Did Jesus know Latin ?
Denis Wright
> Why on earth would he know any Greek, anyway? Were there Greek settlers
> or traders in his everyday world?
It's all open to speculation, but Greek was the lingua franca of that
part of the world at the time, so to that extent it is not surprising
that he would know some Greek.
Denis
JCarew
"Denis Wright" <dwr...@mutz.une.edu.au.invalid> wrote:
>Peter Mackay <peter....@bigpond.com.aus> wrote:
The lingua franca of the Semitic people at the time of
Jesus in the area around Jerusalem was Aramaic. See
below:
THE HISTORY OF THE ARAMAIC LANGUAGE
Aramaic was the language of Semitic peoples throughout the ancient
Near East. It was the language of the Assyrians, Chaldeans, Hebrews
and Syrians. Aram and Israel had a common ancestry and the Hebrew
patriarchs who were of Aramaic origin maintained ties of marriage
with the tribes of Aram. The Hebrew patriarchs preserved their
Aramaic names and spoke in Aramaic.
The term Aramaic is derived from Aram, the fifth son of Shem, the
firstborn of Noah. See Gen. 10:22. The descendants of Aram dwelt
in the fertile valley, Padan-aram also known as Beth Nahreen.
The Aramaic language in Padan-aram remained pure, and in the course
the common language (lingua franca), of all the Semitic clans. By
the 8th century B.C. it was the major language from Egypt to Asia
Minor to Pakistan. It was employed by the great Semitic empires,
Assyria and Babylon. The Persian (Iranian) government also used
Aramaic in their Western provinces.
The language of the people of Palestine shifted from Hebrew to
Aramaic sometime between 721-500 B.C. Therefore, we know that
Jesus, his disciples and contemporaries spoke and wrote in Aramaic.
The message of Christianity spread throughout Palestine, Syria
and Mesopotamia in this Semitic tongue.
Present-day scholars claim that the Aramaic language itself
passed through many stages of development:
Old Aramaic 975-700 B.C.
Standard Aramaic 700-200 B.C.
Middle Aramaic 200 B.C.-200 A.D.
Late Aramaic 200-700 A.D.
which includes:
a. Western Aramaic-The dialect of the Jews (Jerusalem, the Talmud
and the Targums) and the Syro-Palestine dialect.
b. Eastern Aramaic-The dialect of Syriac form, Assyrian Chaldean
form, Babylon, Talmudic Aramaic and Mundaie.
Use of the Aramaic language had become common by the period of the
Chaldean Empire (626-539 B.C.). It became the official language of
the Imperial government in Mesopotamia and enjoyed general use until
the spread of Greek (331 B.C.). Although Greek had spread throughout
these Eastern lands, Aramaic remained dominant and the linqua franca
of the Semitic peoples. This continued to be so until Aramaic was
superseded by a sister Semitic tongue, Arabic, about the 13th century
A.D. to the 14th century A.D., when Arabic supplanted Aramaic after
the Arab conquest in the 7th Century. However, the Christians of
Mesopotamia (Iraq), Iran, Syria, Turkey and Lebanon kept the Aramaic
language alive domestically, scholastically and liturgically. In
spite of the pressure of the ruling Arabs to speak Arabic, Aramaic
is still spoken today in its many dialects, especially among the
Chaldeans and Assyrians.
Before concluding, one more vital aspect of the Aramaic language
needs to be mentioned and that is its use as the major Semitic
tongue for the birth and spread of spiritual and intellectual ideas
in and all over the Near East. According to the research and opinion
of an outstanding Aramaic and Arabic scholar, Professor Franz Rosenthal,
who in the Journal of Near Eastern studies, states: "in my view, the
history of Aramaic represents the purest triumph of the human spirit
as embodied in language (which is the mind's most direct form of
physical expression) over the crude display of material power. . .
Great empires were conquered by the Aramaic language, and when they
disappeared and were submerged in the flow of history, that language
persisted and continued to live a life of its own ... The language
continued to be powerfully active in the promulgation of spiritual
matters. It was the main instrument for the formulation of religious
ideas in the Near East, which then spread in all directions all
over the world ... The monotheistic groups continue to live on
today with a religious heritage, much of which found first expression
in Aramaic."
(F. Rosenthal, "Aramaic Studies During the Past Thirty Years",
THE JOURNAL OF NEAR EASTERN STUDIES, pp 81-82,
Chicago: 1978.)
written by Rocco A. Errico and Michael J. Bazzi
Jim Carew sfo
Evertjan.
> Peter Mackay <peter....@bigpond.com.aus> wrote:
>
>>>Why on earth would he know any Greek, anyway? Were
>>>there Greek settlers or traders in his everyday world?
>>
>>It's all open to speculation, but Greek was the lingua franca of that
>>part of the world at the time, so to that extent it is not surprising
>>that he would know some Greek.
