Koine Greek was similar, and, of course, there was little punctuation at that time. Bible translators generally work from the current scholarly editions of the Greek text, which are carefully punctuated, but if one looks at, for example, the letters of Paul, deciding what the boundaries of a sentence are is neither easy nor obvious. This is true of other ancient authors as well, and in any language where the early writing system didn't punctuate.
Herb
Herbert F. W. Stahlke, Ph.D.
Emeritus Professor of English
Ball State University
Muncie, IN 47306
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________________________________________
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar [[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of MC Johnstone [[log in to unmask]]
Sent: June 19, 2008 3:18 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: The Death of the Sentence?
Spruiell, William C wrote:
> I suspect that the comments about sentences in that piece were actually comments about punctuation. If so, I'm not really sure how to maintain the claim that clearly demarcated sentences are necessary for clear thought, given that -- in all probability -- Plato, Aristotle, etc. didn't mark sentence boundaries in writing at all. Languages always have clause complexes; writing systems may or may not orthographically mark these in various ways.
Arabic is another example of a language that does not clearly demarcate
what sentence boundaries. Until the modern period, Arabic had no
punctuation marks at all, and none appear in the Quran. The frequent
appearance of verbless sentences in Arabic may also complicate attempts
to define the Arabic sentence. I teach English to Arabs and spend a lot
of time trying to get students to write in "sentences", very loosely
described as a string of no more than ten words containing a noun and a
verb. That "rule" usually works and establishes a point from which we
can proceed. At the very least, it prevents students from slipping into
Joycean mode, which can be quite inventive but, unfortunately, violates
the canon of the good sentence imposed by EFL grammars.
Mark
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