[B-Greek] Iterative, Customary, Gnomic, Conative, etc.

Arthur King amgking at sbcglobal.net
Wed Mar 28 14:15:44 EDT 2007


On Mar 28, 2007, at 1:33 AM, John Sanders wrote:

". . . I do not believe there is any positive correlation between the  
skill of "talking
about a language" with the skill of "talking the language".

"In other words, I think you can sit down and read the GNT in Greek  
without
knowing any of this linguistic theory.

". . .  do you want to learn to talk about the Greek, or do you want  
to "talk
the Greek".


So says Funk in the eye-opening preface (which deserves to be read  
carefully and in full) to his A Beginning-Intermediate Grammar of  
Hellenistic Greek, an online version of which is available at
http://www.nauman.org/funk-bighg/preface.html
". . . It is the language itself and not a grammar about that  
language that the student who wishes to learn to read Greek needs to  
confront. For that reason, the grammar itself is suppressed wherever  
possible. And, if modern linguistics is correct in its fundamental  
affirmations, the one needful thing in learning a new language is  
familiarity with its grammatical structure. Such familiarity need not  
be explicit; the learner needs to "know" the structure and structure  
signals only in the sense that he is able, immediately and without  
deliberation, to respond to them.". . .   traditional grammar might  
be something apart from the ability to read Greek, in fact, might be  
an impediment to such ability."

Arthur King

Clinton, CT


More information about the B-Greek mailing list