[B-Greek] NT Greek Paedogogy redux
Bert de Haan
b_dehaan at sympatico.ca
Fri Aug 10 21:42:08 EDT 2007
I am one of the small Greeks of this list and maybe not qualified to say
much on this topic. I would like to make one comment: There have been
quite a few times when I knew the answer to questions asked on this forum
only because I have spent some time with Homeric Greek. My guess is that
studying Attic Greek would have an even greater benefit.
Bert de Haan.
==================
jmlineb at comcast.net (John M. Linebarger) wrote
>
>I'm following the discussion of NT Greek paedogogy with great interest but
>with an increasing sense of frustration. In a theoretical sense I can
>understand that learning Attic Greek provides a good foundation for reading
>the simpler Koine Greek of the New Testament. I can also understand the
>approach that inhales large amounts of text at one sitting, and attempts to
>induce meaning from context instead of looking up everything in a
>dictionary. After all, that's how many of us learned to read our first
>language.
>
>But surely this can be done within the New Testament itself to some degree,
>without having to take a 1-2 year detour to learn Attic Greek? Many of us
>barely have the time to maintain our Koine Greek, much less the much richer
>and more difficult world of Attic Greek. And speaking from experience, it
>is hard enough to convince a church Sunday School class to devote at least
>an hour a day to learning Koine Greek; if I were to suggest learning Attic
>Greek first, I'd have nobody left in my class. They (and me too) want to
>get into the New Testament as quickly as possible, and desire to devote
>their energies to the study of God's word.
>
>So within the corpus of the New Testament itself, how would you sculpt a
>paedogogy that achieves the goals of Greek fluency? Focus one's study
>efforts on Luke-Acts and Hebrews and one's devotional efforts on the
>Johannine corpus and Revelation, with the middle area being the epistles of
>Paul? Inhale large chunks of the other Synoptic gospels (Mark and Matthew)
>on a daily basis to develop and maintain reading proficiency?
>
>You see where I'm going with this -- how does one achieve (or approach)
>proficiency within the confines of the NT corpus itself? Any thoughts from
>the group?
>
>Thanks! Enjoy!
>
>John M. Linebarger
>Albuquerque, New Mexico
>
>------------------------------
>
>Message: 3
>Date: Fri, 10 Aug 2007 08:15:28 -0700 (PDT)
>From: "Eric S. Weiss" <papaweiss1 at yahoo.com>
>Subject: [B-Greek] NT Greek Paedogogy redux
>To: b-greek <b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org>
>Message-ID: <670154.18751.qm at web61011.mail.yahoo.com>
>Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1
>
> > I'm following the discussion of NT Greek paedogogy with great interest
>but with an
> > increasing sense of frustration. In a theoretical sense I can
>understand that learning Attic
> > Greek provides a good foundation for reading the simpler Koine Greek
>of the New
> > Testament. I can also understand the approach that inhales large
>amounts of text at one
> > sitting, and attempts to induce meaning from context instead of
>looking up everything in a
> > dictionary. After all, that's how many of us learned to read our
>first language.
> >
> > But surely this can be done within the New Testament itself to some
>degree, without
> > having to take a 1-2 year detour to learn Attic Greek? Many of us
>barely have the time to
> > maintain our Koine Greek, much less the much richer and more difficult
>world of Attic
> > Greek. And speaking from experience, it is hard enough to convince a
>church Sunday
> > School class to devote at least an hour a day to learning Koine Greek;
>if I were to suggest
> > learning Attic Greek first, I'd have nobody left in my class. They
>(and me too) want to get
> > into the New Testament as quickly as possible, and desire to devote
>their energies to the
> > study of God's word.
> >
> > So within the corpus of the New Testament itself, how would you sculpt
>a paedogogy that
> > achieves the goals of Greek fluency? Focus one's study efforts on
>Luke-Acts and
> > Hebrews and one's devotional efforts on the Johannine corpus and
>Revelation, with the
> > middle area being the epistles of Paul? Inhale large chunks of the
>other Synoptic gospels
> > (Mark and Matthew) on a daily basis to develop and maintain reading
>proficiency?
> >
> > You see where I'm going with this -- how does one achieve (or
>approach) proficiency within
> > the confines of the NT corpus itself? Any thoughts from the group?
