Saint Simon

23 03 2007

Some time ago now, I managed to collect some thirty-one books that Fisher Library was simply giving away. This was in two trips, the first of which saw me taking twenty-seven. When I pointed that out to my supervisor, he informed me that there are twenty-seven books within the New Testament corpus.

I am presently staying at a friend’s house for a few weeks while he and his wife are overseas and, despite the fact that I have since added more books through both loan and purchase, I originally came here with twenty-four. A teacher of mine just reminded me that there are twenty-four books (depending on how one counts them, of course) within the corpus of the Hebrew Bible.

I can’t help being holy.


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Categories : Random Musings

I Love a Happy Ending

17 03 2007

I wrote the first paragraph of a story that I was learning in my Greek class a little while ago and, while I’ve nothing of any interest to add to my reading of that paragraph, I feel that it would be nice to actually conclude the story. I append it below in the Greek, along with my translation. I have written it paragraph by paragraph so that, to read it in English, you need to scroll down again every so often. It is beautiful and inspiring and I think that you might all benefit from reading this story with its simple, almost childlike, exuberance and its wonderfully uplifting moral at the end. Really.

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Categories : Greek, Random Musings, Translation

Being Politely Surprised

12 03 2007

Here’s an idea. Several interjections in English exist in a form designed to prevent one from actually uttering an offensive or otherwise improper term. For example, “God!” becomes “Gosh!”, “Christ!” becomes “Cripes!” or “Crikey!”, and “Jesus!” becomes “Gee!” or “Geez!”. It doesn’t take much imagination to determine the origin of “Shivers!”, or even (perhaps) “For crying out loud!”. How about “Oh my!”? Is it an abbreviated form of “Oh my God!”? Or, perhaps, is it a calque of the Greek “οι ͑μοι”? Hmm.


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Categories : Greek, Random Musings

Ugaritic

10 03 2007

As mentioned, I have just started studying Ugaritic at Sydney University. Unlike many other ancient languages, Ugaritic is still very much open to interpretation. In order to demonstrate this, I have decided to post a short text in Ugaritic, about which I know absolutely nothing. If anybody has any suggestions as to its meaning (it looks like a list of items to me, perhaps an inventory), then I welcome your opinion! Due to font problems, I have typed it up on Mellel but have attached it here as a picture. Seems that, of the many languages that WordPress might enable one to use, Ugaritic is not one of them.

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Categories : Semitic Languages

Spot Goes to the Parthenon

8 03 2007

It feels like forever since I have started a fresh, new language (with Semitic languages, I always feel like I already know half of the lexical and syntactic items that I encounter) and so it is truly wonderful to be working through the JACT Reading Greek: Text. Was there a time when I was given simple, childish sentences in Hebrew? Certainly, but it feels like a lifetime ago and the feeling of doing it all over again is just wonderful. Observe the beauty of the first text within this corpus:

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Categories : Greek, Random Musings, Translation

Some New, Some Old

2 03 2007

In the spirit of Purim, DBS has written a hilarious parody of bBer 2a, the first page of the Babylonian Talmud. Rather than reproduce it here, I advise you all to look at it over there.

Maybe it’s his tone of voice, but something about it reminds me of a post by Ben Chorin almost a whole year ago. A parody of the Artscroll/Feldheim sage biographies, it’s both cleverly written and very funny.

Of course, while I’m in the habit of linking to other people’s parodies, this one is an absolute classic: Mark Shea’s source-critical analysis of The Lord of the Rings. How can a critique be both so humorous and so sobering at the same time?


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Categories : Random Musings

Esther’s Mirror

1 03 2007

Esther is a strange book, to say the least. Of all of the books within the Hebrew Bible, Esther is the only one not to be represented at all in Qumran. Or, at least, it is the only one that is believed to have not been represented at all in Qumran. There are several hundred unidentified fragments, many of which might have been Esther, but most scholars hold the possibility to have been unlikely. While other Biblical texts are represented substantially (either in the number of manuscripts or in the size of the available text), Esther appears to have been ignored. Traditionally, this is assumed to have been because of the absence of God’s name in the text, although one would also do well to remember the absence of God’s name in Song of Songs as well. Besides, while Song of Songs is a purely secular text (ignoring for the moment the reams of religious commentary that were imposed upon it), God might be argued to be operating ‘in the background’ within the book of Esther.

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Categories : Bible, Jewish Tradition, Literature, Purim


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