Day 4

Day 4 started with Professor So Miyagawa (National Institute for Japanese Language and Linguistics) offering the lecture „Time and space în Ancient Egyptian and Coptic – A very linguistic perspective". He presented an overview of the long history of Egyptian language, beginning with the chronology and geographical space of Egypt, the variety of languages spoken in ancient Egypt (Semitic languages, Persian, Greek, Nubian, Meroitic, etc.), the Coptic dialects, focusing on some examples of semantic changes and grammaticalization occurred along the different stages of Egyptian language development. He also presented the modern linguistic concerns for vowel reconstruction and pronunciation.

Dr. Ștefan Zară (Archbishopric of Bucharest) held a seminar on ancient Greek, presenting Saint Gregory of Nyssa's teaching on time and eternity of God. The students in Classics read and translated a passage in ancient Greek from "The Life of Moses" PG 44, 404-405. Time intertwines with space only for the created world and for the human being, who is not able to conceive God's perfection and eternity. The present separates the past from the future, but the human being, waiting for his salvation, is not able to possess time. Time exists in eternity for the divinity, while for the saints, time is a unity transfigured in Christ, as there is an ontological continuity between time and eternity in God's love.