion (indicative) being the default. Nonassertion must be further delineated as a choice between Direction (imperative) or Projection, the latter even further subdivided between –Contingency (subjunctive) or +Contingency (optative). The author suggests this added feature of contingency in the optative might be seen as a sort of parallel to the two imperfective aspects—found in the present and imperfect tense-forms—in that the imperfect adds +remoteness (p 96, nt 3).

Thus, when the Biblical author has chosen any of the non-assertive moods over against the assertive, this should be understood as exegetically significant. And, for example, when the optative is chosen over the subjunctive, “prominence” is indicated (p 121).

It is not sufficient to merely determine voice and mood in isolation. One must consider these as choices over other available options. If a non-default voice (i.e., passive or middle) and/or a non-default mood (i.e., imperative, subjunctive, or optative) is found, the exegete should view this as significant. Within this schema the reader should search for broader patterns. For example, Mathewson notes the significance of Paul’s use of the indicative mood throughout chapters 1—3 of Ephesians as compared to the many imperatives in chapters 4—6. The imperatives build upon the foundation fashioned by the earlier indicatives (p 130).

The future tense-form, which has traditionally proved difficult to categorize, is understood by Mathewson as a quasi-mood. Following Porter, Mathewson views the future as indicating an expectation of fulfillment (p 132). Its form and semantics similar to the subjunctive, the future is sometimes even found where one might expect the subjunctive (e.g., ἵνα clauses). In such usages, the future should be considered “the more semantically weighty form with its feature of expectation” (p 132).

Mathewson suggests how the future might fit within the Modal system—between the assertive and non-assertive moods (chart p 132). Thus, after the Indicative (Assertion) would be the Future (Expectation of fulfillment), followed by the Subjunctive (Projection: no expectation of fulfillment), Optative (Projection: contingent expectation of fulfillment), and Imperative (Direction).

Participles and infinitives (nonfinite verbal forms) are also considered, in conjunction with the mood expressed by corresponding finite verbs (see fig. 6.1, p 139). Participles presuppose the author’s commitment to the subjective reality (which, again, is not necessarily objectively true) portrayed by the control/main verb (p 138). Infinitives do not; that is, “the infinitive merely states the verbal idea” (p 139; emphasis added). The author provides a number of NT examples of each.

I strongly recommend this book. In fact, my goal is to incorporate Mathewson’s approach. While the work necessarily uses some new jargon and some intermediate-level concepts, the writing is suitably accessible for the motivated student. The author illustrates via NT examples as he goes. One might wish he sometimes provided more, but I’d think interested students would be sufficiently inclined to seek out more examples on their own.

Worth the price of the book is Mathewson’s explanation of what is signified by the middle voice of γλῶσσαι, παύσονται (glōssai, pausontai, “tongues, they will cease”) in 1 Cor. 13:8—and, more importantly in my estimation, is not signified (p 68).