I'd prefer to learn the language to read it in the original form, but it's vice versa, people learn the language from translations of Homer.
Ancient Greek was not one language. Like any language, it had multiple dialects and evolved significantly over time. The big one is Ionic Greek, which was the source of the Greek of three time periods scholars care about: Homeric Greek, the language of Homer, named for him; Attic Greek, the language of the "golden age" of Athens; and Koiné Greek, the language of early Christian texts.
An analogy I've heard a few times is to compare Homeric Greek to Chaucer's English; Attic to Shakespeare's English; and Koiné to modern vernacular.
The usual approach is to teach Attic, since it has a large, well-understood corpus and offers the easiest path to either of the other two (in much the same way that it'd be easier to get to Chaucer if you started by learning Shakespearean English). That's how it was taught when I did Greek in college, for example; we started with simple contrived texts in Attic Greek, then moved into reading selections from Athenian figures like Plato and Aristophanes and Euripides. The very back of the book had short passages from Homer for truly ambitious students, but we didn't get into them.
I think that analogy is pretty apt, given that Koine is readily understandable by modern Greeks. Priests in churches today read the original passages from the third century BC in sermons.
That's an interesting take. In England, for O level (hence a few years younger than college age) we did both Plato and Homer as set books. I think the reasoning was that yes the language differences are challenging, but it's important to encompass both to really appreciate the language and culture.
Ancient Greek was not one language. Like any language, it had multiple dialects and evolved significantly over time. The big one is Ionic Greek, which was the source of the Greek of three time periods scholars care about: Homeric Greek, the language of Homer, named for him; Attic Greek, the language of the "golden age" of Athens; and Koiné Greek, the language of early Christian texts.
An analogy I've heard a few times is to compare Homeric Greek to Chaucer's English; Attic to Shakespeare's English; and Koiné to modern vernacular.
The usual approach is to teach Attic, since it has a large, well-understood corpus and offers the easiest path to either of the other two (in much the same way that it'd be easier to get to Chaucer if you started by learning Shakespearean English). That's how it was taught when I did Greek in college, for example; we started with simple contrived texts in Attic Greek, then moved into reading selections from Athenian figures like Plato and Aristophanes and Euripides. The very back of the book had short passages from Homer for truly ambitious students, but we didn't get into them.