Featured Greek Grammars

I do my own self.

 

Not me! That would be a huge job.

 

There is a textbook by the faculty of Bob Jones University, put out by BJU Press: A Handbook for New Testament Greek, 4th ed. You can find it here: New Testament Greek Handbook (5th ed.) | BJU Press. I wish they had listed the authors; I don't like anonymous authorship. Having said that, the preface to the third addition is by Samuel Schlaiter, one of their ancient language profs, so I assume he is the principle author

It has a unique approach, combining both beginning and intermediate courses into one textbook. That makes it a hefty tome at 348 pages in my 3rd ed. It is a wire bound book, which is okay, but I prefer hardbound for textbooks, and a hardy, long-lasting hardbound at that!

The beginning course consists of 33 lessons in 139 pages, manageable but more lessons than Black, . Then there is a middle section, "Guided Readings in First John," of about 28 pages. Then comes the intermediate course, about 79 pages, which seems kind of short, until you notice that there are 15 appendixes! I assume that those would come handy as supplementary to the textbook section. Then come the obligatory verb charts and the standard dictionaries, "English-Greek Lexicon" and "Greek-English Lexicon" of the vocabulary words. (I think it is a mistake to call this short dictionary a "lexicon," as incomplete as it must be.)

Unfortunately, there is no general index--always handy in a textbook. Also, there is little on verbal aspect except brief statements at the beginning of each lesson on verbs, telling the kind of action.

The homework exercises for both the beginning and intermediate grammars are in a different book, A Workbook for New Testament Greek, by Brian Hand. The answers are given, also.

 

Very useful.

 

Here is a PDF of Machen's grammar I found on the Internet.

 

Here is a PDF of the Davis beginning grammar.

 

Samuel Green's basic grammar, A Brief Introduction to New Testament Greek, came out in 1911. It is a true oddity, with 79 short chapters, and nothing about the verb until the very last chapter. Scattered among the chapters are homework exercises presented as chapters, which is also kind of odd.

On the plus side, it does have the obligatory dictionaries at the end. And it uses the five case format which I like. However, all in all, this grammar is quite out of date, and would be very difficult to teach from or learn from. Nevertheless, I'll attach a PDF of it, and you can take a look at this historical oddity. As I recall, it was widely used 100 years ago.

 

In the 4th edition, the verbs start at Lesson 15 (out of 36). That's kind of late, IMO. Maybe that's why I only used Mounce for one year before switching to Black.

 

Just one more thing about Machen's grammar. Unfortunately, it did not have the answers to the homework problems in an appendix, as do most other beginning grammars. However, one can buy a separate volume by David L. Thompson, Study Guide for J. Gresham Machen's New Testament Greek for Beginners. This is what I used in Japan when Machen's was the only beginning grammar in Japanese.

Check it out here: https://www.amazon.com/Study-Gresha...+l.+study+guide+for+machen's...,aps,74&sr=8-1

 

Before I discuss the “elephant in the room,” William Mounce’s popular and massive beginning grammar (415 pages; maybe I can do that on Monday), I’d like to recommend a DVD set by him that is very helpful to those who cannot take a class in the language but want to learn, or those who need to do a review. “The Biblical Greek Primer” is a set of three DVDs that does not claim to give a complete course, but only to help the uninitiated. It says on the box, “Learn enough Greek to understand your Strong’s Bible and other Bible study tools.” I do recommend it if you fit in the above categories. Checking it out on Amazon, I see that it may be hard to find, though.

 

The most used beginning grammar is Basics of Biblical Greek Grammar, by William D. Mounce (Zondervan, 2019). I recently got a free copy of the 4th edition to look at, since I'm a Greek prof. The cover states that over 400,000 copies have been sold. That is a huge number for a basic Greek grammar, showing that this is the preferred textbook of many, many Greek profs!

I taught just one year with the 3rd edition, simply because that was the textbook used by the previous prof, and I didn't have time to compare others and make a good decision. All in all it was a good textbook, though somewhat lengthy for a beginning Greek grammar at 414 pages (4th ed.), not counting the appendixes. One definite improvement with this edition is that unlike the 3rd ed., which was "deep and wide," this one is normal book size.

The great thing about this textbook is the extras. There is a website with lectures and essays (www.billmounce.com), a vocabulary app (FlashWorks, with a cute cartoon prof), a workbook (Basics of Biblical Greek Workbook, by Mounce), etc.

Mounce does use some linguistics, but not as much as Black. I found Black to be more useful in this area, such as his teaching on morphemes.

Perhaps the main reason I switched is that Mounce has a complicated system of telling the student how to remember paradigms, such as his eight "noun rules." In my way of teaching, it seems easier just to tell the students to memorize the paradigm. Those noun rules seem complicated. They may be more helpful or better pedagogy in the long run, but I only have the kids for two semesters! And so it goes.

 

I hope they reissue it.

 

I just thought of something. One reason I like David Alan Black's beginning grammar is that he has a chart with instructions on how to write the Greek alphabet. Looking at the other grammars I've discussed so far, none of them do that: Machen, Davis, BJU, Green, not even Mounce. In fact, I've borrowed two more from my son, Baugh and Porter, and they don't do it either.

Now I have to say, American students are lousy at following directions, so many of them develop their own way of writing and don't pay attention to Black or to me! But at least it's there if they need it!

I'll attach my own such chart that I used with Machen in Japan. Notice the numbers for each stroke. That's how Japanese kids learn to write those crazy Chinese characters.

 

S. M. Baugh wrote A New Testament Greek Primer, 2nd ed. (2009). It is a useful, pretty standard approach, with some use of linguistics. The answer keys are in the back for the exercises, including translation sentences.

The physical format has holes so that it can be put in a 3 ring binder, and I can see how that might be helpful. There are 30 chapters, a nice length for getting through in two semesters. It has some nice practice sections at the end of each chapter, and lays out the paradigms in a nice font. (Aside: the absolute worst Greek font I've ever seen is in the UBS The Greek New Testament, 4th ed. Really tough to read.)

One weak point is that the normal verb charts using λύω are lacking. That's pretty much a standard, and very useful feature, so it's surprising not to find them. I probably would not use this textbook, but it's not bad. The fact that this is the 2nd edition shows that it is being used fairly widely.