21st Century Classical Greek -- modality

So we’re studying afairisetai, which the Perseus Word Tool suggests might be a “future perfect”, which in our schema is not a perfective but a passive of the imperfective conceptual. It turned out that we had a transitive context, in which it is impossible to use passive morphology. I also crossed out a base voice assignment because I couldn’t think of a way that taking something would not be deliberate, requiring executive voice.

τῆς γὰρ ἐμπορίας οὐκ οὔσης, οὐδ᾽ ἐπιμειγνύντες ἀδεῶς ἀλλήλοις οὔτε κατὰ γῆν οὔτε διὰ θαλάσσης, νεμόμενοί τε τὰ αὑτῶν ἕκαστοι ὅσον ἀποζῆν καὶ περιουσίαν χρημάτων οὐκ ἔχοντες οὐδὲ γῆν φυτεύοντες, ἄδηλον ὂν ὁπότε τις ἐπελθὼν καὶ ἀτειχίστων ἅμα ὄντων ἄλλος ἀφαιρήσεται, τῆς τε καθ᾽ ἡμέραν ἀναγκαίου τροφῆς πανταχοῦ ἂν ἡγούμενοι ἐπικρατεῖν, οὐ χαλεπῶς ἀπανίσταντο, καὶ δι᾽ αὐτὸ οὔτε μεγέθει πόλεων ἴσχυον οὔτε τῇ ἄλλῃ παρασκευῇ.

The only option left from the word tool is “aor subj”, the dreaded subjunctive. It is dreaded because we get taught that it is used in conditional for “future more vivid” and the question is, “more vivid than what?” How much more vivid does it have to be, to use subjunctive?

It’s a fuzzy definition and in the 21^st century we have a more objective one.

Languages have a way of expressing things that are uncertain, things that are probable, things that you want to say while showing that you’re not invested in the truth of what you’re saying. Languages have different ways of saying these things; sometimes it’s morphology, sometimes it’s periphrastic (using auxiliary words). English modality tends to be periphrastic; Biblical Hebrew has morphology for non-indicative modalities.

I generally go with three classes of modality besides the indicative: deontic (imperatives and wishes); epistemic (investment in truth); and oblique.

Oblique is all over Torah in Biblical Hebrew. It generally appears in a two-clause statement. There’s a main clause which states something generally or specifically known. There’s a subordinate clause with a specific verb morphology, the truth of which is instantly accepted on the strength of the main clause. Most of the subordinate clauses are purpose or result clauses; a large number are cause or effect clauses; one or two are conditional.

Greek is different. The oblique in Classical Greek is an X that will  probably happen. It is not guaranteed like an indicative verb; there are grounds for thinking that it is true, but it’s not hard evidence.

This is why oblique shows up in some conditionals, in the protasis (“if” clause). This is a proposition for which there is no exact evidence, but it is likely to be true.

Oblique also shows up in persuasive speeches presenting an action that is eminently possible, but for which the speaker doesn’t want to issue an imperative. An imperative (which is deontic modality) would be pretty close to an ultimatum. The speaker who uses an oblique is trying to be persuasive, not arrogant.

Because an oblique is only probable, its negation is mi. I said I would give you a good reason why mi is used for anybody who might fall into a given class and this is it; the speaker is not signing up that 100% of people deserve to have a certain adjective applied to them, but some people do deserve it. The speaker uses ou only when he is sure that the group he is talking about deserves the adjective.

There’s just one more issue with the word tool assignment and that’s for next week.