The regular Kindle prices are great, but Baker is offering selected commentaries free for one day on Jan. 9 (past, alas!), Jan. 16, and Jan 23. Today’s is on James. More at Evangelical Textual Criticism.
Category: Bible Study Tools
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Dave Black on Greek Study Resources
Dave Black suggests ten books for studying New Testament Greek during 2012. Four of these are on my regular list and a couple more are on my reading list. I might work on a list of my own when I’m back in Pensacola with my library. I’ve extracted the list onto The Jesus Paradigm since one can’t link to a particular post on Dave’s blog.
One book I’m reading currently is Dave’s Linguistics for Students of New Testament Greek: A Survey of Basic Concepts and Applications
. Thus far I highly recommend it. I’ll review it here when I’ve finished reading it.
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Dave Black (and Charles King) on Greek Teaching Methods
Dave Black notes the following:
9:04 AM This morning Kyle Davis, one of my teaching assistants, sent me a link to this excellent essay: The Method of Teaching New Testament Greek (.pdf). On the several takeaways I got from reading it, this one is perhaps the most important:
Extensive memorization produces improved strategies for memorization, but does not increase the ability to memorize. If the learner implements higher order learning patterns, learning becomes easier and more effective.
Amen and amen! This is one reason I have reduced memorization to an absolute minimum in my own beginning grammar, Learn to Read New Testament Greek, and instead focus on teaching students basic principles of noun and verb morphology. Once you understand how language works, that information will stick with you a lot longer than had you simply memorized a long list of paradigms.
So grateful for colleagues who teach Greek and who are open to newer methods of pedagogy and linguistic approaches to the language. Why make the subject any more difficult than it already is?
My own experience is somewhat different than either Dave’s or that of the article author, as I’ve never taught a required Greek course. I did encounter students in required courses in both Greek and Hebrew when I was in graduate school. I had the recommendation of the professor as a tutor, and was frequently sought out in the hours before a test came up, which was normally too late for me to be of much help.
Since then I have frequently taught either individual students or small groups, but for the most part these were people who really wanted Greek or Hebrew in order to make use of it.
What does especially resonate with me from the cited article is the note about memorization. I grew up on memorization. We memorized extensive passages of scripture from the KJV in school. For example, I have recited Psalm 119 at one sitting, word perfect. That memorization didn’t make me a better memorizer. What helped me with learning was the simple process of consistently trying to understand what was going on and then fix it in memory through those relationships. Thus learning a system and then memorizing the minimum necessary makes great sense to me. It has made sense to my students as well.
I am also a firm believer in reading quantities of text in the source language. I was introduced to reader’s grammars by Dr. Sakae Kubo, who edited an early edition for Greek, and I consider them a wonderful tool. Computer based tools replace them for many, but I still need to sit down at a desk from time to time in order to study. I don’t use such tools much now, but I do still have them on my shelves.
The one item on which I’d disagree is on the value of translating English into Greek or Hebrew. I don’t push it a great deal, but several of my students have testified that it was helpful in fixing vocabulary in their memory.
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On Publishing Philippians: A Participatory Study Guide
This post will contain reflections both on the recently released Philippians study guide and the series of which it is a part. I generally write such reflections after each book my company releases. So be warned—there are products discussed here!When I first created this blog I was the only author in the participatory study series. Making a book series grow and sell usually requires a great vision pursued relentlessly. This series, on the other hand, has grown and substantially improved its original vision.
When I first wrote To the Hebrews: A Participatory Study Guide and Revelation: A Participatory Study Guide, I didn’t feel any great optimism that I could break into a very competitive market. People write Bible study guides all the time. Quality varies dramatically, and often the best sellers are those written by people with famous names.
What I wanted was a system that brought together biblical scholarship, spiritual disciplines, accessibility to lay people, and a somewhat ecumenical approach. I must specify that my view of ecumenism is not homogenization, but rather a willingness to engage in respectful give and take and especially to look at multiple traditions when choosing sources and study materials.
I wrote those two books myself, and I had an upcoming class in mind with each one. You can see by the design of the books that this was early in my own publishing experience. From the point of view of developing the company, I needed titles. With the process we use, I can produce study guides for my own use quite economically. My thought was that if these guides sold successfully it would be great, but I wouldn’t count on it, and I would put my efforts into finding authors with manuscripts of their own, not ones following a plan I had designed.
