Biblical Greek

Since Charles Darwin made the theory of evolution popular, the church has been faced with the problem of either denying the validity of evolution or finding a way to interpret the Bible that will harmonize with both an old-earth scenario and with the belief that humans evolved from lower forms of life. This article will not deny either of these scientific conclusions. Its purpose will be to discuss some of the proposed interpretations of the Bible's teachings that have been presented for the purpose of harmonizing the Bible and science, showing that some of these have serious problems. But first I will present an alterative view that has both mathematical and exegetical support to undergird it. Two benefits that are inherent in this view are its simplicity and its employment of the historical-grammatical hermeneutic. Also it does not contradict any New Testament teaching, which should be a requirement for any methodology employed to discover the Bible's teaching on human origins. I appreciate all those who have taken in hand to harmonize an inspired view of Scripture with the present views of the science community.

K Biblické řečtině. Str. 144 - 150 (Problems with the Biblical Greek)

I believe that the increased emphasis on the semiotic reading of the text with
E-
dem on internal formal grammatical construction, we can free ourselves from excessive reductionism (e.g.: in genre typology and genre criticism, or strict philological analysis genetic morphological z{consistencies of the text), but also from reductionism (regardless of non-narrative ro ofreasure of text and semantic text evidence, which are represented by reductive models). It is ultimately true that both the structuralist model and ultimately hermeneutics emphasize the fact that it is necessary to perceive and read contextually (i.e.: the entire text), not a text divided (many times violently) into one tloose parts subject to partial interpretations. On the contrary, the interpretation of individual parts of the text must be perceived with regard to the whole, not at the expense of the total and those messages of the entire text.

The purpose of this book is an “exegetical companion,” meaning anyone working on teaching or preaching from 1 Peter can use this guide as the read the Greek New Testament. The handbook does not “give all the answers” by parsing every verb. In fact, it rarely parses forms fully. What is provided is a running commentary on syntactical categories and lexical data intended to illuminate the text for teaching and preaching. This means Forbes only comments on the nuance of a particular case or verb tense if it sheds light on the meaning of the text. He assumes a great deal from the reader, especially knowledge of Greek syntax. The guide makes use of abbreviations for standard works and syntactical categories. These are all families to scholars, but frequent consultation of the abbreviations page will be necessary for beginners. It does not help much to be told a genitive is “partitive” if one does not know what a partitive genitive is!

"We have needed this book for a very long time. My students share with me time and again how frustrating it is that once out of the classroom, they lose their Greek knowledge so quickly—a knowledge that took untold hours and much hard work to acquire. And yet, maintaining facility with Greek doesn't require untold hours; it can truly take just a few minutes a day. Now, I can tell my students: Buy this book. Jonathan Kline will give you your time back. More importantly, he will remind you of why you studied Biblical Greek in the first place: in order to develop a more expansive, more nuanced, more intimate understanding of the New Testament texts and the claims that they make on the world."
–Michal Beth Dinkler, Assistant Professor of New Testament, Yale Divinity School

The technique of translating from Biblical Greek (2): Kinds of translation technique in translating ancient literature and the example of the translation of participles in the Slovak commentary translation
For a translator of ancient literature three basic techniques are considered legitimate: philological, cultural, and commentary translation – all of them respect the principle of the functional equivalence. While being linguistically faithful to the original, the philological translation chooses the most elegant way of expression. Explanatory notes are concise. The cultural translation attempts to “translate” cultural realia as well. Any commentary is built into the text of the translation itself. A commentary translation chooses such a translational equivalent that is formally closest to the original expression – it respects also the formal correspondence as far as possible. Such a translation does not have any life of its own, but forms a Siamese twin with the exhaustive textual commentary.
The commentary translation with its secondary principle of formal correspondence is often confused with the illegitimate translation technique of the literal translation. The difference between them is shown on the example of participles. Linguistic analysis of the original recognizes several kinds of usage: (1) adjective participles, (2) adverbial and predicative participles, (3) analytic verbal expressions, (4) graphic participles, (5) participles expressing purpose, (6) construction of the type ei=pen le,gwn, (7) Greek participle as the translation of the Hebrew absolute infinitive. Each of these groups should be restructured in Slovak in a different way. Within the boundaries of one group, however, the translation is consistent.

