What is "KURIAKOS"?

Cindy Smith cms at dragon.com
Fri Mar 31 11:22:15 EST 2000


>From:	MX%"mauros at iol.ie"  "Maurice A. O'Sullivan" 21-MAY-1999 18:23:10.10
>To:	MX%"b-greek at franklin.oit.unc.edu"
>Subj:	Re: What is "KURIAKOS"?

>From: "Maurice A. O'Sullivan" <mauros at iol.ie>
>Subject: Re: What is "KURIAKOS"?
>Reply-To: "Maurice A. O'Sullivan" <mauros at iol.ie>

>At 17:51 21/05/99 -0400, you wrote:
>>Dear B-Greekers,

>>Recently I had a friend of mine tell me that our English word "church" came
>>from KURIAKOS. I looked it up in Perschbachers, and he has it translated as
>>"pertaining to the Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord's". So I suppose that
>>certainly makes sense, in that the church is the Lord's. But do we use the
>>word "church" because of KURIAKOS? (He also said "church" is related to the
>>German word, but I don't remember it.) I'd just never heard this before.

>The etymology from the Shorter Oxford may help:

> CHURCH
>OE cir(i)ce, cyr(i)ce = OFris. szereke, szurka, tzierka, OS kirika, kerika
>(Du. kerk), OHG chirihha, kiricha (G Kirche), f. WGmc f. med.Gk kurikon for
>kuriakon use as n. (sc. doma house) of neut. of kuriakos pertaining to the
>Lord, f. kurios master, lord. C   <<<

>By way of explanation, >>f. WGmc f. med.Gk << refers to WestGermanic and
>medieval Greek.

>And if you want to read a masterful survey of the entire history of Greek,
>and especially the progress from classical to medieval and beyond, I
>recommend :
>Geoffrey Horrocks, Greek: a History of the Language and its Speakers
>(Longman, 1997(

I think it should be noted that the Greek word ekklesia simply means a 
gathering of people and, while traditionally translated "church" or 
"belonging to the Lord," is sometimes more accurately translated 
"assembly."  I had a friend who was Dutch who once told me that 
Kuriakos means "Sunday" in Dutch, presumably meaning "the Lord's Day." 
I believe and welcome correction that SUNAGWGH synagogue is a synonym 
for EKKLESIA.

>Hope this helps
>Maurice

>Maurice A. O'Sullivan  [ Bray, Ireland ]
>mauros at iol.ie


Cindy Smith				   Spawn of a Jewish Carpenter
GO AGAINST THE FLOW! \\ _\\\_     _///_ // A Real Live Catholic in Georgia
cms at dragon.com       >IXOYE=('> <`)=  _<<  "Delay not your conversion  
cms at romancatholic.org//  ///       \\\  \\   to the LORD, Put it not off 
cms at 5sc.net				     from day to day" Ecclus/Sira 5:8



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