In the event, not only have I taught from them myself more times than expected, but I’ve seen them sell quite a few more copies than I had thought possible. No, they aren’t threatening to be on anyone’s best seller lists, but they have definitely exceeded my initial expectations.
A few years after I had released those first two guides Geoffrey Lentz approached me with a study outline from the book of Luke. Geoffrey had invited me to teach one of his classes from my guide to Hebrews, and he liked the outline of the method, but also the proposed freedom for working within the framework. I liked his outline and his idea, and the result was The Gospel According to Saint Luke: A Participatory Study Guide.
Geoffrey really rounded out the idea of the series by improving the presentation and tying the method more closely with lectio divina. He at first proposed including both a discussion of lectio divina and the introduction to the method that I had produced, but once I looked at his connections, I suggested we work together to combine the two. Participatory study and lectio divina are not identical; participatory study provides more of an emphasis on resources and critical questions, yet the two work together very well.
Once I saw the completed study guide to Luke, I knew immediately that if I could find any more authors for the series, I would present that volume as the guide to how we would structure study guides.
After Luke, Geoffrey and I got together and wrote Learning and Living Scripture: An Introduction to the Participatory Study Method. In that book, Geoffrey’s more pastoral concern and my more technical emphasis combine and lay out the method along with exercises.
Since then we’ve introduced Ephesians: A Participatory Study Guide, by Bob Cornwall and most recently Philippians: A Participatory Study Guide by Bruce Epperly. Each new author has brought something unexpected to the method and to the particular book they present. I don’t want to describe one book or another as “best.” (I do plan to revise my two volumes to incorporate some features in layout and presentation learned from later volumes.)
I had wondered just how well someone could take the basic framework and yet use their own gifts and emphases in producing an effective guide. I couldn’t have been more pleased when I read the following sentence in Bruce Epperly’s preface to Philippians: “Henry provided a vision for this study and gave me permission to work out the details in a way congruent with my gifts as a pastor, teacher, and spiritual guide.”
This was not so much pleasing as a pat on the back, though I admit to being delighted when my work is appreciated. More than that, it indicates that someone whose gifts differ dramatically from my own was able to exercise those gifts within this framework and produce what is truly an exceptional study guide. I’ve gotten some comments from people who wonder about one statement or another. Bruce is a progressive theologian and an adventurous theological writer. But nobody has said it doesn’t challenge them to press boldly on toward the mark.
I look at the way the series is developing—and there are several more volumes either in progress or in preliminary negotiations—and I’m truly amazed. I wish I could say I envisioned the quality of the people who would submit proposals for inclusion in the series, almost all of them with doctoral degrees and considerable experience teaching. I wish I could say I’d envisioned what’s happening to the series—but I’m delighted that the result is better than I ever imagined.
I encourage you to take a look at this latest study guide. Not only will it challenge you to take a more serious look at the content of Paul’s letter to the church at Philippi, it will challenge you to take what you learn seriously and apply it in your own spiritual life. Each lesson starts by asking you to open yourself to the Spirit in some way and concludes by challenging you to carry what the Spirit has done out of the church or classroom and out into the world.
I have been very pleased to publish every book I have published since I started Energion Publications, and I don’t want to take anything away from those books. Yet my heart is in getting the people in our church pews, not to mention those who rarely show up there, to learn the joy of exploring the scriptures while listening to the Spirit. Thus Philippians: A Participatory Study Guide will always have a special place in my heart. It does an extraordinary job of accomplishing that mission.
There are review and evaluation copies of all the participatory study guides available, If you’re interested, e-mail me with the reason you want one, and I’ll take care of it.
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The Biblioblog Top 50 for June
. . . finds me at #27, which is actually surprisingly good considering that I only wrote one blog post during June. My excuse is that I was working on half a dozen book releases for my company, two of which will actually take place in July.
As for the great controversy about the library, I would note that if one puts complete posts in one’s RSS feed, as I do, one must expect to lose some page views. You can follow my blog via Good Reader and never actually look over here at all. At the same time, I’m glad the discussion resulted in direct links to posts, which is a requirement for collating content.