Based upon the corpus of Classical and Hellenistic Greek, the goal of this study is to analyze the lexicon of fraternity both in its diachronic evolution and from the point of view of linguistic typology. The lexicon of fraternity in Classical Greek and in non-semiticized Koine Greek can be compared to that of Classical Latin, where the word frater is free from any hyperonymical function and refers to the son of either one or both parents of the person one is referring to. The situation in Septuagintal Greek and New Testament Greek, by contrast, is similar to that of Vietnamese, where the word corresponding to ἀδελφός works as an hyperonym of the different "relatives" within the lexicon of fraternity.
Fondé sur le corpus du grec classique et hellénistique, cet article tente de préciser le lexique de la fraternité en grec, dans son évolution diachronique, en fonc-tion de la typologie linguistique. L'organisation du vocabulaire de la fraternité en grec classique et en grec koinè non sémitisé rapprochent ces états de langue d'un idiome tel que le latin classique où le terme frater, dénué de toute fonction hype-ronymique, désigne le fils de l'un ou des deux géniteurs de la personne de réfé-rence. Le grec de la Septante et celui du Nouveau Testament sont en revanche comparables à une langue telle que le vietnamien où le terme qui correspond à ἀδελφός assume dans la structure du vocabulaire de la fraternité la fonction d'hyperonyme de la proche parenté.

This paper continues the enquiry into the advisability of engaging profit making organisations to deliver academic content through the kind of relationship represented by the partnership established between the Hebrew University and eTeacherBiblical aka The Israel Institute of Biblical Studies.  Appendix B considers the statistics for the Biblical Hebrew A and Biblical Greek A semesters which both started on 22 May 2016.  The issues raised include:
1) The procedures when no student attends a scheduled lesson.
2) The procedures when no student attends a scheduled lesson for three consecutive classes.
3) The procedures for making recorded lessons available to students.
4) The procedures to ensure that students are offered all 30 classes scheduled to be taught during each semester.
5) Availability of recordings and course pages.
6) Class sizes.
7) The procedures when there is a technical difficulty which prevents a student from connecting to an end of semester examination.

Also introduced in this paper is consideration of the Institute's compliance with Israel's Consumer Protection legislation and whether students are made aware at any stage of the regulations which the eTeacher administrative staff apply when implementing the procedures listed above.  Should these procedures be considered as "matter material to a transaction" as defined by Israeli Consumer Protection Law, 5741-1981?

It is well known that interpreters of the Bible are in disagreement concerning the baptism in the Holy Spirit and concerning the place of spiritual gifts in the church today. Even though this paper includes a rather broad survey of the subject, the purpose of this upload is to share some new approaches to the study of this subject. This work will apply rules of the Greek article to certain New Testament passages in order to throw more light on the passages that deal with these subjects. Also through application of the chiasmus and through a revealing outline of 1 Corinthians 13:8-13, the author hopes to show that Paul predicted that future Christian edification, as is experienced today, would be accomplished apart from the spiritual gifts employed by the Holy Spirit in Paul''s day; rather, edification would be accomplished through the sharing of full New Testament knowledge by the believers in the spirit of love. It was not my intention "to say that God never leads his children or that God would never communicate with someone verbally. Also this essay does not assert that miracles have totally ceased; however, Paul summarizes by listing the abiding gifts of grace: “faith, hope, love, these three'" (1 Cor. 13:13; NASB). (Mayer has other uploads that deal with harmonizing the Bible and science, which prove mathematically by exegesis that the descendants of Adam and Eve married into an existing human race.)

The central thrust of Paul’s letter to the Ephesians includes the Jewish historical responsibility to the global humanity, which was newly embodied in Paul’s personal mission to the nations of the world, through the proclamation of the liberating work of God in Christ to all. This historic podium, where Abraham was the legal custodian of God’s secret cosmological agenda, became Paul’s commission in Christ. Here is a preface to this significant message today!

