My idea of how East and West can learn about each other

[Claudius]

I was trying to think of a way for Latin Catholics, Byzentine Catholics, Coptic Catholics and so forth to learn more about each other. I figured that if we were to have a meaningful interaction, in that there as a specific goal that we were trying to get to together them perhaps that could open the way. So I eventually came up with an idea for a Color Coded Bible.

A Color Coded Bible would be one where each word in every sentence is highlighted to show grammatical function. Ok, what does that mean? It means in every sentence, the subject would be highlighted blue for instance, and the object red. The verb would be highlighted yellow. Adverbs would get a color and other things. So suppose we took the 4th verse from the 4th chapter of Matthew. Each of our rites has its own liturgical language and our Bibles reflect that. We take our Bible highlight the words the colors that we all agree on in our liturgical language and them compare.

Obviously this idea is not quite finished, but for the purpose of Bible study and Language study this could certainly be intellectually interesting. We could even do it for common prayers like the Magnificat or even the Divine Liturgy.

Anyway, that is my idea. Please let me know what you all think.

P.S. What is the actual correct pronunciation of Biblical Greek? I have been learning Greek on my own but it is really hard because I do not know how to pronounce the words. The same problem comes up when studying Aramaic, Hebrew, Coptic and Slavic. I can pronounce Latin so I chat away in it all day and understand.

I am specifically asking for the official Catholic Church pronunciation of Greek and or any of these other languages. I do not care how some college proffessor somewhere thinks it should be pronounced, I want to know how to pronounce it so that if I ever get an opportunity to go to a Greek Catholic Liturgy in Greek, I will know what the Priest is saying.

 

[Harpazo]

I was trying to think of a way for Latin Catholics, Byzentine Catholics, Coptic Catholics and so forth to learn more about each other. I figured that if we were to have a meaningful interaction, in that there as a specific goal that we were trying to get to together them perhaps that could open the way. So I eventually came up with an idea for a Color Coded Bible.

A Color Coded Bible would be one where each word in every sentence is highlighted to show grammatical function. Ok, what does that mean? It means in every sentence, the subject would be highlighted blue for instance, and the object red. The verb would be highlighted yellow. Adverbs would get a color and other things. So suppose we took the 4th verse from the 4th chapter of Matthew. Each of our rites has its own liturgical language and our Bibles reflect that. We take our Bible highlight the words the colors that we all agree on in our liturgical language and them compare.

Obviously this idea is not quite finished, but for the purpose of Bible study and Language study this could certainly be intellectually interesting. We could even do it for common prayers like the Magnificat or even the Divine Liturgy.

Anyway, that is my idea. Please let me know what you all think.

P.S. What is the actual correct pronunciation of Biblical Greek? I have been learning Greek on my own but it is really hard because I do not know how to pronounce the words. The same problem comes up when studying Aramaic, Hebrew, Coptic and Slavic. I can pronounce Latin so I chat away in it all day and understand.

I am specifically asking for the official Catholic Church pronunciation of Greek and or any of these other languages. I do not care how some college proffessor somewhere thinks it should be pronounced, I want to know how to pronounce it so that if I ever get an opportunity to go to a Greek Catholic Liturgy in Greek, I will know what the Priest is saying.

Most Bible scholars, unfortunately, butcher the Greek language. They read the Greek letters in a way as if they looked like our Roman alphabet, and most of the time ignore some dipthongs and other pronunciation things.

I’ve listened to the DL of St. John Chrysostom in Greek, and it’s identical to the Modern Greek pronunciation (that’s the preferred pronunciation). So when speaking ancient Greek, always use the Modern Greek pronunciations.

An example of how Biblical Scholars butcher it:
ο αδελφός–>brother (1). pronounced: o adelFOS
οι αδελφοί–>brothers (more than one). pronounced: ee adelFEE

With οι αδελφοί most, if not all, Biblical scholars that don’t know anything about modern Greek pronounce it as “oy adELfoy.” It annoys me to no end, because Greek is such a beautiful language, and we as Americans love to take shortcuts and make things easier, even if it isn’t right.

Sorry about that rant. Aramaic/Syriac is a different story, haha. It’s terribly complex and even harder if you don’t have any background with Semitic languages. I’m learning that first hand experience!

But you do have a good idea going there. I’ll help in anyway possible.

Pace e Bene
Andrew

 

[Claudius]

Thanks for the imput. Looking at Greek and trying to find the way the Church says it really trips me up since it seems everyone has a different opinion.

I really am thinking of the Bible Color Code thing and I will work on a few sentences from English and Latin and post them so everyone can see what I mean. Them if anyone is able to post the same sentences from the Bible in Greek, Coptic and Aramaic then perhaps we will be getting somewhere.

Another idea that was to start a Wikipedia type thing but instead of use the secular Latin and Greek that I can’t even read, to specifically use Ecclesiatical Latin, Klione Greek and so forth. We may have to make it members only. Wikipedia is really frustrating in how every religion gets to post what they think of themselves but only the Catholic Church is not allowed to do this, so instead a lot of Anti-Catholic people show up just to write hate messages. The Orthodox I think got sick of it themselves and started the now famous Orthodox Wiki. I would love to do a Wiki in Latin and not have some high school student trying to tell me that J is not allowed and No Accent marks.

Anyway I will get to work and see what you all think a little later.

 

[bpbasilphx]

I want to know how to pronounce it so that if I ever get an opportunity to go to a Greek Catholic Liturgy in Greek, I will know what the Priest is saying.

Just as ecclesiastical and liturgical Latin has been assimilated to Italian, liturgical Greek is pronounced as if it were modern Greek.