>
> The lingua franca of the Semitic people at the time of
> Jesus in the area around Jerusalem was Aramaic.
"Linga Franca" to my ears means the international trade language of the
region (Eastern mediteranean), wich was not Arameic but Koine-greek.
Compare this with Malay in the Indanesian region of the last few hundred
years. A region where far over 200 local languages are/were spoken.
Arameic was the local language of the Palestine inhabitants that had
replaced Hebrew. ["bar"(=son) (bar-abas, bar-mitswah) had replaced "ben"]
A Arameic speaking bright boy, learning Hebrew as the best of the class,
would have picked up quite a mouthfull of Koine long before his 13th year,
AND new some catching sentences in the language of the oppressor: Latin.
Later, his girlfriend Mirjam of Magdalen, a prostitute, could have told him
of the not so highbrow uses of that language.
Perhaps this is much clearer to a native speaker of a regional language,
like Dutch. We could understand and speak some German and English before
our first lesson in secondary school. That speaking started as child's
play. "Immer gerade aus, fucking bastard"
--
Evertjan.
The Netherlands.
(Please change the x'es to dots in my emailaddress)
Denis Wright
> The lingua franca of the Semitic people at the time of
> Jesus in the area around Jerusalem was Aramaic. See
> below:
Of course, in that narrower sphere, but I am talking about a much
broader area and a greater range of peoples.
Denis
JCarew
Language of Christ may disappear in Syria
May 13, 2001
BY PHILIP SHERWELL
MALOULA, Syria--The language of Christ is heading for
extinction in the last three remote Syrian mountain
villages where it is still spoken.
Television and modern communications are taking their
toll, as the younger generation increasingly relies
on Arabic and forgets Aramaic, the lingua franca of
the Holy Land 2,000 years ago.
In the steep winding streets of Maloula, the
picturesque home of a first-century cave shrine
to St. Tekla and a hillside monastery and convent,
many villagers still greet each other in the
tongue in which Jesus preached.
However, Muse Barkila, a local man who is helping
a German academic to record Aramaic, fears the
language could disappear within 20 years.
"I learned it from my father, and I teach it to my
children," says Barkila. "But fewer and fewer young
people speak Aramaic. If we do not start to teach
it in school, it could be lost forever."
Western Aramaic, as it is referred to by philologists
(Eastern Aramaic is still spoken in small Christian
pockets in Iraq and Iran), has survived in Maloula
and the nearby settlements of Jabadin and Bakha
thanks to their inaccessibility.
Although the villages are just north of Damascus,
they sit in high mountain passes overlooking vineyards
and apricot orchards and have remained isolated for
centuries. In recent years, however, many locals have
left to find work in the capital, while Arabic-speaking
outsiders have moved in as the tourist industry has
grown.
"The bus and the television are to blame," said
one local, bemoaning the language's slow demise.
About 10,000 people still have a working knowledge
of Aramaic. In the Greek Orthodox church of St.
Tekla and the nearby Roman Catholic church of St.
George, prayers are said in a mixture of
Aramaic, Greek and Arabic in an attempt to
maintain the language.
The Rev. Sami Dager, a local Catholic priest, said:
"We encourage the people here to keep alive the language
that Christ spoke, but we can no longer rely only on it
being passed down from father to son. We need some
sort of school as well." At St. Tekla's convent,
Pelagia Sayaf, the mother superior, echoed the
message.
Toni Khuri, a shopkeeper, said, "We are proud to
speak Aramaic, and we will never forget it."
After offering to recite the Lord's Prayer in
Aramaic, however, he stumbled over the words.
Western Aramaic is the direct descendant of the
dominant language in the Middle East 2,000 years
ago. It replaced Hebrew for the Jews, and portions
of the Old Testament were written in it.
Although documents and inscriptions in old Aramaic
have been found as far afield as Greece and India--the
oldest one dating to 850 B.C.--there is no surviving
script, and the language is now purely oral. With the
help of Barkila, Arnold Werner, a Heidelberg University
professor, has transliterated Aramaic into the Western
alphabet in an effort to breathe new life into it.
Sunday Telegraph
Jim Carew sfo
ko...@parade.com
> Jesus didn't exist. The Romans liked the idea of one God, but couldn't
> accept the jewish model. So the perpetuated the myth about Jesus.
> Christianity is the biggest load of bullshit in the world. It is a
> bastard religion. Look at what it has done to America. I feel sorry
> for all the old Nuns and Priests that have spent thief whole life
> believing in a myth. At sunday school we had to describe Jesus's
> travels---what travels?
>
> Patsy M
He, the mythical haysus, ate spaghetti didn't he or was that a taco? When
he broke the cookie at the passover was it chocolate chip or matzoth?
Just like priests today in the lutheran, episcopal and presbyterian
churches, when they aren't busy molesting kids, hold up that big cookie
and break it over the wine. You know the ole timey breaking the
bodythang.