| 26. Linguistic Exegesis The verse opens with the coordinating conjunction kai {καὶ | kaí} linking this statement to the preceding discourse. The comparative conjunction kathos {καθὼς | kathōs} ‘just as’ introduces a protasis of comparison. The aorist verb egeneto {ἐγένετο | egéneto} ‘it happened’ presents the events of Noah’s time as a completed historical reality. This is localized by the prepositional phrase en tais hēmerais Nōe {ἐν ταῖς ἡμέραις Νῶε | en tais hēmérais Nōe} ‘in the days of Noah,’ where the dative plural hēmerais marks a temporal sphere. The demonstrative adverb houtōs {οὕτως | hoútōs} ‘thus / so’ introduces the apodosis, and the future verb estai {ἔσται | éstai} ‘it will be’ projects the comparison into the future. The second temporal phrase en tais hēmerais tou huiou tou anthrōpou {ἐν ταῖς ἡμέραις τοῦ υἱοῦ τοῦ ἀνθρώπου | en tais hēmérais tou huioû tou anthrṓpou} ‘in the days of the Son of Man’ mirrors the earlier structure, with the genitives tou huiou tou anthrōpou tightly binding “Son” and “Man” into the Christological title. The repeated en tais hēmerais construction and the comparative kathos … houtōs pattern create a balanced parallelism that underlines the typological link between Noah’s days and the eschatological days associated with the Son of Man. |