[B-Greek] Etymological fallacy?
Carl W. Conrad
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Tue Nov 18 19:28:16 EST 2008
The etymological fallacy appears to be alive and well at the Koinonia
blog in yesterday's "Word study on ekklesia ("church") — Monday with
Mounce 15 " entry:
http://zondervan.typepad.com/koinonia/2008/11/monday-with-mounce.html
= http://tinyurl.com/5n9t54
It's the old chestnut about EKKLHSIA being derived from EKKALEW and
the word meaning that believers have been "called out of the world" to
belong to King Jesus. It's worth consulting BDAG on this; the word is
actually the standard ancient Greek political word for assembly of
citizens. In the LXX EKKLHSIA was used to convey the Hebrew Qahal,
"congregation" -- and it is pretty evident the word was carried over
into early Christian usage for the congregation of believers.
Warnings against the etymological fallacy don't seem to do much good.
Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Ret)
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