Twenty Centuries as Twenty Days

Greek at PLTS is very different from Greek at Fuller. At Fuller, the classes were structured as if the students were going on to get a PhD in Biblical Languages. I'm fairly certain that wasn't my track, so taking Greek at Fuller didn't last very long for various reasons (my right hand being in a cast for four months was one of the biggest reasons). I'm taking Greek again at PLTS, and it's a very different environment than Fuller. Greek here is much more laid back and taught as an application for ministry; if we're interested in learning more about the language, the professor is extremely helpful with resources to further advance our knowledge.

The professor at PLTS shared a poem with us the first day of class. It was written by Czeslaw Milosz in Berkeley in 1968. When he was in his 60s, he started learning Biblical Greek and Hebrew, and the following poem is about his experience.

You asked me what is the good of reading the Gospels in Greek.
I answer that it is proper that we move our finger
Along letters more enduring than those carved in stone,
And that, slowly pronouncing each syllable,
We discover the true dignity of speech.
Compelled to be attentive we shall think of that epoch
No more distant than yesterday, though the heads of caesars
On coins are different today. Yet still it is the same eon.
Fear and desire are the same, oil and wine
And bread mean the same. So does the fickleness of the throng
Avid for miracles as in the past. Even mores,
Wedding festivities, drugs, laments for the dead
Only seem to differ. Then, too, for example,
There were plenty of persons whom the text calls
Daimonizomenoi, that is, the demonized
Or, if you prefer, the bedeviled (as for "the possessed"
It's no more than the whim of a dictionary).
Convulsions, foam at the mouth, the gnashing of teeth
Were not considered signs of talent.
The demonized had no access to print and screens,
Rarely engaging in arts and literature.
But the Gospel parable remains in force:
That the spirit mastering them may enter swine,
Which, exasperated by such a sudden clash
Between two natures, theirs and the Luciferic,
Jump into water and drown (which occurs repeatedly).
And thus on every page a persistent reader
Sees twenty centuries as twenty days
In a world which one day will come to its end.