The Greek word κύριος (kurios ‘Lord’) carries amazing theological weight in the New Testament. It is often used to refer to Jesus, sometimes with the implication that Jesus is the “Master” or “Rabbi” of the disciples (e.g. John 13:13), other times as a merely polite term of address for an unknown male (e.g. John 4:11), and sometimes to declare Jesus as universal “Lord” of creation (e.g. Acts 10:36). The term can also be used when God the Father is the clear referent (e.g. Matthew 11:25, Acts 17:24), as well as the Holy Spirit (2 Corinthians 3:16-18). Kurios is also often used in quotations or references to the Old Testament in places where the divine Name, יהוה (YHWH), is found in the Hebrew (e.g. Matthew 4:7, Acts 15:17). Finally, in several key passages, kurios is used to quote or allude to the divine Name while also clearly referring to Jesus, thus exhibiting the astounding high Christology of
the New Testament and showing that the New Testament authors believed at an early date that Jesus is in fact YHWH, the God of Israel, made flesh—truly man and truly God.

The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate that:
1) Kurios plays an essential role in establishing the high Christology of the New Testament.
2) More than any other term, kurios is used to tie together the three members of the Trinity.
3) Contrary to claims otherwise, the term kurios functions as a single key term, regardless of whether it used in the arthrous or anarthrous condition.
4) When translating kurios, therefore, great care must be taken to preserve these essential theological roles.

(Revised version, 2022)

Hellenistic literature, having great achievements in the fields of philosophy, drama, and poetry, did not know the theological concepts and issues which underlie the texts contained in the Hebrew Bible. So when the creators of the Septuagint, and then also the authors of the New Testament, used the Greek language to convey God's inspired truths to the world, they were forced to give secular terms a new theological meaning, frequently choosing neutral words for this purpose, not burdened with negative associations. With their translation work, they built a kind of bridge between Hellenic and Jewish cultures. On the one hand, the Septuagint allowed Jews reading the Bible in Greek to remain connected not only with the religious heritage of their fathers, but also with the cultural values that were closely related to that language and its world. In turn, for the Greeks, who after some time began to appreciate this work and gained knowledge of its content, it opened vast horizons of new religious and spiritual values, which until then were completely alien to them. The work of the authors of the Septuagint was continued and developed by the authors of the New Testament, which added to their theological output many new religious and moral values arising from the teaching of Jesus Christ. That way they contributed considerably to the development of the Koinē Greek and significantly transformed the spiritual life of the people speaking the language.

In this essay I examine the contrast of kenodoxian ("empty glory") and Christ"s ekenosen ("emptying himself") to show that in humility Christ emptied himself of glory in order to accomplish the will of the Father-and thereby attaining the highest glory. The nature of true glory and the path to it I conclude to be a major theme of the letter. I believe it is in this framework that the constant exhortation to exercise the humbleness of Christ"s mind is put forward by Paul, as the true way to keep one"s eyes on the goal of doing God"s will in the endeavor to receive the true glory that only comes from God.

Revisions to the Greek NT in NA28 are restricted to the Catholic Epistles—the product of the Münster Institute’s ongoing work on the Editio critica maior. The text of the rest of the NT remains unaltered. The updated manuscript data, however, spans the apparatus of the entire NT and signals a new day for its textual history. The revised correctors of the Apocalypse in Codex Sinaiticus make the point. The proposed revisions have direct and far-reaching implications for the book’s textual history. Corrections once placed in the fourth through sixth centuries now occupy the seventh. The changes appear slight, even inconsequential—“touch ups” in support of the task of reconstruction. The clarification and re-dating of the correctors, though, represent a material shift with instant repercussions. The inclusion of new and additional witnesses—alongside of and in juxtaposition to the corrections—further portend altered textual alignments and disclose forgotten chapters in the history of textual criticism. The clarity of the new data also facilitates an examination of their limitations and unclutters the landscape for renewed textual research. The stage is set for a reappraisal of the Apocalypse’s textual history.

