[B-Greek] What makes a good Greek Commentary?

Eric Ciampa ericc at ccvnow.com
Tue Apr 21 13:18:32 EDT 2009


I don't know how well it meets Marks criteria but I often pull out the  
ICC commentaries when I want some help with the Greek text. Many are  
dated but they are still quite useful, at least for me. The upside is  
that some are downloadable for free now. For example, I recently  
picked up their volume on Galatians (free to download). if anyone has  
strong opinions either way about the ICC series for greek study I  
would be interested to know.

I would also be quite interested in finding out what commentaries  
people here use for Greek.


On Apr 21, 2009, at 7:28 AM, Suttles, Andrew C. (GRC-DSI0) wrote:

> Does anyone have much experience with these Bryn Mawr commentaries?   
> I assume they are aimed at students so I would hope they would be  
> helpful for a beginning to intermediate reader.  They are  
> inexpensive, so I might pick up a few if they are useful.
>
> Andrew Suttles
> Cleveland, OH
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: b-greek-bounces at lists.ibiblio.org
>> [mailto:b-greek-bounces at lists.ibiblio.org] On Behalf Of
>> Leonard Isaksson
>> Sent: Monday, April 20, 2009 11:41 PM
>> To: b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org
>> Subject: Re: [B-Greek] What makes a good Greek Commentary?
>>
>> How about the Bryn Mawr commentary series for something concise?
>>
>> It seems to me like NT commentaries have as their business to
>> deal with the NT text and message.  Such as John Chrysostom
>> wrote commentaries that seem to me like they are longer than
>> the NT book that it covers.
>>
>> I like Zerwick.   I don't read Latin, so J. A. Bengel is not  
>> available
>> for me, haven't seen the English translation of him.
>>
>> On Apr 20, 2009, at 8:31 PM, Mark Lightman wrote:
>>
>>> I've been reading through the Iliad using several commentaries.
>>> It's been frustrating, and the experience has reminded me
>> that I never
>>> really found a good commentary to the Greek NT.  This got me
>> thinking
>>> about what makes a good Greek commentary.
>>> Three things:
>>>
>>> 1.  IT HAS TO BE COMPLETE.   A commentary has to give you help with
>>> ALL the diffficult passages.  It's frustrating to come across a
>>> difficult word or construction and look it up in several
>> commentaries
>>> and find nothing on it.  A good commentary has to somehow anticipate
>>> which passages will cause the reader trouble and hit them all.  It
>>> should probably offer a literal translation of all the really
>>> difficult passages.
>>>
>>> 2.  IT HAS TO BE CONCISE.  This is a balancing act with
>> criterion one.
>>> The commentary has to stick to the Greek, giving background
>> informaton
>>> only when it is necessary to understand the Greek.  A commentary
>>> cannot be wordy because the point is to give you the info quickly so
>>> you can get back to the text.  NT commentaries in particular
>> drive me
>>> crazy when they get into theology or homiletics-- good
>> things on their
>>> own but not what I need to unpack Greek.  A good commentary
>> cannot be
>>> longer than the text it helps explain.
>>>
>>> 3.  ITS FORMAT HAS TO BE USER FRIENDLY.  This really means the
>>> commentary has to be beneath the Greek text.  One pet peeve
>> of mine is
>>> when a commentary says stuff like "See the note on page 101 above,"
>>> Why not just repeat the essence of the note?  maybe condensed, but I
>>> hate having to flip back to the prior note.    You should be able to
>>> go from the commentary to the Greek text and back again as
>> smoothly as
>>> possible.
>>>
>>> The good news is I have found one commentary on the Iliad that meets
>>> all three criteria, a 2002 effort by Pamela Draper.  The bad
>> news is,
>>> it only covers Book 1, and I found it only after working
>> through Book
>>> 1 several times with other commentaries.  Draper's really
>> does set the
>>> standard in my mind.  She is complete AND concise and the format is
>>> great.
>>>
>>> So, what about NT Greek commentaries?  I haven't had much luck, and
>>> wonder if list members know any that meet all three of my criteria.
>>> Zerwick is
>>> fairly complete and pretty concise.  If you put him under a
>> Greek text
>>> you would'
>>> have a nice volume.  The NET Diglot is also concise and complete in
>>> the sense that is offers you help with MOST of the difficult Greek
>>> constructions, and the format could not be better, large print with
>>> everything on facing pages.
>>> Lightfoot's volumes
>>> on Paul are the best real commentaries I have ever found.  The only
>>> ones I own, the Expositor's Greek New Testament, is
>> generally neither
>>> concise nor complete, though the format is nice.
>>>
>>> Actually, I don't really need a Greek NT commentary anymore, but if
>>> list members know of any really, really GOOD commentaries on
>> anything
>>> in Greek that would meet all three criteria, let me know.  If a
>>> commentary is good enough, that may be reason enough to read a Greek
>>> text.  (Except for Thucydides.)
>>>
>>> Mark L.
>>>
>>>
>>>
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>>
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