Customer Reviews

A Grammar for New Testament Greek

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I have to say that I'm still working my way through this book, but I have several problems with the text. Too much information is stuffed into chapters, instead of being spread out to facilitate a slower, easier method to learn Greek. Also, there are almost no examples in the text to convey what is being taught. Since grammer rules are often tricky, examples could have provided a much needed explanation of what the chapter is trying to convey.

The exercises are excellent and copius, allowing for plenty of opportunity to practice translation. The book also has a great index of verbs, adjectives and all kinds of goodies that are easy to refer to. The author even includes a list of common terms that one will find in the Greek New Testament, as well as a list of common names.

As I work my way through this text, I have to say that overall it is a good, not great or excellent, book. But with steady study and hard work, the book does yield success. Maybe Machen would be better.

I used the manuscript for this book in a Greek class at Princeton Seminary, and I found it to be very well organized, clearly written, and very accessible. This grammar, while not being 'inductive' as such, is certainly functional. My only complaint is that there is a lack of focus on accenting; for many students and teachers, that is not a problem.

This book pushes the student to learn all the alphabet, acents, and pronounciation in the first 6 page lesson. This is too fast for any but the most committed student. The lack of in text examples makes a good discussion with someone else an essential element in learning greek using this text.

Overall, this text is sufficient in teaching the skills and tools necessary to understand and read New Testament Greek. I was actually instructed using James Efird's text (with the same title). So I was able to make a few comparisons. In Adam's text, all of the info needed to read Koine Greek is there, but it is not always presented in the best manner or order. Some irregualrities (for instance - of verbs) are presented too early and my friends found that confusing. At times, too much information is crammed into a chapter. And more often than not a sufficient amount of examples are not present in each chapter. There are plenty of exercises, which provides a benifit, and then again does not. For a Pre-Seminary student (or any other student for that matter) who is not only studying Greek, he/she may have many other subjects to prepare for and the abundance of exercises may be too over-whellming as a homework assignment. There also is no vocabulary section in the book. To wrap this up, I always wanted to state that there was a lack of emphasis on accents...of course many teachers don't stress that in class. Even though I've been harsh, the book does provide the necessary means to learns New Testament Greek and read the original text. From my experience as a student, tutor, and teacher, I've had the opportunity to compare and contrast. I prefer Efird's text and wish it had not gone out of print. But this text will suffice.