[Praxeas]

Originally Posted by Iron_Bladder

B]“And his gifts were that some should be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers,” (Ephesians 4:11, RSV).

kai autov edwken touv men apostolouv touv de profhtav touv de euaggelistav touv de poimenav kai didaskalouv[/b]


Bruce has claimed that Ephesians 4:11 teaches a five-fold ministry of offices within the Church. However, only four Church offices are actually mentioned here, each of which are written in the predicate accusative and are distinguished in the original Greek from the other three offices by the prepositions ‘tous men’ or ‘tous de,’ which are both translated as ‘some.’

So the final Church office which this verse lists is the combined office of ‘pastor and teacher,’ as proven by the single use of the word ‘some’ (tous de) which precedes both ‘pastor’ and teacher. This word ‘teacher’ is used again at 1st Corinthians 12:28, where it’s specifically stated as being the third office after firstly the office of apostle and secondly the prophet. Now the fact that the title of pastor is omitted from this list, shouldn’t be taken literally as implying that the teacher is more important than the pastor, for the ‘teacher’ implies the office of ‘pastor’ Bruce.

How does the single use of tous de PROVE that?