[B-Greek] Translating Participles
John Wilking
jcwilking at yahoo.com
Sun Nov 16 08:38:24 EST 2008
Carl,
I know that understanding must come before translating. You can't translate what you don't understand, but what do you mean by the word "art"?
John C. Wilking
--- On Sun, 11/16/08, Carl Conrad <cwconrad2 at mac.com> wrote:
> From: Carl Conrad <cwconrad2 at mac.com>
> Subject: Re: [B-Greek] Translating Participles
> To: "George F Somsel" <gfsomsel at yahoo.com>
> Cc: javajedi2 at yahoo.com, b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org
> Date: Sunday, November 16, 2008, 7:37 AM
> On Nov 16, 2008, at 6:45 AM, George F Somsel wrote:
>
> > Randall will, of course, tell you that the object is
> not translation
> > (and it isn't the object); but there are
> relatively few who can take
> > the time off from other pursuits and spend the money
> to fly off to
> > attend an immersion course in the language. Most of
> us will be
> > exposed to the language one hour per day for a maximum
> of five days
> > per week (and more likely for three days per week).
> Copious reading
> > is the key to gaining a feeling for what is going on
> in the
> > language. In the beginning man created a translation.
> And he saw
> > the translation and said, "This sucks !" So
> he read some more and
> > tried again. As he read his facility improved. This
> continued for
> > 70 years (well, perhaps less). And, at the end of the
> 70 years, he
> > said "hEURHKA! I have begun to understand
> this."
>
> And part of what he understood is that s/he doesn't
> have to translate
> it in order to understand it, that s/he may be able to
> understand it
> and still not translate it, that s/he will much sooner come
> to
> understanding than to the ability to translate it --
> because
> translating is an art.
>
> > Thomas is correct. What the participle posits is a
> relationship
> > between the activities mentioned. What words you use
> to indicate
> > this relationship may change depending upon what you
> consider that
> > relationship to be. Is it temporal "he did X
> then he did Y"? Is it
> > indicating a concurrent event "While doing X he
> did Y"? You need to
> > develop a feel for this. Language is not simply the
> plugging in of
> > exchangeable parts. You don't exchange part A for
> part X and part B
> > for part Y in each and every case. A grammar can
> provide some
> > guidelines to get you started, but the grammar is not
> the final word.
>
> All of which is sound doctrine.
>
> I might add something that you should not take amiss, Ken:
> I think you
> are discovering what I first began to understand as a TA in
> grad
> school: that when one begins teaching Greek, one comes
> increasingly to
> understand Greek grammar; when you have to explain it to
> someone else,
> you have to develop an intelligible explanation for how the
> language
> works. For me that meant, as I think you're realizing
> it means for
> you, coming to appreciate lots of things that never really
> made that
> much sense before (and perhaps finding out that the
> grammars don't do
> all that good a job of explaining things either).
>
> > From: Kenneth Litwak <javajedi2 at yahoo.com>
> > To: b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org
> > Sent: Sunday, November 16, 2008 2:32:11 AM
> > Subject: [B-Greek] Translating Participles
> >
> > I've now consulting five or so beginning
> grammars on translating
> > participles because of a difference between the
> grammars that may
> > only have significance in English but that's where
> students are.
> >
> > The issue is what helping verbs/words to use with a
> given tense.
> > Depending upon which grammar I use, I could translate
> PROSELQWN
> > APEKULISEN "After coming to (the tomb) he/she/it
> rolled away' or
> > "having come to (the tomb) he/she/it rolled
> away" or "when he had
> > come to (the tomb) he rolled away". If I use
> "having" as some
> > grammars do, then this could be confused by students
> with the
> > perfect participle, which I might translate the same
> way.
> >
> > Mark 1:4 KAI KHRUSSWN BAPTISMA could be "and
> preaching a baptism,"
> > "and while preaching a baptism," "and
> while he was preaching a
> > baptism," or even "and he was
> preaching." In one grammar, "was"
> > would not be used for a present active participle but
> for an aorist
> > active participle. In another grammar,
> "was/were" could be used for
> > a present active participle and
> "have/has/having" for an aorist
> > while in another "have/has/having" would be
> reserved for a perfect
> > active participle. I learned to use
> "having" for the aorist, not
> > only the participle but sometimes even the aorist
> indicative if that
> > made sense in English. I recognize that the most
> important thing is
> > whether the action is contemporary with, prior to or
> future to the
> > action of the main verb but we still need to know what
> words to use
> > to convey that as umambiguously in English as
> possible. I would like
> > to be able to say to my students something like,
> "You can use 'was/
> > were' with a present
> > participle and 'have/has/having with an aorist or
> perfect
> > participle" or some other variation but they need
> some guidance as
> > to what is correct and when I'm seeing grammars
> disagree with each
> > other, it's hard to give advice that is very
> helpful unless I just
> > say "You're using Mounce. Do what he says.
> Period." That to me,
> > however, is not the way to learn a language. In fact,
> at the risk
> > of challenging my own question here, I recently heard
> a comment to
> > the effect that the entire Zondervan approach to
> learning languages
> > was a problem in that it presumed you could have a lot
> more
> > precision than was warranted. I certainly see that.
> Translation has
> > a lot of art to it, but at the same time, there would
> certainly have
> > been some sense of distinction in the minds of Greek
> speakers, even
> > if we can't know what that was exactly.
> >
> > I'd like to be able to create a chart for my
> students of
> > translation choices for the different tenses, but
> right now, I don't
> > think I can constrain those choices very much.
> Suggestions? Thanks.
> >
> > Ken
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > ---
> > B-Greek home page: http://www.ibiblio.org/bgreek
> > B-Greek mailing list
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> >
> >
> >
> >
> > ---
> > B-Greek home page: http://www.ibiblio.org/bgreek
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>
>
> Carl W. Conrad
> Department of Classics, Washington University (Retired)
>
>
>
> ---
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