[B-Greek] Definitions

Carl Conrad cwconrad2 at mac.com
Mon Feb 22 07:56:38 EST 2010


I would concur with most of what has been said (I've retained the lean substance of the thread below, while trying to trim away the fat) in response to Eddie Mishoe's question(s), especially with Nikos Adamou's recommendation to "read the manual." I think the responses have, however, demonstrated why Eddie has been confused about these questions; we just don't talk about these matters or use these terms, "Hellenistic Greek", "Koine Greek," and "NT Greek" consistently. Perhaps we don't even agree about how they SHOULD be used, although I think it more likely that we simply don't take the pains to BE consistent in using them. Perhaps we'd all do well to read Robertson's account, or perhaps some more recent account (Dan Wallace handles these matters adequately, in my opinion, in the opening chapter of GGBB ("The Language of the New Testament," pp. 12-30).

A point that's implicit in some of the other comments but needs clearer expression, I think, is that ancient Greek, from the beginnings of extant literature (Homeric and Hesiodic poems) has always had both a LITERARY form in which traditions were formulated and preserved and official records were maintained and a DEMOTIC form in which merchants and peasants and artisans and ordinary people conversed and conducted their everyday affairs.

In the earliest era of extant Greek texts (excluding the Linear B documents of the Mycenean era), there was the artificial poetic dialect of Homeric and Hesiodic poetry, a language drawing upon all major dialect groups and used in the composition and recitation of the hexameter, elegiac, and lyric verse in which the traditions shared and sustained by all Greek-speaking communities internationally were formulated. In contradistinction from that there were the dialects spoken by peoples in their local areas -- Doric, Aeolic, Ionic, Arcado-Cyprian.

In the Classical era (roughly 6th century BC to the death of Alexander), especially in the period of the Athenian empire, an administrative language emerged as used in the imperial courts and in commerce throughout the Aegean states controlled by Athens. This was the seminal core of what emerged as the "shared" or "common" language termed KOINH.

In the Hellenistic era (loosely, roughly from the death of Alexander until the Byzantine era), the KOINH itself emerged in the more LITERARY levels taught in schools throughout the Greek-speaking world (including Egypt and Syria and Anatolia and Macedonia) as well as in the everyday speech of peasants and merchants and in the household of common people. ALL of the Greek spoken in this era can be called HELLENISTIC GREEK, but we should be aware, I think, that the Greek of this area is not the same in the official records of the Ptolemaic and Syrian and Macedonia administration and writings of poets and philosophers and historians, on the one hand, and in the speech of peasants, and merchants and artistans on the street ,on the other. All of this could be called KOINH, inasmuch as it is used all over the Greek-speaking world, but still there is a distinction of level between the language used in literature and in courts and the language spoken in the streets. And it should be noted that the grammatical schools toward the end of the first century increasingly endeavored to prescribe the "good" Greek must follow the forms and usage of the Classical Attic writers.

As for the New Testament, I think that anyone who has read and studied the Greek of the Synoptic gospels and of the Pauline letters and of the Johannine books is aware that something of a distinction can be drawn between the Greek of Luke and Acts and Romans and 1 & 2 Corinthians and Hebrews, at one extreme, and the Greek of Mark's gospel and Revelation, at another: the former is more literary and seems to reflect training in a grammar school, while the latter would seem to be composed by authors whose native language was not Greek.

Some of what I've said here may be (probably will be) disputed, But I hope it may help explain why we aren't clear and clean in our usage of the terms.

On Feb 21, 2010, at 10:13 PM, Nikolaos Adamou wrote:
> 
> CHAPTERS II, III & IV of Robertson's Greek Grammar make the best discussion on this issue I have seen.
> They are available in WORD or PDF
> 
>> Date: Sun, 21 Feb 2010 19:07:45 -0800
>> From: lightmanmark at yahoo.com
>> To: b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org; edmishoe at yahoo.com; gfsomsel at yahoo.com
>> Subject: Re: [B-Greek] Definitions
>> 
>> Now that I think about it, I suppose a distinction between Hellenistic
>> and Koine might be that some writers of the Hellenistic period are
>> said to be "Atticist," i.e. trying to copy earlier Attic writers.  You might
>> prefer to call these people Hellenistic but not Koine.  i.e. Xenophon of
>> Ephesus might be called Hellenistic, while Chariton, who is said not
>> to be Atticist at all, might be called Koine OR Hellenistic.
>> 
>> --- On Sun, 2/21/10, George F Somsel  wrote:
>> 
>> 
>> From: George F Somsel 
>> Subject: Re: [B-Greek] Definitions
>> To: "Mark Lightman" , "B Greek" , "Eddie Mishoe" 
>> Date: Sunday, February 21, 2010, 7:57 PM
>> 
>> 
>> I understand that although NT Greek is a species of koine which is frequently spoken of as common Greek of the period, it should not be considered "gutter Greek" but lies on a slightly higher plane than what might be found on the street.
>> --- On Sun, 2/21/10, Eddie Mishoe  wrote:
>> 
>> 
>> From: Eddie Mishoe 
>> Subject: [B-Greek] Definitions
>> To: "B Greek" 
>> Date: Sunday, February 21, 2010, 7:32 PM
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> I am trying to grasp the distinctions, differences, and similarities (if any) of the words used to define various Greek "languages/dialects." What are the differences among these:
>> 
>> 1. Hellenistic Greek
>> 
>> 2. Koine Greek
>> 
>> 3. NT Greek
>> 
>> Sometimes these words seemed to be used interchangeably, while other times they seem to be quite dissimilar. Can these be defined in such a way as to put a fence around each term?
>> 
>> As it stands, it seems like these can be defined in concentric circles, the smallest, inner circle being NT Greek, next is Koine, and then Hellenistic. If so, they should be able to be distinguished from the others, and that is precisely what I'm looking for.


Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Retired)






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