Biblical Hebrew Forum

[dwashbur AT nyx.net]

I would think that the Greek of the Oxyrhynchus papyri make it clear that 
this Koine was not 
a localized phenomenon.

On 14 Apr 2007 at 15:54, Yohanan bin-Dawidh wrote:

> Peter,
> 
> I am not actually a speaker of Koine Greek, and admit that what I am stating
> could be complete nonsense per se, for it is information that I have come
> across over the years reading articles posted to JSTOR by various professed
> scholars.
> 
> Yohanan bin-Dawidh
> 
> P.S. Since I cannot verify my knowledge on this subject, since I truly do
> not speak the language I will cease to be a part of the discussion on this
> dialect of the Greek language.
> 
> 
> On 4/14/07, Peter Kirk <peter AT qaya.org> wrote:
> >
> > On 14/04/2007 21:22, Yohanan bin-Dawidh wrote:
> > > Dear Harold,
> > >
> > > Note that this cited text from Wikipedia refers to Koine Greek as
> > > Alexandrian, Hellenistic, Common or New Testament, and states that it is
> > the
> > > Greek dialect that arose within the Meditteranean, i.e. mainly Semitic
> > > lands, where Semitic language was spoken, and thus a dialect of
> > > Greek/Semitic language arose. This reminds of the perversions of Yiddish
> > and
> > > Ladino that my people speak, which are dialects of Hebrew mixed with
> > other
> > > languages.  It is likewise reported that Koine while taking from Semitic
> > > languages also carries Latin variants within. Basically, it is trash
> > talk,
> > > as testified to by those who spokeAttic Greek.
> > >
> > >
> > Yohanan, do you actually know any Koine Greek? Can you read it? Do you
> > know what proportion of Semitic, or Latin, words are found in typical
> > texts? Do you really have any evidence to suggest that it is a mixed
> > language of the time you claim? It was indeed a mixture of Greek
> > dialects, but not of Greek and Semitic, except for a rather small number
> > of Semitic loan words. Yes, the intellectual snobs who still tried to
> > speak Attic, rather like some people today who claim to speak
> > Shakespearean English but don't, looked down on the common people who
> > spoke a less literary dialect.
> >
> > --
> > Peter Kirk
> > E-mail:  peter AT qaya.org
> > Blog:    http://www.qaya.org/blog/
> > Website: http://www.qaya.org/
> >
> >
> _______________________________________________
> b-hebrew mailing list
> b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
> http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/b-hebrew
> 


Dave Washburn
But I can't say Sylvester, George!