[B-Greek] Re: VERBS: defining "regular" and "irregular"
Perry L. Stepp
plstepp at kcu.edu
Fri Mar 4 09:49:45 EST 2005
As Dr. Conrad and I concluded in an offlist discussion yesterday, one of the
problems with "regular" and "irregular" verbs is that there is no set
definition of "regular and "irregular."
Here is the text of the whole exchange. Toward the end, I suggest two
possible definitions of "regular." Perhaps those suggestions might be food
for discussion? Also: twice in the discussion I refer to Dr. Conrad's list
of irregular Greek verbs, which can be found at
http://ioa.com/~cwconrad/Docs/IrregularVerbsGNT.pdf.
I WROTE:
>Also re. regular vs. irregular verbs: are you aware of any statistics
>on the proportion of regular vs. irregular verbs in the GNT? For some
>reason, I have the number 225 in my head (as in, "There are 225
>irregular verbs in the Greek New Testament"), but I don't know where I
>came up with that number and none of the other profs here remember
>hearing that number (or any number) attached to the question.
DR. CONRAD RESPONDED:
It seems to me that any answer to this question depends upon more than one
factor. I'd consider an irregular verb ANY verb that has ANY form that can't
be predicted on the basis of the lemma (assuming the conventional
present-first-singular active or middle indicative as the lemma except for
verbs that don't have that form). Given the fact that NT Koine is a language
in flux with alternative forms such as DEIKNUMI/DEIKNUW and AFIHMI/AFIW, my
guess is that there are AT LEAST 225 irregular verbs in the GNT; but there
are also (you'll recognize my never-forgotten concern) quite a few verbs
that are listed even in BDAG with active lemmata that should have
middle-voice lemmata. There are bound to be differences of opinion here, but
I would be somewhat dubious if there are ONLY 225 irregulars in the GNT.
One of the virtues of my list (again:
http://ioa.com/~cwconrad/Docs/IrregularVerbsGNT.pdf) is that I've tried to
give roots--and varied forms of roots, where there's vowel-gradation--for
all irregulars. It's my contention that if one understands the rules of
morphological formation and basic Greek phonology, one can recognize
"irregular" verb-forms even if one doesn't know the principal parts--at
least, one can surmise what the lemma would be and consult the lexicon
intelligently. That's something that I kept emphasizing in my own teaching
over the years.
I WROTE:
>So there's no consistent definition of "regular" vs. "irregular"?
>The strictest definition would be to call "regular" only verbs where
>the root occurs without alteration in the different tense stems
>(basically using Mounce's terminology, not his definition.) By that
>definition, BLEPW, APOSTELLW, and BAPTIZW would not be regular verbs.
>Only verbs like LUW would be regular.
>A less-strict definition would be to call "regular" those verbs where
>the root is recognizable in the different tense stems--it has undergone
>predictable changes, such as doubling of consonants, square of stops,
>liquid phenomena, insertion of a iota, etc. BLEPW, APOSTELLW, and
>BAPTIZW would be regular. Would BALLW be regular? The stem vowel
>changes in the perfect and aorist passive are not unique.
What do y'all think? Is there a consistent definition of "regular" that we
should use as we teach Greek? Does regular simply mean "predictable,
assuming you memorize this list of possible changes"? Or does regular mean
"the root is consistently and immediately recognizable as such throughout
all the tense stems"?
Grace and peace,
PLStepp
Kentucky Christian University
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