Punctuation in the Greek

Jim West jwest at highland.net
Mon Aug 2 07:47:13 EDT 1999


At 11:54 PM 8/1/99 +0000, you wrote:
>I am a novice when it comes to Greek, but I have heard that the there was 
>no punctuation in the original Greek.  Is that true? 

Yes.  The oldest mss of the NT had no punctuation- and in fact no spaces
between words on the line.

> If so, how does one 
>discern the intention of the author? 

Its not really hard at all.  Mss were written to be read aloud- and if you
think about it- when you are speaking there is generally no break in sounds
until you reach the end of your thought.

> Your comments would be appreciated as 
>would any resources that you could refer me to.  Thank you.

A look at any standard introduction to the text of the New Testament will
discuss this fact.

Best,

Jim

+++++++++++++++++++++++++
Jim West, ThD
email- jwest at highland.net
web page-  http://web.infoave.net/~jwest




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