by Greg Gwin<\/p>\n
As we study and discuss the New Testament there is sometimes a reference made to things that are contained in the original language. Someone will mention that “the Greek says” this or that. It’s not a bad thing to try to understand something about the meaning of words as used by the inspired writers, but a couple of warnings are in order.<\/p>\n
First, there are relatively few real scholars of the Greek language, and there are none <\/b>who have become such by spending a few hours looking at reference books or following links on the Internet. Not even those who have enrolled in one or two semesters of Greek studies at a college or university are qualified as true experts in this complicated field of study. This being the case, it is highly unlikely – effectively impossible – that the average person is going to find some undiscovered ‘nugget’ of information hiding in the Greek that was never noticed by those who have spent long years of dedicated work studying and learning the language.<\/p>\n
Once, in a discussion of the meaning of certain words in an important New Testament text, one fellow made it a point to emphasize his high marks in two semesters of Greek during his college days. He then proceeded to claim that the established authorities were wrong and that he had a better understanding of what the words meant and how the passage should be translated. There was little use in further discussion because he had – at least in his own mind – settled the matter with some ‘insider’ knowledge of what was ‘in the Greek.’ How foolish!<\/p>\n
Additionally, we should never convey the idea that the average person who has never studied Greek is incapable of comprehending the will of God. The truth is that large teams of competent researchers have combined their efforts to produce some excellent translations into the English language. Any diligent student today can take these versions and fully understand what God would have him to do. It may very well be – and often is the case – that a guy who couldn’t tell an ‘alpha’ from an ‘omega’ knows more about the real sense of a Bible text than another individual who has trouble ‘seeing it’ from behind his pile of Greek reference books.<\/p>\n
Any and all efforts to fully understand the inspired Word and apply it to our daily lives are commendable. But, be cautious about novel<\/strong> interpretations and conclusions that are based upon claims about what is “in the Greek.”<\/p>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" by Greg Gwin As we study and discuss the New Testament there is sometimes a reference made to things that are contained in the original language. Someone will mention that “the Greek says” this or that. It’s not a bad thing to try to understand something about the meaning of words as used by the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[1574,530,964],"class_list":["post-65092","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article","tag-greek-language","tag-interpretation","tag-understanding-the-bible"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":18510,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/its-greek-to-me\/","url_meta":{"origin":65092,"position":0},"title":"It’s Greek To Me","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"April 17, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"by Roger Blackwelder Some questions were raised recently about the value of having a knowledge of New Testament Greek.\u00a0 Some have used arguments based on the translations of words to authorize immorality that the Bible clearly condemns.\u00a0 This usage of Greek is disturbing; it casts a shadow on an otherwise\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Article"","block_context":{"text":"Article","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/article\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-content\/uploads\/2008\/04\/Greek-Manuscript.png?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":28649,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/is-thayers-greek-lexicon-bad\/","url_meta":{"origin":65092,"position":1},"title":"Is Thayer’s Greek Lexicon bad?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"August 29, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I was just in a conversation with a person who quoted you as saying that you think that Thayer's Greek Lexicon is a false interpretation of the Greek language.\u00a0 Is this true?\u00a0 If so, what interpreters of the Greek language do you consult with, or do you have enough\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7470,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/must-a-preacher-teach-from-the-greek-and-hebrew-text\/","url_meta":{"origin":65092,"position":2},"title":"Must a preacher teach from the Greek and Hebrew text?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"September 18, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: I would like you to answer a question for me. There's a person here in our city teaching from his basement or another room he has rented. He teaches Greek and Hebrew lessons and he also appears on TV. This person teaches that if your pastor isn't teaching from\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":39665,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/what-language-was-the-new-testament-written-in\/","url_meta":{"origin":65092,"position":3},"title":"What language was the New Testament written in?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"July 11, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: What is the real Greek of the New Testament? Koine Greek or Aramaic? Wikipedia says suggests it is Aramaic Greek, but I was taught it was Koine Greek but you can find many websites that say it was Koine Greek, this has become very confusing to me. Which is\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":37328,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/should-we-trust-the-translation-of-the-bible-since-languages-change\/","url_meta":{"origin":65092,"position":4},"title":"Should we trust the translation of the Bible since languages change?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"February 22, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Hi, I was wondering, should we be so confident to trust the translation of the Bible, seeing that language changes and the Greek spoken back then is most likely not the current Greek. Also with English and any other language, Language changes through time, words and meanings sometimes change\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":19744,"url":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/why-are-translations-in-greek-instead-of-hebrew-the-language-jesus-spoke-in\/","url_meta":{"origin":65092,"position":5},"title":"Why are translations in Greek instead of Hebrew, the language Jesus spoke in?","author":"Jeffrey Hamilton","date":"August 1, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Question: Why are all of your translations in Greek instead of Hebrew, which would be the language Jesus spoke in? Answer: The following is specific toward Matthew, which is usually the one book people like to claim was originally written in Hebrew:\u00a0Was Matthew originally written in Hebrew or Aramaic? The\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Answer"","block_context":{"text":"Answer","link":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/category\/answer\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65092","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=65092"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65092\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=65092"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=65092"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lavistachurchofchrist.org\/cms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=65092"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}