47: judge, find, laugh, must, be

Here are today's vocabulary words; they are verbs with present, future, and aorist stems, plus a brief definition. (If you are just beginning Greek and have not studied the future or aorist stems yet, you can just focus on the present stem.) Click on the word to learn more at Logeion, and there's also a study tips post.

1. κρίνω ~ κρινέω ~ ἔκρινα: decide, judge

2. εὑρίσκω ~ εὑρήσω ~ ηὗρον: find, discover
3. γελάω ~ γελάσω ~ ἐγέλασα: laugh

4. δεῖ ~ δεήσει ~ ἐδέησε: must, it is necessary

5. πέλω ~ (no future) ~ ἐπλόμην: be, become

Here are the proverbs and sayings:

Χελώην Πεγάσῳ κρίνεις.

Μακάριος ἄνθρωπος ὃς εὗρεν σοφίαν.

Μακάριοι οἱ κλαίοντες νῦν, ὅτι γελάσετε.

Δεῖ τοὺς μὲν εἶναι δυστυχεῖς, τοὺς δ’ εὐτυχεῖς.

Πολλὰ τὰ δεινά, κοὐδὲν ἀνθρώπου δεινότερον πέλει. 

Listen at SoundCloud.

Laura Gibbs · Greek Proverbs: 047

Plus some commentary:

Χελώην Πεγάσῳ κρίνεις.

You're comparing a tortoise to Pegasus.

Of course, the tortoise is slow and crawls on the ground, while Pegasus, the winged horse, is fast and flies through the air. Erasmus gives the form Χελώνην Πηγάσῳ συγκρίνεις (= συν-κρίνεις). For more about the famous flying horse, see Wikipedia: Pegasus. For another proverb, see this earlier post: Πηγάσου ταχύτερος.

Μακάριος ἄνθρωπος ὃς εὗρεν σοφίαν.

Blessed is the person who has found wisdom.

These words come from the Biblical Book of Proverbs. The King James translation reads "Happy is the man who findeth wisdom," but Greek ἄνθρωπος is a person or human being (as opposed to an animal); the Greek word for man (as opposed to woman) is ἀνήρ.

Μακάριοι οἱ κλαίοντες νῦν, ὅτι γελάσετε.

Blessed are you who are now weeping, because you will laugh.

The words come from the Gospel of Luke. In Latin, the text reads: Beati qui nunc fletis, quia ridebitis, and from the Latin beati (Greek μακάριοι), we get the English word "Beatitudes" which refers to the blessings here in the Gospel of Luke and likewise in the Gospel of Matthew. You can find out more at Wikipedia: Beatitudes.

Δεῖ τοὺς μὲν εἶναι δυστυχεῖς, τοὺς δ’ εὐτυχεῖς.

It is necessary that some be unlucky and others lucky.

For more about the Greek goddess of Luck, see Wikipedia: Tyche. This saying refers to her two forms: good luck (εὐ-τυχ) and bad luck (δυσ-τυχ). This is another one of the "monostichs" (one-liners) of Menander; here you can see the iambic meter, with hyphens and n-dashes separating the iambic elements:

Δεῖ τοὺς - μὲν εἶ–ναι δυσ-τυχεῖς – τοὺς δ’ εὐ-τυχεῖς.

Πολλὰ τὰ δεινά, κοὐδὲν ἀνθρώπου δεινότερον πέλει.

There (are) many marvelous things, but nothing is more marvelous than a human being.

The words are sung by the chorus in Sophocles's Antigone. The word κοὐδὲν is a contraction, and the breathing mark gives you a clue that it is two-words-in-one: καὶ οὐδὲν. The verb πέλω is best known from its frequent use in the Homeric epics, but it can be found in classical Greek also, as you can see here in Sophocles.

Bellerophon riding Pegasus was the British Airborne Forces emblem in World War II:

---

Click here to subscribe/unsubscribe to the email list.

---