[B-Greek] Adverbs
Carl Conrad
cwconrad2 at mac.com
Wed Mar 30 04:53:46 EDT 2011
On Mar 29, 2011, at 10:53 PM, =) <p1234567891 at gmail.com> wrote:
> Dear all,
>
>
> On 29 March 2011 20:31, Carl Conrad <cwconrad2 at mac.com> wrote:
>
>>
>> On Mar 29, 2011, at 1:26 AM, =) <p1234567891 at gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Dear all,
>>>
>>>
>>> Yes I certainly agree that it is impossible to understand the Greek text
>>> through its English translation, but I am of the opinion that it is
>> possible
>>> to understand the grammatical construction apart from the actual meaning
>> by
>>> grouping the clauses, so I didn't mean to say that it was the English
>> words
>>> that modify each other, but rather that the grammatical function was
>>> equivalent. So I could do it entirely in Greek but since English is my
>> first
>>> language I do think in English, although I understand the English words
>> to
>>> be simply placeholders for the Greek...
>>
>> But in not a few cases the Greek construction has no English equivalent.
>> Greek's distinctive structures can be reproduced in English -- that's what
>> woodenly literal translations ordinarily achieve. Participles, for
>> instance,
>> are workhorses in Greek narrative and exposition. The bane of ancient
>> Greek pedagogy is the endeavor to read Greek while thinking in English
>> or another language that's not structured like Greek. The objective in
>> learning ancient Greek must be understanding the structures in which
>> the Greek mind thinks.
>>
>>>
>>> Anyway, can I confirm some of the examples?
>>>
>>> [John 6:62] "... anabainonta opou hn to proteron"
>>> I understand it to mean that "pou hn to proteron" = "[he] was previously
>>> somewhere" (did I use "pou" correctly?) and therefore "ton uion tou
>>> anqrwpou" is described as "anabainonta X" where X is "opou hn to
>> proteron"
>>
>> Yes. hOPOU HN TO PROTERON is adverbial with the ptc. ANABAINONTA
>>
>>> [1 Cor 15:46] "all ou prwton to pneumatikon alla to yucikon epeita to
>>> pneumatikon"
>>> Am I right to say that you understand it to imply "ou estin/ginetai
>> prwton
>>> to pneumatikon" and "epeita estin/ginetai to pneumatikon"? I also think
>> so,
>>> based on the parallel, but how would one know that it does not mean "to
>>> pneumatikon ou estin to prwton"?
>>
>> Well, for one thing, TO PNEUMATIKON OUK ESTIN TO PRWTON is
>> an un-greek sentence, in terms of word-order; it's possible but its
>> natural
>> meaning would be either "the spiritual is not the first thing" or "the
>> first
>> thing is not the spiritual" -- that is to say, TO PRWTON in this instance
>> would ordinarily appear a substantive, not an adverb.
>>
>> Yes, indeed I was asking if a Greek-speaker would necessarily have to say
> something like that in order to say "the spiritual is not the first thing".
> For example if he wanted to say "the spiritual is not first but second"
> could he say "all ou prwton to pneumatikon alla deuteron", or does he have
> to say "all to pneumatikon ou prwton alla deuteron"?
Or more likely, ALL' OU MEN PRWTON TO PNEUMATIKON, DEUTERON DE.
>
>
>>> [2 Pet 1:20] "touto prwton ginwskontes ..."
>>> So it means first "touto ginwskontes" before anything else? Rather than
>>> "ginwskontes prwton touto ... epeita ekeino ..."?
>>
>> The EPEITA indicates "next in sequence."
>>
>>> As for the adjectives, are "euriskei outos prwtos" and "prwton euriskei
>>> outos" equivalent then?
>>
>> Well, yes -- except that Greek idiom prefers the former. That is to say,
>> it tends to use the adjectival form of an ordinal in the nominative rather
>> than an ordinal adverb with a verb of action.
>>
>> Hmm I see. Is there a slight difference in emphasis then, or is it
> completely identical?
They might be identical in meaning, but the Greek author would
ordinarily write hEURISKEI hOUTOS PRWTOS, not PRWTON hEURISKEI
hOUTOS. That is to say, the latter is not what a Greek would ordinarily
say, although he might conceivably write PRWTON MEN hEURISKEI
hOUTOS ... EPEITA DE (ALLO TI PRATTEI).
Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Retired)
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