[B-Greek] Ancient Greek - Why English /Greek Grammar
L. Harris
ljoharris at ckt.net
Sun Feb 26 09:03:24 EST 2006
Randal Buth :"since when did Plato or Luke need to know English grammar terms in
order to learn Greek? Did Isaiah or Hillel need English in order to
learn Hebrew?"
As babies of course they did not need to learn grammar, but to write what they then later spoke, they did. But why do you need to learn English grammar to come to the place where you can understand what they wrote? Because English grammar was adopted from the Greeks through the Romans. In other words even though it's called "English grammar" it's for the most part in reality "Greek grammar"
The following is just a short list of some of the things we inherited from Greece.
Our literature would not exist as it dose without the Greek tradition.
Our Alphabet came from Greece through Rome.
Our language is littered with Greek words.
Our science has forged an internationl language through Greek terms;
OUR GRAMMAR and rhetoric came to us from Greece, even the punctuation and
paragraphing are Greek inventions
Our literary genres are Greek-the lyric, the ode, the idyl, the novel, the
esaay, the oration, the biography, the history, and above all the drama;
again nearly all the words are Greek.
The terms and forms of the modern drama-tragedy, comedy, and pantomine-are
Greek;
The comic drama has come down almost unchanged from Menander and Philemon
through Plautus and Terence, Ben Jonson and Moliere.
The Greek dramas themselves are among the richest portions of our
inheritance. (Will Durrant, The Life of Greece, Our Greek Heritage)
We are not as much interested in "speaking the Greek they spoke", as
we are in, "READING THE GREEK THEY WROTE!" and understanding it.
Regards,
Linda Harris
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