[B-Greek] William D. Mounce's Basics of Biblical Greek

Doug Hoxworth dhoxworth at charter.net
Thu Dec 4 13:25:22 EST 2003


><Thomas>
>While I can now see why Mounce and Summers have taken their respective tact I continue wonder about the differences in Cases. Since context determines whether a given form is say Genitive or Ablative, why not simply refer to such as a Genitive of Separation? (Or some
appropriate phrase). Why 8 rather than 5 cases? Which is 
"right" and which is trying to simplify the truth in order 
to make it learn-able? I'd rather have a harder time 
learning it correctly than have to retrain later because I 
learned the wrong way easily.

<doug>
actually, there are only five forms and there are a 
plethora functions (especially for the oblique cases like 
the Genitive and Dative). in my opinion, the eight case 
system is wrong (or at least woefully incomplete) simply 
because there are not only eight cases. if case is defined 
by form (only 5) rather than function (a plethora) then i 
think this simplifies it greatly and makes learning much 
more enjoyable.

all one needs to do then is learn the forms and then learn 
the function of them when getting into the text. one 
cannot possibly learn or understand the functions without 
getting their feet wet by viewing contexts. this is quite 
different from just learning the forms which one can do by 
simply memorizing the declensions (others) or memorizing 
eight noun rules (mounce) without ever having to look at 
contexts. one is form, the other is function. i find it 
best to treat them separately in a way. one is an issue of 
morphology (word formation) and the other an issue of 
syntax (word arrangement).



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