[B-Greek] NA27 and Greek-English Dictionary

Carl W. Conrad cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Thu Oct 2 14:21:57 EDT 2003


At 1:53 PM -0400 10/2/03, Barry W. Hickey wrote:
>After reading through the archives about both current GNT editions, I came
>to be persuaded that very few people like the font of UBS4.  Many seem to be
>`distracted` when reading because of the font.  Therefore I'm leaning
>towards purchasing a copy of NA27.  Are there any versions of NA27 that
>contain a Greek-English dictionary similar to the one available with UBS4.
>If not, how important is such a dictionary for a beginning student?

It's true that some have complained about the font of UBS4, but in my
opinion, this is primarily by way of comparison with that of UBS3 which
seemed a bit "heavier." Yet the font of UBS4 is certainly easy enough to
read. Personally I've always felt that the font of the Nestle-Aland edition
is less attractive, although ultimately I think this is a matter of one's
taste: what pleases one may not please another.

The dictionary is another matter altogether. The dictionary by Barclay
Newman that's commonly offered in some editions of UBS4 is so inadequate
that even a beginning student of Greek--and perhaps ESPECIALLY a beginning
student of Greek is ill-advised to use it; it is not so much that
information in it is wrong is that it so concise and limited in scope that
one can readily be misled by using it to find one-word equivalents for the
Greek words of the GNT. One is better advised to choose one's GNT--either
UBS4 or NA27--WITHOUT the dictionary and spend any savings on a good Greek
lexicon. If a beginning student doesn't want to invest in BDAG, one might
do well to acquire one of the analytical lexica of the NT: there are
several on the market. But even a beginning student really ought to have
more information about NT Greek words than is provided in the Barclay
Newman glossary.
-- 

Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Emeritus)
1989 Grindstaff Road/Burnsville, NC 28714/(828) 675-4243
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
WWW: http://www.ioa.com/~cwconrad/



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