“BTW, tell your son that the old Greek Classics major says bravo...”
Thank you. I'll relay that. He seems to be very good with languages. He's 13 now, finishing up 8th grade. When he was younger, he taught himself much of “elvish” from Tolkien. About three years ago, he started teaching himself Latin. This school year, although he's homeschooled, he was invited by a local Catholic high school to come for one course - Latin. Apparently, he'd taught himself enough Latin on his own that he tested into the second year of high school Latin.
He'll be starting Greek next year, along with more Latin. He's only 13, so who knows what he'll eventually do, but since he started with the Latin, he's been strongly considering majoring in classics in college. He started to teach himself Greek this spring, but decided to hold off until summer, or maybe just wait until he has it in the fall.
“By the way, the ablative form is also completely consistent with ‘from the Son’;”
That's true. That's part of the ambiguity. The ablative can be translated in a number of different ways. My son actually showed me his text book that showed a bunch of different ways the ablative could be translated, given various contexts. It was surprising to me. It makes it clearer to me why there is some controversy concerning “filioque.” It's an inherently ambiguous term.
When my son looks at the Latin, he says it's as if it's trying to say two different things - “from the Father by means of the Son,” but also “from the Father and the Son.” Perhaps both were meant, the first because that is accurately what happens, but the second to counter the Arians.
Just a guess from someone who has a tough enough time with English.
sitetest
One of the greatest teachers of my life, one of those who made me what I am, was my Latin teacher when I was 13 years old. She instilled in me a love for Latin that lead through a college major to both grad school and the Law and which I carry to this very day. 13 is a great age to be when one learns to read Latin well. There’s just so much fabulous stuff to read!