Day: June 6, 2016

All hail Steve Theodore’s answer, which is exemplary.

OP has been kind enough to provide the original in https://www.quora.com/What-does-…. It is from a modern textbook:

Ἐγώ εἰμι Ἑλληνικὸν παιδίον καὶ οἰκῶ ἐν ἀγροῖς. Ἐν τοῖς ἀγροῖς ὁ Φίλιππος γεωργός ἐστιν: αὐτὸς γεωργεῖ καὶ ἔχει χωρίον.
Ἆρ΄ ἐροτᾷς τίς μὲν εγώ, τίς δ΄ ὁ Φίλιππος;

What it means is that the textbook author does not have an idiomatic command of Ancient Greek.

First giveaway, “I am a Greek child”, Ἐγώ εἰμι Ἑλληνικὸν παιδίον. Quite apart from the obtrusive pronoun (“IIIIIIII am a Greek child”—you normally wouldn’t put the pronoun in at all): Greek then and now keeps its ethnonyms and adjectives separate, unlike English and Spanish. You just wouldn’t say “I am a Hellenic child”. You would say “I am a Hellene and a child”, παῖς εἰμί, Ἕλλην τε. (Or in Modern Greek, “I am a Hellene-ling”: είμαι ελληνόπουλο.)

And in context, “So you may ask: who am I and who is Philip” is meant as a cue for “well, let me tell you more about who I am and who Philip is.” But in that case, τίς doesn’t sound right: it sounds like a philosophical question on What is Truth? Who is the Dancer, and Who is the Dance? In this context, ποῖος “what kind of person” makes more sense.

As for “you may ask”, wouldn’t that be better as an optative or subjunctive anyway?

My votes, in no order:

1. The Sonatas and Partitas for Violin, as a group. I refuse to separate out the Chaconne, they’re all sublime.
2. The Cello Suite no. 5, with the Devil’s Fugue.
3. The Passacaglia & Fugue.
4. Brandenburg no. 5.
5. Orchestral Suite no. 3. Minus the Air; the Goldberg Air is more Bachlike for me, anyway.
6. The Double Violin Concerto.
7. Chromatic Fantasy and Fugue. Bonus points because Glenn Gould said it was Bach for people who don’t like Bach.
8. The Capriccio for the departure of a dear brother.
9. The keyboard Toccatas.
10. The St Anne Prelude and Fugue.

Yes, I know there are some gaps there, and some of the choices are a bit eccentric.

A friend of mine was listening to Telemann’s solo violin music, to understand better what was so good about Bach’s solo violin music; I followed his lead. And you know, I like Telemann’s solo violin music. It’s not sublime, but I disagree with Jordan Henderson that every piece of music I ever listen to must be sublime.

As the Greek proverb goes: even a priest gets bored of too much Kyrie Eleison.

For the same reason, I made a point of reading Marlowe, to understand Shakespeare better. It’s context. And it’s pretty good in and of itself. It doesn’t have to be the best for it to be good and worthwhile. That’s zero-sum thinking.

This question comes up a lot in different guises. Let me put up a related question.

Let’s say some contemporary of Beethoven’s—in fact, a classmate of Beethoven’s—started writing music a century ahead of his time. With polyrhythms, and atonality, and all that nice Stravinsky stuff.

What would Beethoven make of him?

I give you: Anton Reicha, and his 36 Fugues (Reicha).

Beethoven’s reaction?

Ludwig van Beethoven, who dismissed Reicha’s method for turning the fugue into something that is no longer a fugue (“daß die Fuge keine Fuge mehr ist”)

Not clear that Beethoven even noticed the polyrhythms.

What happens if your music is 100 years ahead of its time? It simply doesn’t compute for your contemporaries; and they ignore it.

Listening to Reicha’s fugues is trippy, btw. You see what he’s doing with his experimentation; and then all of a sudden, you’re catapulted back into the world of the Mozart toy piano. (Yes, the recording I have is fortepiano.)

Yeah, it’s Psalm 91. Forget I asked. From DailyTehillim – Home Page , it looks like the transliteration is pretty good.

Curious whether Psalm 91 had established use as a phylactery or in exorcisms.

EDIT: Per Jewish and Christian Scripture as Artifact and Canon , Psalm 91 was used in phylacteries against demons as far back as Qumran! Woah…