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Helps and Keeping Up Your Greek
Dave Black has another good paragraph on keeping up your Greek:
I will not go into the mechanics of keeping up with your Greek this summer. For this, you can refer to my book Using New Testament Greek in Ministry, published by Baker Book House. Con Campbell and a host of other Greek teachers will tell you that the use of helps such as interlinears is anathema. Do I agree? You bet I don’t! Do I really care what helps you use? I want those of you who are struggling with your Greek to employ any tool available that will keep you in the Greek text. And if you are feeling like a nobody, just remember that God specially chooses nobodies to glorify Himself. The success or failure of your Greek studies depends on the extent to which your thoughts and attitudes and habits are brought under the control of the Holy Spirit. Our constant daily priority is to submit ourselves to the Spirit’s control so that His fruit may be manifest in our lives. I am the ultimate egalitarian when it comes to languages. Greek is for everyone who has a love for Bible study. It is hoped that through our class many will be led into a deeper knowledge of God’s Word and challenged to become more obedient to the call of God on their lives — despite their struggles and failings. Being able to read your Greek New Testament is one of the most joyous and rewarding activities possible, and I have labored diligently to equip you for this task. I make no pretense of having successfully accomplished this. But I have tried. Ultimately, however, the work is God’s. Now let us trust Him to accomplish it!
Dave already linked to my own previous post on this topic, so I hardly need to add anything.
But I will anyhow!
The key problem I find amongst pastors and teachers who are not in an academic environment is not that they lack skill discovering lexical forms (though they generally do), but rather that they don’t have enough exposure to Greek text to provide context and background to their study, or more precisely, they take so look piecing together individual Greek words, that they can’t really study the passage.
The best solution to this, in my opinion, is to read quantities of Greek. Large quantities. Reader’s lexicons and interlinears make that possible. Don’t neglect digging in and learning the nuts and bolts. But if you’re already used to the sound and feel, you’re going to find it easier to practice the details.
Even though I always get in trouble on this, I must recommend both memorization and reading aloud. One of my own methods for keeping my Greek fresh is to read passages aloud and record myself doing so. I then put them on CDs which I have in the car. Right now I have Philippians, 1 John, and the first 8 chapters of Romans. I started doing this when I was teaching and noticed that my pronunciation was not as fluid as it once had been. I have been quite horrified to hear some of my “slips of the tongue” when listening to myself, but things have gotten better as I put this into practice.
Besides, if you want your spirits lifted, there’s nothing quite like the text of Philippians to listen to as you drive!
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A Misuse of the Word LITERAL
One of my pet peeves is the way “literal” is used in discussing biblical interpretation. The problem is not just that the word has changed meaning; rather, it is now scattered all over the map. “Literal” comes to mean anything from “seriously” to “severely out of context” much more often than it means “literal as opposed to figurative.” Even “literal as opposed to figurative” leaves something to be desired since without a knowledge of just which way something is to be taken, either literally or figuratively, one often can’t tell what is meant.
For example, if I say I don’t take Genesis 1 literally, just what do I mean? For me, Genesis is not narrative history. Having said that, there are many things it could be, and it happens that I take Genesis 1:1-2:4a to be liturgy. There are figurative elements in liturgy, but it is a more specific label.
In any case, in studying Philippians, I came across this note in the Orthodox Study Bible regarding the Greek word leitourgia in 2:17: “Service is literally ‘liturgy.’ …” I hate to beat up on the Orthodox Study Bible so much, especially considering that at the same time as I use it, I’m becoming more and more delighted with the eastern church fathers.
But “service” is not literally “liturgy” nor is leitougia literally “liturgy.” “Liturgy” is merely one gloss one might use, expressing a certain portion of the semantic range of the Greek word. One might say the the word translated “service” is the one from which we derive the English word “liturgy,” though that doesn’t really mean much regarding the meaning of this passage.
So again I will maintain that “literal” is one of the most misused words in biblical interpretation. I’ve suggested before that if I could take one phrase away from conservatives it would be “the Bible clearly teaches.” If I could take one phrase away from liberals it would be “we don’t take that literally.” Neither one advances the discussion.
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Amongst the Biblioblogs
… I’ve attained #19 on the top 50 list, and do not appear in the Biblical Studies carnival (there’s good reason for this), which is extremely well done and links to some excellent posts.