> >
> > Thanks! Enjoy!
> > John M. Linebarger
> > Albuquerque, New Mexico
>
> Hi, John. You probably won't like my answer, and I don't like it,
>either. I took a couple years
> of NT Greek and have taught it off and on at church(es) over the past 10
>years or so. In fact,
> I'm currently teaching a small class, using Croy's A PRIMER OF BIBLICAL
>GREEK (and
> have already experienced the usual 40% or so dropout rate - even if you
>just teach NT
> Greek, a lot of students will quit). But I am seeing that I don't know
>Greek, even though I
> know NT Greek better than all the pastors I've had, and better than most
>of the Dallas
> Theological Seminary students and grads I went to church with for a
>period of several years.
>
> Every time I start reading an Attic Greek textbook, I realize and learn
>things about Greek
> that I wasn't taught or didn't learn from my NT Greek textbooks. This
>time I hope I maintain
> the effort and will to complete a 1st-year Attic course (I am not good
>at self-study, but it's
> my only option). I have decided that this is the last time I will teach
>a NT Greek class,
> though. I don't think it's right to teach people simply NT Greek without
>starting with Attic
> Greek, both because of everything I've read here at B-Greek, and because
>of the little bit I've
> experienced myself.
>
> Sure, someone who takes a NT Greek class will likely make fewer Greek
>errors from the
> pulpit or in their studies than your typical pastor/teacher armed with
>e-sword and Vine's and
> Strong's Concordance. But I am no longer sure that someone who only
>knows NT Greek is
> adequately prepared to read the Greek NT. Maybe I'm just being
>pessimistic.
>
> FWIW, I learned a marvelous principle about accents in Mastronarde's
>INTRODUCTION TO
> ATTIC GREEK that I had never heard or read in any of my many NT Greek
>grammars.
> Maybe it only applies to Attic Greek (Mastronarde and/or Carson say that
>the accent rules
> changed a bit for Koine, but I don't know how much).
>
> From Unit Two, Section 4, p. 17 of Introduction to Attic Greek, by
>Donald J. Mastronarde:
>
> CONTONATION AND MORA. The apparently complex "rules" of Greek
>accentuation can be
> understood in terms of a single general principle involving the concepts
>of contonation and
> mora. CONTONATION is the combination of the rise of pitch generally
>thought of as the
> accent with the necessary return or fall to standard pitch which follows
>it. In the case of an
> acute accent, the contonation includes both the syllable on which the
>accent is written (and
> on which the pitch rises) and the entire following syllable (on which
>the pitch falls), if any,
> whether it counts as long or short. In the case of the circumflex
>accent, the contonation
> occurs on the one syllable on which the accent is written, for there are
>both a rise in pitch
> and a return to standard pitch on that syllable. A MORA is the
>(theoretically assigned)
> "standard" length of a short vowel (A, E, I, O, U, and final AI and OI
>in most cases). A long
> vowel (A, EI, H, I, OU, W, U) or a diphthong* (except for final AI and
>OI in most cases)
> occupies (theoretically) a time span equivalent to two morai.
>
>The general principle of Greek accentuation is that the contonation may be
>followed by no
> more than one mora before the end of a word (or phrase pronounced as one
>word unit). This
> principle is in many respects similar to rules in other languages (e.g.,
>Latin) which constrain
> the position of the accent according to the nature of the final
>syllables of a word. In Greek
> this principle limits the position of the acute and circumflex accents
>and requires the
> addition of an extra accent in some phrases consisting of word +
>enclitic.
>
>My additional comments:
>
>* So-called "improper" or "long" diphthongs (A, H, and W with subscripted
>I) are also always
> long. I am not sure why Mastronarde omits mention of AU, EU, and HU.
>
>By convention there are a couple exceptions to this principle when it comes
>to the enclitics
> ESTI(N) and TIS/TI:
> 1) ESTI(N) following a word with a circumflex on the ultima is not
>accented; one would
> normally expect an acute on the ultima of ESTI(N); and
> 2) TINWN (the genitive plural) following a word with an acute on the
>penult has a circumflex
> accent on its ultima; normally a disyllabic enclitic following such a
>word receives an acute
> accent on its second syllable.
>
>
> Eric S. Weiss
>
>
>
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