Help with translation

Greek Learning Greek
1

Hey, I can’t seem to translate these sentences:

  1. πολλῶν ὁ καιρὸς γίγνεται διδάσκαλος
    What I get is: the right time becomes a teacher of many things. What’s the subject? if it’s ὁ καιρὸς, then what is the role of διδάσκαλος? What is the predicate? and why is πολλῶν in genitive?
  2. σύν μυρίοις τὰ καλὰ γίγνεται πόνοις
    What I got is: " together with many things, the beautiful becomes suffering". Is that correct? why is πόνοις in dative?
  3. βίον πορίζου πάντοθεν, πλὴν ἐκ κακῶν
    What I got is: provide life from every side, except by evil.
    I read all the definition of these words, yet I feel they simply don’t add up to a sentence. what is “to provide life”? why is κακῶν in adverb?
  4. …πολλὰ ψεύδονται ἀοιδοί
    What I got is: “The singers lie often”
    But then - why is πολλὰ not in masculine?

Thanks

2

  1. You got it more or less right. In this context, καιρός is something like “the critical moment” rather than “the right time”. διδάσκαλος, or more precisely διδάσκαλος πολλῶν, is predicative. Something like: “The critical moment will turn out to be the teacher of many things”.

  2. “Nice things come with many pains” σύν μυρίοις πόνοις go together, hence the datives.

  3. Not sure how to interpret this without any context, perhaps βίος here is more like “livelihood”, “subsistence”, not just “life”. “Make your living out of anything except evil things”.

  4. Accusatives, especially adjectives in the neuter (πολύ, πολλά, μέγα, πρῶτον), are often used as adverbs in Greek. See Smyth 1606-1611.