From: Paul S. Dixon (dixonps@juno.com)
Date: Fri Apr 24 1998 - 01:19:45 EDT
B-Greekers:
I am a pastor and I majored in NT Literature and Exegesis at Dallas
Theological Seminary (Th.M, '75). In four years at Dallas I took 40
semester hours of Greek and 16 semester hours of Hebrew. Dallas Seminary
was and still remains strong in the original languages.
One of the horror stories I heard early on at DTS was the all too common
plight of students who had gone through four years of Dallas (even
non-language majors were required to take minors in Greek and Hebrew),
then never used the Greek or Hebrew again. It is unbelievable, but many
pastors today have done this very thing.
Anyhow, that story shocked me into resolving it would never happen here.
Another student and I made a pact to keep the languages up and to hold
each other accountable in years to come (he has fallen by the wayside; I
have not).
One of the things that really helped me out early on was memorizing
passages in the Greek. My first elective was the Pastoral Epistles.
Yikes, talk about hapax legomena. I didn't know any better, so I decided
to memorize Titus that semester, not for credit, but for my own
edification and joy. I also starting taking my Greek text to church and
Sunday School and following the reading in it. I soon discovered that if
I did not take my Greek text with me, either for teaching purposes or for
following along, I always wished I had.
The most significant thing I did, however, was making the resolve to
master the NT Greek and the Greek NT, by the grace of God. I have never
regretted it. I say this only to encourage others to do likewise. It
has been a tremendous blessing and joy to me, and has greatly
strengthened my ministry.
Paul Dixon
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