An overview of the variety of textual differences that exist between the Apocalypse in Codex Sinaiticus and the book in modern critical editions, thereby offering a window into the book's early readership. There is also a YouTube link to the lecture version of this paper, which was recently delivered at Samford University for their Holley Hull Lecture Series: https://vimeo.com/878444925/a35492dd8b?share=copy&fbclid=IwAR10Iu7HKuAjjcEcDdxgfT7XKqe2F6W6Bwb1cVHafNO0Yz6g4VhsIhXHMz4

Some modern scholars have brought vital discussion related to the origin language of the New Testament. Instead of being written in Greek, some of them believed that, not just partially or some words, but the whole New Testament manuscripts was originally written in Aramaic language. They are known as Aramaic Primacist. Besides historical and some other external evidences, linguistic approach also can be used to discover in what language the New Testament Manuscript originally written.

Many scholars believe that the human race has come into existence through neo-Darwinian evolution. Many religious scholars believe that God created mankind by special creation. "New Evidence for Two Human Origins" attempts to prove that God used both evolution and special creation to produce the human race. This work presents new evidence that shows that the science of evolution does not contradict the Bible. Mathematical analysis of the decrease in life spans given in the Bible and exegesis of the original languages of the biblical texts show that the descendants of Adam and Eve married into an existing human race.

In Greek for Life Merkle and Plummer want to encourage (and occasionally shame) seminary students and pastors to work hard at the task of learning Greek so they will be properly prepared to present God's word in their ministries. They especially want to gently invite the " lost Greek lamb " back to the fold in order to recover Greek skills lost by years of neglect.

This new Introduction to Biblical Greek is in many ways not new. Schwandt bases his introduction on H. P. V. Nunn, The Elements of New Testament Greek (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1913). This has been done before: J. W. Wenham published an update of The Elements of New Testament Greek in 1965 for Cambridge University Press. Elements is now in its third edition by Jeremy Duff (with a forward by David Wenham, J. W. Wenham’s son) in 2004. The third edition is considerably different in sequence than Nunn’s original text, compressing the original thirty-seven lessons into twenty chapters. Although the new edition included a few composition exercises, these exercises are greatly reduced from Nunn’s Elements.

Numbering systems (such as Strong’s) are a popular way to reference the lexemes of the Greek New Testament corpus but a straight enumeration is not without problems, particularly when there is disagreement about whether two forms are the same lexeme or not. We present a way of referencing lexemes that allows competing viewpoints to be represented simultaneously. Existing numbering systems can be mapped into this new system without any loss of granularity and new analyses can be expressed without violating the integrity of existing references into the system.

Koine Greek Grammar and its accompanying Workbook and Answer Key & Guide have been in the making for decades. It was first a small manual Kairos Greek Grammar; then it grew into a fully integrated and hyperlinked CD that has been published by Logos Bible Software (2005). Now, this current handbook––KOINE GREEK GRAMMAR: A BEGINNING-INTERMEDIATE EXEGETICAL AND PRAGMATIC HANDBOOK––has been thoroughly expanded to include my more explicit description of marked, emphatic, prominent, and pragmatic features of Greek, ideas that were nascent in KAIROS, but now grounded in a communication theory informed by Relevance Theory (Dan Sperber and Deirdre Wilson), Prominence Theory with reference to translation (Kathleen Callow), and Discourse Grammar and Pragmatics (Stephen Levinsohn, Stanley Porter, and Steven Runge). Exegetically significant aspects of Greek syntax and the use of the Greek language (i.e., pragmatics) occur strategically throughout KOINE GREEK GRAMMAR and include the following:

- conjunctions and their constraints
- point/counterpoint sets
- polysyndeton, asyndeton, correlative emphasis, and lists
- fronted modifiers for emphasis (genitive, demonstrative, quantitative)
- vocatives as thematic address
- appositional statements
- the historic present and the verb tense options in narrative
- metacomments as orienting statements
- interjections as attention getting devices
- quantitative, qualitative, interrogative, negative, and comparative types of emphasis
- special uses of the noun cases
- participle uses, including periphrastic and genitive absolutes
- special uses of the Moods
- left-(dis)locations
- discourse pragmatic uses of the article
- conditional and exception clauses

