[B-Greek] Interlinears!

David Hindley dhindley at compuserve.com
Thu Dec 21 18:56:33 EST 2006


David,

Here's the skinny. Their usefulness is directly related to how you use them. 

I think the criticism that they tend to downplay the significance of the Greek text is not really the case. One of the things I liked about the "crib translation" manner of Greek interlinear "translations" is the fact that they *emphasize* just how fundamentally different Greek is when compared to, say, English. Matters such as word order, grammatical forms of underlying words, and the ways that different translations have dealt with Greek sentences that would be very awkward to translate word by word, jump out at you mainly because Greek is so different from what you are used to.

HOWEVER, that being said, I also make use of them with the benefit of 2 years of formal Greek education. I think that unless you are willing to take some formal Greek training *and* brush up on your English grammar (I learned more about English grammar while learning Greek than I ever did in primary/secondary school), an interlinear is not really going to help you understand what you are reading. 

So, if you have an interest in learning what the Greek NT *really* has to say, an interlinear *can* help by illuminating things you may want to study more closely as you acquire reading proficiency and study tools such as grammars and lexicons.

Good luck!

Respectfully,

Dave Hindley
Cleveland, Ohio USA

Original Message
=========================
Message: 10
Date: Tue, 19 Dec 2006 12:31:15 -0600
From: "David Anderson" <sarxws at gmail.com>
Subject: [B-Greek] Fwd:  ?`s - PLEASE HELP!
To: b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org

What's so bad about interlinears? I don't have one and was thinking of
purchasing one, but am now second guessing my plans due to your warnings.

Thanks,

David Anderson
Mobile, Alabama
==========================




More information about the B-Greek mailing list