The so-called passivum divinum in the New Testament

The article deals with those places in the New Testament where God's acting is expressed by means of a passive verb form without mentioning God explicitly. The author considers the usage of the term passivum divinum as useful. However, two conditions are to be met. The respective verb form in the concrete utterance should have a clear passive meaning and the context should unequivocally point to God as the only agent. The first condition cannot be met by the verb form alone because e.g .the aorist (and future) forms with the formant &qh& are not always clearly passive. This is demonstrated especially in Mt 1.16 where the form evgennh,qh itself is often regarded as a passivum divinum whereas the author of the article contends that here this verb form only expresses the fact that Jesus "was born", i.e. that he "came into the world".

Keywords: New Testament Greek; passive voice; passivum divinum