Some of these discussions will have extended Intermediate-level treatments that are placed within greyed boxes. Other significant enhancements are the inclusion of CHECK POINTS that give students a chance to practice what is being learned in each chapter along with (SUGGESTED) ANSWERS that immediately follow. Scattered throughout KOINE GREEK GRAMMAR are images of ancient realia, i.e., remnants of Mediterranean material culture including biblical and non-biblical papyri fragments, vase paintings, coins, bas-reliefs, imperial artifacts, inscriptions, funerary stele, statues, gems, temples, maps, and reconstructed scenes of life in the polis. The language and syntax of the Greek NT is contextually located in these worlds. Still present (but improved) are the CASE IN POINTS at the end of each chapter that briefly describe how particular points of Greek grammar just presented helps us when interpreting the Greek NT. In other words, the CASE IN POINT illustrates how Greek grammar is valuable as a tool for the study of the NT. 
In addition to having a full APPENDIX, VOCABULARY OF WORDS OCCURRING 20 TIMES OR MORE, and INDICES, KOINE GREEK GRAMMAR has a separate extensive WORKBOOK AND ANSWER KEY & GUIDE. that has been carefully crafted with many exercises drawn directly from biblical expressions and actual verses.

The goal of this paper is to examine the major areas of discussion when looking at homosexuality in the Bible, provide a brief survey of the different approaches used by both affirming and non-affirming scholars, and to make a choice on which arguments seem best.

La fonosemantica, sebbene sia considerata un recente sviluppo della linguistica, in realtà affonda le sue origini nella remota antichità ed anzi meglio si applica alle lingue antiche piuttosto che a quelle moderne. Pertanto può gettare luce su alcune espressioni simboliche che risultano impenetrabili ai moderni metodi d'interpretazione, come ad esempio la celeberrima metafora del “cammello nella cruna dell'ago”.

This study investigated the unusual Greek of John 20:28 in which two articular substantives have a singular referent. This study searched through the Septuagint, the Greek New Testament canon, Biblical scholars and Greek grammarians. This study analysed data from an exploratory and inductive analyses to form new hypotheses from data. In the analyses, the researcher reports that Hebraism is the reason for the unusual Greek of John 20:28. The following are the findings in this study which explains why the two articular substantives (Ὁ κύριός μου καὶ ὁ θεός μου) in John 20:28 is referring to two persons in Koine Greek but has only one person in view: (1)  The New Testament writers, acquainted with the Septuagint, followed after its usage of ὁ κύριος (The Lord) when referring to the God of Israel. Psalm 35:23, Revelation 4:11 and John 20:28 all have ὁ κύριος (The Lord). This indicates that both titles in John 20:28 are equally divine titles (2) the dative singular pronoun (αὐτῷ) in the same text is addressing a singular referent (Ἰησοῦς),  and this shows that the substantives are in the vocatical nominative (direct address) and that this is in agreement with that of Sharp (1803) and Murray Harris's results (2009).  The Greek of John 20:28 is not unusual but normative in the Septuagint. (3) It is shown that the Greek of John 20:28 is consistent with its parallels in the Septuagint, showing that its Greek is an example of Hebraism. There are three instances of Hebraism in the gospel of John (John 4:12, John 12:14, and John 28:28). Psalm 35:23 is not only a parallel but even an allusion to John 20:28 which supports its being a Hebraism. An LXX expert, Solamo (2015) had explicitly affirmed that John 20:28 is a Hebraism. Contextual analysis within the same chapter of John 20 supports these results even further due to another allusion from the LXX (Genesis 2:7, John 20:22) wherein Jesus was ascribed an attribute unique to the Jewish deity with a very supportive ὁ θεός allusion for 20:28. This finding provided objective evidence that Jesus is θεός in John 20:28.