[B-Greek] Transition from Classical to Koine

alexali at internode.on.net alexali at internode.on.net
Sun Dec 27 20:36:05 EST 2009


  
 
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There are differences, and you could get text books and analyse these. 
But Barry is right. Jump in, and start reading. Reading NT Greek will 
be far more helpful to you than reading grammar books. My personal 
experience was to start with classical Greek, because the university 
at which I studied did not offer NT Greek, though the NT was the field 
of my interest.   
 
	When I then made the transition that you speak of, from classical to 
koine, I found that the koine was relatively easy, and in some ways NT 
idioms seemed to me closer to English. If I read Barry aright, he is 
saying that the best thing to do is to get into reading the NT without 
being concerned about differences between classical and NT Greek that 
you will encounter, and with that I entirely agree.  
 
	If I may venture one further comment, it is that a potentially 
deeper difficulty is that in moving to reading NT Greek, you will very 
likely be moving to reading a text where you are familiar with one or 
more translations. This can actually hinder us from seeing what the 
Greek is saying, because we have a forward-echo of the sense from our 
knowledge of the translations. Your classical studies may be like mine 
- wrestling with material I wasn't familiar with; and there is much 
value in this. However, I'm not seeking to dissuade you from the 
reading of NT Greek! - just flagging something that may be worth your 
considering as you begin your transition.  
 
	Alex Hopkins  
 
	Melbourne, Australia 
 On Mon 28/12/09 11:50 AM , Stephen Kirkman stephen.kirkman at live.com 
sent: 
 Aren't there certain differences between the two though (or so I've 
been told)?  
 > From: nebarry at verizon.net [1]  
 > To: b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org [2]  
 > Date: Sun, 27 Dec 2009 19:47:23 -0500  
 > Subject: Re: [B-Greek] Transition from Classical to Koine  
 >  
 >  
 >  
 > --------------------------------------------------  
 > From: "Stephen Kirkman"   
 > Sent: Sunday, December 27, 2009 5:34 PM  
 > To:   
 > Subject: [B-Greek] Transition from Classical to Koine  
 >  
 > >  
 > > Are there any materials available for transitioning from 
Classical Greek  
 > > to Koine? I only have a couple semesters of Classical, but would 
like to  
 > > start reading the New Testament?  
 > >  
 >  
 > Just pick up a copy of the NT and start reading. You won't have 
any trouble  
 > at all, beyond the normal sorts of obstacles faced by all students 
 
 > transitioning out of elementary to reading actual authors.  
 >  
 > N.E. Barry Hofstetter  
 >  
 > Fecisti nos ad te et inquietum est cor nostrum, donec requiescat 
in te...  
 > -- Augustine, Confessions 1:1  
 >  
 > http://mysite.verizon.net/nebarry/ [5]  
 > http://my.opera.com/BarryHofstetter/blog/ [6]  
 >  
 > ---  
 > B-Greek home page: http://www.ibiblio.org/bgreek [7]  
 > B-Greek mailing list  
 > B-Greek at lists.ibiblio.org [8]  
 > http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/b-greek [9]  
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