A Good Review

Well, as promised, we had a review of Lessons 1-3 on Sunday, rather than Lesson 4. Actually, we only had time to review L1-2, so we’ll start off next class with a review of L3.

We also, as promised, welcomed Raewyn to the class. Actually, I’d promised on this blog that we’d welcome “Reawyn”, but that person didn’t show up—so I had to go back a minute ago and change the spelling on that post (Sorry ‘bout that, Raewyn!).

The review session went exceedingly well—everyone picked up something they hadn’t noticed the first time around. I even learned a few things about pacing the lessons. Thanks to Joc for the idea!

And thanks to Joc for the other idea—that from now on we run the lessons on a 1-2-review format. I thought that was a really good suggestion so I’m already recalibrating my future lesson plans accordingly.

Just because it was a review, we didn’t forgo our weekly “Why Learn Greek”. Have a look at it by clicking here or the Why Learn Greek 4 link above.

Speaking of the WLG’s; I met the husband of a PBC member yesterday who has been reading Greek for some years now. He’d heard I was teaching Koine at the church and was keen to get together and discuss the heaps of exegetical insights that he’s discovered through reading the Greek NT. He’s already sent me one by email and I’ll be using it in class next Sunday.

How cool is that?


God Bless,
Ιακωβος

A Day of Review Update

UPDATE: ...And the second reason it's a good time for a review this Sunday is: PBC Greek Class has just gained another student!

Yes, this Sunday, we'll be welcoming RAEWYN to the class.

Apparently Raewyn has always wanted to learn Koine Greek and, just the other day, she heard about our class through Colleen . Colleen ask if it wasn't too late for her to join up. I told her it wasn't, so she did.

I'm sure we all look forward to meeting Raewyn on Sunday and will be more than happy to help her get up to speed.


God bless,
Ἰακωβος

A Day of Review

You've probably noticed there's no new lesson posted today; that's because this Sunday will be a REVIEW DAY. There's two very good reasons for this--one I can tell you now, and one I'll announce tonight....

Several of you have had a flat-out week chock full of non-Koine happenings. That, combined with the looooong two week break, has meant there's been precious little time to go over the lessons at home. A good time to go over everything in class that we've covered to date.

So have a look over your notes and write down any questions that come to mind--this Sunday is the day to ask 'em.

We might even get in another game or two of βιγγω.

God bless,
Ἰακωβος

B – I – G – G – W ?

After a two week break, we gathered together last Sunday for Lesson Three. We took the break so everyone could go off and celebrate Mother’s Day with their families—except for Colleen, who was busy racing through the Baylis Beach to Dargaville Sport Northland Run/Walk. She posted a magnificent time for the 12 km course: Exactly 1 hour 39 minutes and 57 seconds—an absolutely outstanding result. There were several people from my work on the same course and Colleen’s time makes them look like they did it on stilts. Congratulations Colleen! Her next Run/Walk is in Paihia on the 30th May and she assures me that, as it’s only (!) 8km long, she’ll be finished in plenty of time to attend class that afternoon. That’s the spirit, Colleen!

We also hit the ground running on Lesson Three—right out of the gate everyone reported on the mistakes I’d made on the homework assignment. The assignment was designed to encourage everyone to focus their attention on details in Greek text such as punctuation and diacritical marks. And considering all the lapses in detailing they showed I’d had when I compiled it, I’d say everyone was focused just fine. A big Alpha for effort for everyone—except me, of course.

Βιγγω!

We then got into two rousing games of Βιγγω—which is “Bingo” written in Greek script. Everyone excelled at that, too—especially Larry; who managed to have 3 bingo’s in one game. That’s the spirit, Larry!

The Lesson proper covered the accusative and nominative case forms for 2nd declension nouns in –ος. And surprising as it might seem, we had as much fun with that as with the Βιγγω…or so I’m lead to believe after Jocelyn told me that she loved reading the Lesson notes on the blog and Trish reported that even the grammar was fun. That’s amazing—and means next week, when we do the dative, vocative and genitive cases, they’ll both be in hysterics. That’s the spirit, Ladies!


God Bless,

Ιακωβος

Lesson Three Posted Already

Χαριτε!

I've just posted Lesson Three (see the tab above) even though we haven't had it yet, because a couple of you requested I make the notes available before the class. I thought that was a really good idea. So from now on, by the Thursday prior to the class, I'll post the lesson notes here. I'll also email them to everyone at the same time. This way you'll have a chance to prepare and, by having the notes in front of you during the lesson (if you print them out), you'll be able to follow along and add your own helpful notes as we go. Sweet as....

Hope you all had a great Mother's Day weekend! See you Sunday.

God Bless,
Ιακωβος

Update on Proper Names

ὁ διδασκαλος here...

Since last Sunday, I’ve been doing a bit of thinking about proper names. Because of both the Why Learn Greek illustration and one of the practical exercises, we discussed the different transliteration/translation paths of proper names—from Hebrew to Greek, Hebrew to English, Greek to English, etc. After some reflection, I thought I should clarify things a bit…

Regardless of the fact that three pairs of names, Joshua & Jesus, Judah & Judas, Jacob & James, are translations of three single Jewish names (Yehoshua, Yehudah, Yahkov respectively), today each of the six is a legitimate and distinct name. Joshua, Judah and Jacob are direct English transliterations of the Hebrew names; whereas Jesus, Judas and James are English transliterations from the Greek transliterations of the Hebrew names.

First century Greeks only had one Hellenised version of the Hebrew names, but modern Greeks use two just like we do. For example, in Greece today, James is Ἰακωβος; Jacob is Ἰακωβ.

If there was any confusion out there, I hope that cleared it up.

God bless, Ιακωβος

The Diacritical List

ὁ διδασκαλος here...

Lesson Two of the PBC Greek Class was another roaring success! Trish, Colleen, Larry and Jocelyn all generously donated another 2½ hours of their busy lives to bless me greatly by allowing me teach them some more Koine Greek.

Trish was hard-out running back to Kerikeri to swap her mum and a friend for two bags of limes then rush back to class.

Colleen took a break from training for the Sport Northland Run/Walk Series Bayley’s Beach to Dargaville run/walk next Sunday (well, I presume she took a break; didn’t actually see her drive her car to the lesson).

Larry & Jocelyn had just finished a marathon drive from Haruru Falls to Auckland and back just to be here—their daughter and son-in-law Elle and Rob were moving to Melbourne for six months and L & J took them down to catch their flight out (all went well, too; both couples reached their respective destinations near enough at the same time!).

A big “thanks heaps” goes out to all of them from me.

I also want to thank our stationer and part-time projectionist, my beautiful and lovely assistant (and wife), Sandy, for the course binders and toilet door certificates. And her coffee wasn’t bad, either.

The lesson itself covered the capital letters, the seven main diphthongs, punctuation and, though we all made the diacritical list—breathings, iota-subs, diaereses, accents and elisions—none of us are any the worse for wear.

It is marvellous to note that now, after only two lessons, everyone has all the tools they need to be able to read the entire Greek New Testament! They might not understand it, but they can certainly start reading it—who knows how many words they’ll discover they do understand already?

Jesus is amazing!

Lesson Three has been put off a week because of Mother’s Day commitments and Colleen’s run/walk to Dargaville, so plenty of time for me to prepare the next lesson and for everybody to complete their huge, three-page homework assignment. They’ll be seeing breathing marks and iota-subs in their sleep….

…the lucky ducks.

God bless,
Ιακωβος