[B-Greek] Greek "urban legends

James Spinti JSpinti at Eisenbrauns.com
Tue Dec 1 08:53:54 EST 2009


Sarah,

Perhaps the "miss the mark" definition is first because it occurs in Xenophon's Anabasis, book 1. Since many (most?) schoolboys in the 19th century started their Greek reading with Xenophon, it would make sense to list it first. Just speculating here... 

James

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James Spinti
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-----Original Message-----
From: b-greek-bounces at lists.ibiblio.org [mailto:b-greek-bounces at lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of Sarah J. Blake
Sent: Monday, November 30, 2009 6:08 PM
To: b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org
Subject: [B-Greek] Greek "urban legends

It should be clarifies that what you all are calling "urban legends are not so much "urban legends" as they are incomplege explanations. To illustrate:

From Liddell and Scott (Logos version), looking up ἀμαρτάνω yields the a lengthy entry which includes the phrase "to miss the mark" in the first definition." A complete study would prompt the exegete to interpret the word appropriately given the particular passage. First-year texts don't provide this much information--they assume students will go on to further study. The challenge is to provide appropriate information without overloading the student. (It can happen.)

I would caution against using this information to imply that these terms don't actually mean these things--in some contexts they do. The point is this is n't a complete definition.


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