Hello. Can I ask you something?

Any good resources for learning Koine Greek from scratch?

@Dan, are you around.

Hi Sarah, for Dan you need @Daи not @Dan :)

@JackDouglas sooo frustrating. Do you know how many times I have done that!

@PaulVargas I asked @Daи the same question a while back: he is a good person to ask

@Sarah If you just type @Da then press tab it should auto-complete?

@PaulVargas I am not Dan, but Mounce has a complete course with DVD instruction and everything.

@JackDouglas I know!

ah, OK

@Daи, are you around

@JackDouglas You would think I could remember that! It is the blond!

And I only have on grey hair to temper it!

@JackDouglas What I mean is thank you.

That was, "I only have one grey hair to temper the blond."

of course, I knew that :)

How are you?

@Daи, I thought you had already seen my comment to you yesterday and so I removed it. I was hoping you would take a look at the way I restated the etymology. I was careful to not assert anything, but rather to point out the facts and present possibilities, with support. I see today you did take a look at it and still think I am making fallacious etymological assertions. I thought I would inquire as to what I am missing.

@Sarah "Thus, it could carry the meaning, I am from; or, if we regard word order which communicates emphasis in the Greek language, it could carry the meaning from I am (food for thought when considering that God's name is "I AM" (Exodus 3:14). While words are not necessarily defined by the parts that make them up, in this case, it is by no means a stretch...."

it's a stretch

@Daи go on.

if you have time of course.

the word ἐξουσία pretty much means 'power', 'authority', indicating someone has the ability and lawful right to choose/do something

@Daи And that authority comes from where?

to try to read "from I am" into it and then the name of God goes waaaay too far

@Sarah the word itself doesn't tell us that, so any attempt to make the word do so is futile

@Sarah you can argue from the passage in context about things, but that won't come from grammar, it comes from semantics

I highly recommend you read the book I linked in comments

it deals with this in depth

but the analogy I gave is the same issue

a butterfly is not an airborne dairy product

neither should you take parts of words and try to define them in context with this

rather, consult a lexicon that has examined how the word was used in other literature in the same/similar context

and that will help determine meaning

@Daи How do these lexicons determine what the meanings of the words are?

@Sarah by examining their use in context in other literature

@Sarah you need to distinguish between etymology and semantics, the latter may help with the former, but not necessarily

@Daи Etymology is how the word came to be, not how it is defined.

what is most important is what the author intended to communicate, which we can get at by understanding how others used the term

@Sarah yes, and so often is irrelevant to discussing the meaning of a word in context

it's fodder for 'Strong's scholars', but you don't find that in higher-level discussion of semantics

this is why you might want to invest in a good Greek-English lexicon for the NT

you will get a lot more insightr

@Daи but may be very relevant, and it may cause a truth to stand out!

I recommend

amazon.com/Greek-English-Lexicon-Testament-Christian-Literature/…

@Sarah not in this case, nor in most

@Sarah again though, think of etymology like history and present-day meaning in context as current motivation

here's an analogy

@Sarah ever heard the mother's meat loaf pan story about tradition?

@Daи We clearly come at this from different angles. And so, I would like to back away from the issue of the word itself and to your statement that I made a fallacious etymological claim. I did not assert, I suggested. I supported.

@Sarah suggestions can be fallacious as well

especially when irrelevant to the point being made, which is to determine the meaning of the word

@Sarah your initial claim about 'authority' coming from 'author' is based on the English word, not on the Greek

you then proceed to make 'suggestions' about the Greek word while reading the meaning of the English word back into it

@Daи For them to be fallacious, the facts must be incorrect. Have I stated anything as fact that is not. You are free to disagree with the conclusions I reach and by all means DV. But please do not falsely accuse me.

@Sarah accusing you of committing an etymological fallacy isn't a false claim in this case. I did DV, and my comment will remain as a warning for others who read the post.

@Daи yes.

@Sarah so you understand that the reason the granddaughter cuts the ends off of the meatloaf has nothing to do with why her grandma originally did it?

@Daи Dan, this conversation is futile. I totally understand what you are saying. I know words are not necessarily defined by their components.

I acknowledge that in my answer!

So for you to reassert that as though I have transgressed the matter is odd.

@Sarah then why include it?

even suggesting something is an assertion of sorts

if you didn't mean to say anything, you wouldn't say it at all

@Daи Because it is a truth and I think the word highlights that truth!

@Sarah what truth?

@Daи That there is no authority except by God!

@Sarah OK, but that has nothing to do with the word, nor does the word itself strengthen that argument in this context.

@Sarah you can still make that assertion without trying to make etymology support it (fallaciously)

@Daи You are free to your opinion on that but I see no harm in pointing out the components of the word that are factually there and seeing that they are consistent with the truth!

@Sarah you are indeed free to state your opinion on anything, and I am also free to comment, vote, etc. on it. I merely attempted to explain it because you requested me to do so, I didn't edit your post to remove it or anything

@Sarah remember, you asked my opinion, I'm now giving it.

I didn't edit your content or anything, I just voted and commented.

@Daи I asked your opinion because I wanted you to know I had restated the information in case you still wanted to down vote it. And I expected if you found something erroneous about the facts I stated that you would have told me. I am surprised that your reflection implies I am still doing something I actually am careful not to do.

@Sarah you're still doing it in my opinion (even if you don't intend to), we'll have to agree to disagree.

and the facts are erroneous. They confuse semantics, etymology, and the meaning of Romans 13:1 (Paul wasn't commenting on the meaning of the word ἐξουσία, he was making an assertion about the concept/reality it represents)

@Daи OK, thank you so much for taking the time to converse with me. Thank you also for taking the time to give reason for your DV. I appreciate it as I did think it helped me make things even more clear even if not to your comfort zone. You go beyond the call of duty and I am grateful even though we do not see eye to eye always.

@Sarah sure, no problem - I'm always happy to explain my reasoning when asked

@Daи Scholars have rightly moved away from assuming that words are defined by their components. That certainly will avoid some error. Consider however that there is a danger on the other side of the spectrum of denying that the components that comprise a word may well define the word.

@Daи @Sarah @JackDouglas So ... Mounce is fine for a beginner? I mean to learn Koine Greek.

@PaulVargas Ah, I would not know because I am only a beginner. Sorry I stuck my nose in.

@PaulVargas I'm teaching Greek with Mounce as we speak

not literally as we speak, but tonight at 7pm the class meets that I'm teaching :P

@PaulVargas it's a great text for a beginner

along with the lectures by Mounce

although I find the text easy to follow even without the lectures

be sure to also get the workbook and do the exercises

my only complaint is that at times he throws things into the homework exercises that have not yet been covered, which can be frustrating for the student

but since he made the answer key available online, you can look up the answer and move on

knowing that you will understand it eventually

Right.

@PaulVargas he also doesn't assume any in depth knowledge of English grammar, which is nice for many students

I'll look on Amazon. I guess there is a digital version.

@PaulVargas very good

@Daи What about "The Basics of Biblical Greek: Grammar"? I saw it in teknia.com/basicsofbiblicalgreek/grammar

@PaulVargas that is the text I'm referring to

and this is the course that uses that text

Excellent. You've helped me a lot. Thank you.

@PaulVargas sure, any time

@Daи Thank you for your recommendation of the Lexicon. I do not have that one. But we do have the Theological Dictionary of the New Testament in Libronix, what appears to be an excellent Scholarly work. I looked up ἐξουσία in. I was absolutely blown away, both by the scholarship and by what I found in regard to the word! Thanks.