Explaining the Greek Verb System

schulc at cuaa.edu schulc at cuaa.edu
Tue Jun 4 04:18:04 EDT 2002


Friends,
Perhaps I should rename this thread. I think the topic has shifted to "where to 
begin teaching Greek." I arrived at a university where I had started 14 years 
ago by learning classical Greek and I found that they had reverted to beginning 
with Koine. I'm switching it back this year. I have found the recent arguments 
in this thread for and against this decision very interesting.
One additional point: one becomes more sensitive to the range of meaning of 
vocabulary words through exposure to additional texts. Too many students of the 
Bible study the Bible and the Bible alone as though it is a set of isolated 
texts and not part of a historical context. Beginning the student with non-
Biblical texts will thus have the advantage of exposing them to the world in 
which the Scriptures were written. The example I've been using lately to defend 
this shift: When we translate 'oikos' we shouldn't think of a suburban ranch 
home. I've also found support for my shift back to classical from a survey 
among recent graduates who said that our school had done an excellent job in 
teaching them Greek grammar but a poor job in teaching them the cultures of the 
ancient world.

Rev. Charles R. Schulz
Assistant Professor of Religion
Concordia University, Ann Arbor
(734) 995-7384

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