[b-greek] Re: Interlinear Bibles

From: Susan Jeffers (SusanJeffers@compuserve.com)
Date: Sun Dec 02 2001 - 06:09:24 EST


Hi Robin --

Let me be a bit countercultural here --

I certainly agree that over-reliance on interlinear Bibles can be
detrimental to one's long-term total comprehension of Greek, BUT they're
great for someone who wants read the Bible in Greek and may or may not ever
get beyond a beginning knowledge of the language. Which is most people who
start, whether they know it or not.

My own husband has been stalled at the
interlinear-and-occasionally-look-the-word-up stage for over a decade,
whereas I've gone on to actually learn the grammar and lurk on b-greek.
When we go to a Bible study group, he'll read along in his interlinear and
sometimes ask me to explain some point if it seems germane. Which works
great for us. He's just about gotten to the point where he wants me to sit
down with him and go back over the alphabet so he can sound out the words
better. Since his use of an interlinear was what got me interested in
learning Greek in the first place, I can't complain too much.

[Lest you scoff, we're doing HTML the same way -- he got me interested in
web pages but barely knew what HTML was, I've been actually studying and
learning it and helping him understand what's what and we're working
together on a web page for his business; he knows a little more HTML each
time we work on the page, by a purely inductive method. While I think of
it, I have a link to an amazing online audio Greek New Testament, and one
to a large-print text, if you want to try that out as an audio-visual aid.
I like to hear the Greek spoken and read along. Also I'm hoping to work
with someone I met on this list to put up some additional study aids for
homeschoolers. See www.read-the-bible.org.]

So back to your actual questions. For a textbook I like Mounce too, and
used it when I taught Greek I last time. But it's pricey and depending on
your learning style can be kind of annoying. My homeschooling friend and I
are using "Teach Yourself New Testament Greek" by D F Hudson, which is
brief and to-the-point. I'm working on some exercises and practice stuff
to supplement it, which I hope to post. I just did an audio tape and some
study sheets for the Lord's Prayer; EMail me later if y'all get to the
point where that might be helpful. I got a lot out of just repeatedly
reading the Bible passages onto the tape!

Since you already have a Strong's Concordance, let me suggest an
interlinear with Strongs numbers. I bought mine as a 2-volume set quite
some time ago, and still find them really useful (Hendrickson I believe is
the publisher). Of course there are a *lot* of textual issues, but I don't
think there will ever be the wide availability of study helps keyed to
other GNT texts for people who don't know a lot of Greek as already exist
for the Strong's system. I also have volume called "The NKJV Greek English
Interlinear New Testament" (Nelson 1994) which I like because it has
footnotes that single out the most important differences between the
Majority Text, the Textus Receptus, and the NA/UBS that scholars and the
modern translators follow. This gives me a very handy way to bridge the
gap (in Bible study groups for example) between the way the King James
reads and the modern translations. Also it has little word studies and a
nice index of key Greek words.

Whatever you buy, I hope you can get your hands on an actual copy
beforehand, and not just order over the Internet. I've found "look and
feel" to be as important as anything else, and personal reactions are hard
to predict sight-unseen.

If I can be of any help, feel free to EMail me off-list -- I'm not nearly
as expert at Greek as many on this list, but I do like helping folks get
started.

Grace and peace of the Lord to you,

Susan Jeffers
susanjeffers@compuserve.com

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