[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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