Daily Greek Vocabulary Challenge: Nov. 13

Here are today's vocabulary words; it's Group 103. Click on the word to learn more at Logeion:

κρατέω ~ κρατήσω ~ ἐκράτησα: rule over, conquer 

μανθάνω ~ μαθήσομαι ~ ἔμαθον: learn, understand 

διώκω ~ διώξω ~ ἐδίωξα: chase, pursue 

ἔρχομαι ~ ἐλεύσομαι ~ ἧλθον: come, go 

λανθάνω ~ λήσω ~ ἔλαθον: escape notice; forget 

These are the proverbs (and there are always more proverbs at the blog):

Θυμοῦ κράτει.

Μανθάνων μὴ κάμνε.

Σαοὺλ Σαούλ, τί με διώκεις;

Πᾶν τὸ ἐρχόμενον ματαιότης.

Ὁ ἄδικος οὐ λανθάνει τοὺς θεούς.

And now, some commentary:

Θυμοῦ κράτει.

Master your emotions.

The Greek word θυμός covers a whole range of emotions, as you can see in the LSJ dictionary entry, so I just opted for "emotions" as the translation, even though it is singular in Greek; another translation could be: "Control your anger."  The verb κρατέω takes a genitive complement: θυμοῦ. The verb is formed from the noun κράτος, meaning "strength, power," etc., and you can see that same root in the -cracy words in English like democracy, aristocracy, bureaucracy, etc.

Μανθάνων μὴ κάμνε.

Don't get tired of learning.

The negative μή is used moods other than the indicative, which means the imperative as here, the subjunctive, etc. Literally, "as you are learning (participle), don't get tired (imperative)." The root of the verb μανθάνω is μαθ- as in English words like polymath and mathematics.

Σαοὺλ Σαούλ, τί με διώκεις;

Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?

This is from the famous "road to Damascus" moment in the Biblical Book of Acts when Saul (later Paul) has a vision of Jesus in which Jesus rebukes him with these words; the King James version reads "Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?" You can find out more about this famous Biblical scene at Wikipedia: Conversion of Paul. The Greek verb διώκω can means simply "chase" or "pursue," but it also has a legal meaning of "prosecute" or "persecute," which is the meaning in this context.

Πᾶν τὸ ἐρχόμενον ματαιότης.

Everything that is to come is foolishness.

This is from the Biblical Book of Ecclesiastes. I've personally been feeling the special relevance of this one lately! King James reads "all that cometh is vanity," but "vanity" here does not mean vain self-regard; instead, it means emptiness, pointlessness. The Greek root word μάτη means "folly, foolishness," and the adjective μάταιος means "foolish, pointless," hence ματαιότης is "foolishness, pointlessness."

Ὁ ἄδικος οὐ λανθάνει τοὺς θεούς.

The unjust person does not escape the gods.

The word ἄδικος is an alpha-privative, ἄ-δικος. The word "escape" here means to "escape the notice of," i.e. the gods see the person who is unjust; he cannot escape their judgment.

Conversion of Saul
(the gold letters in Latin read: Saule, Saule, quid me persequeris?)

And here's a random proverb too:

---

---

Click here to subscribe/unsubscribe to the email list.

---