[B-Greek] Preferred Lexicon

Albert Pietersma albert.pietersma at sympatico.ca
Sat Dec 29 21:28:35 EST 2007


Far it from me to cast aspersions on LSJ qua lexicon of Classical  
and, to an extent, post-Classical Greek. Yet, to the extent that  
Septuagintal Greek is relevant for the NT, it bears noting that LSJ  
is not very good at all——a fact recognized by all LXX lexicographers  
of my acquaintance.  As John Lee argued almost forty years ago  
(Glotta 47 [1969] 234-242), the 1968 LSJ Supplement, and by extension  
LSJ itself, repeatedly created "new" senses of well-established Greek  
words on the basis of their translational context, without  
attestation in compositional literature and without due regard for  
linguistic relation to the Hebrew (Aramaic) source text. Thus from a  
LXX perspective I would offer this caveat: senses of words based  
solely on the LXX and without attestation elsewhere might best be  
taken cum grano salis——until proven otherwise. That is not to say  
that LSJ didn't know their Greek, but it is to say that reliable  
lexicographical conclusions presuppose sound lexicographical method.
Al

On Dec 29, 2007, at 8:25 PM, Hugh Donohoe Jr. wrote:

> I found this comment by a professor on a review of
> BDAG. I was just wondering if others shared his
> opinion?
>
> "As far as how this lexicon competes with others, I
> offer this opinion. The classical lexicon by Liddell
> and Scott remains the best lexicon even for New
> Testament. My reasons are as follows. First, the
> definitions offered in Liddell/Scott are so precise
> that I have never found them to be wrong and seldom
> found them inadequate. The men who put it together had
> a masterful knowledge of Greek. Second, Liddell/Scott
> gives words definitions that the student can memorize,
> unlike Danker, which still provides too wide a range
> of semantic possibilities (often entrees are clouded
> with dozens of possible meanings, none of which are
> truly necessary if a student has a basic definition
> with which to work). Third, with Liddell/Scott, one
> can see what the word meant in classical writers and
> can see how it developed in the Hellenistic period."
>
>
>        
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