We see ὄνομα αὐτῷ __ used a lot to tell what someone's name is inside of another sentence or something.
ἐγένετο ἄνθρωπος ἀπεσταλμένος παρὰ θεοῦ, ὄνομα αὐτῷ Ἰωάννης. (John 1.6)
I would assume that «ὄνομά μοι» should actually be used in situations like this, as a sort of separated part of a sentence and not as a main clause on its own. For a main clause, I would think that καλεῖται τὸ ὄνομά (or, τοὔνομά) μου...
1: τί καλεῖται τὸ ὄνομά σου;
2: καλεῖται τὸ ὄνομά μου Ἰάσων.
I think it strange that we still wrestle with phraseology regarding something that we all use when we have our spoken lessons on Skype and Google Hangouts.
I mean, look at how the phrase books (such as
this one) tell us to state our age. It uses a perfect participle! That's not right at all, since the participle would hang on another part of a sentence. We have a few examples of age in the NT, and this is how they are stated:
Mark 5:42 - καὶ εὐθὺς ἀνέστη τὸ κοράσιον καὶ περιεπάτει, ἦν γὰρ ἐτῶν δώδεκα. καὶ ἐξέστησαν εὐθὺς ἐκστάσει μεγάλῃ.
Luke 2:42 - καὶ ὅτε ἐγένετο ἐτῶν δώδεκα, ἀναβαινόντων αὐτῶν κατὰ τὸ ἔθος τῆς ἑορτῆς...
Luke 3:23 - Καὶ αὐτὸς ἦν Ἰησοῦς ἀρχόμενος ὡσεὶ ἐτῶν τριάκοντα, ὢν υἱός, ὡς ἐνομίζετο, Ἰωσὴφ τοῦ Ἠλὶ...
John 8:57 - εἶπον οὖν οἱ Ἰουδαῖοι πρὸς αὐτόν· Πεντήκοντα ἔτη οὔπω ἔχεις καὶ Ἀβραὰμ ἑώρακας;
Acts 4:22 - ἐτῶν γὰρ ἦν πλειόνων τεσσεράκοντα ὁ ἄνθρωπος ἐφ’ ὃν γεγόνει τὸ σημεῖον τοῦτο τῆς ἰάσεως.
These are some clear examples from the NT, and we can draw conclusions from them about how to tell your age.
(1) "I am x years old." = εἰμί + gen. (ἐτῶν) + numeral [
ἐτῶν τριάκοντα καὶ ἕπτα εἰμί. I am 37 years old.]
(2) "I become x years old." = ἄρχεσθαι + gen. (ἐτῶν) + numeral [
ἐτῶν τριάκοντα καὶ ἕπτα ἠρξάμην. I turned 37 years old.]
(3) "I am x years old." = ἔχω + numeral + acc. (ἔτη) [
τριάκοντα καὶ ἕπτα ἔτη ἔχω. I am 37 years old.]
This is what I think can be pulled from this. Why, then, does that phrasebook encourage us to use the perfect participle when there are perfectly good ways to say this?
I find myself frustrated with phrasebooks. I wish we could all clean up a really good copy and use it consistently.
It other words, it seems that we should be asking πηλικὸς εἶ;
how old are you? and responding with ἐτῶν Χ εἰμί
I am of x years.
We should also find a more consistent and faithful way of telling someone what our names are.
What do you think?