The Purpose

There are many on-line Greek texts of Koine writings such as the New Testament, the Septuagint, Apocrypha, and Early Church Writings, so why another one?

  1. This site is intended to teach Greek for the beginner by reading the text.
    1. It assumes some understanding of the Greek alphabet.
    2. There are many words which are obvious when you pronounce them.
  2. If you have taken a few lessons in Greek, you know some vocabulary.
    1. Thus you can begin to read parts of the verse as you go along.
    2. When you encounter an unfamiliar word, clicking on it will take you to the lexicon to see its meaning and its parsing (i.e., identification).
    3. If you hover over the word, its basic meaning will appear.
  3. There are many other sites and books displaying these scriptural texts
    1. but when you encounter a new word, you must resort to a book or another website to locate the meaning and even a third book or website to discover the parsing.
    2. That process slows down the flow of reading the text.
    3. In contrast I hope this website will facilitate a quicker ease of reading the text and thus make reading the Greek smoother and more enjoyable.

The Grammar

  1. When you click on any link-word (usually in blue) in the text, you will be taken to a lexicon where you will see the following:
    1. The Greek word itself in red
    2. The parsing (i.e., grammatical breakdown) of that particular word in green.
    3. Either:
      1. the definition of the root word.
      2. or another link to the root word where the meaning is displayed
  2. Nouns and participles show the case, gender (masculine, feminine, neuter) and number (singular or plural)
  3. Cases are given as
    1. Nom = Nominative (usually the subject of the clause or sentence)
    2. Gen = Genitive/Ablative
      1. Genitive case is generally the indirect object which describes the character or relation and is usually translated with the English preposition of as in, this is a bar of steel or this is a poem of Longfellow or the pen of the king
      2. Ablative case generally gives the idea of departure or separation and is usually translated with the prepositions off, from, away from
      3. Since both the Genitive and Ablative forms are identical, students often learn this case as the of/from case.
    3. Dat = Locative/Instrumental/Dative
      1. Locative case is generally the case of position often translated with the prepositions in, on, among, at, by as in the boy is by the pool
      2. Instrumental case is generally the case of means or association often translated with the prepositions with or by as in travel by car, open with force
      3. Dative case is generally the case of interest or advantage often translated with the prepositions to or for as in give this to Mary, it is for you
      4. Since these three cases are identical in form, students sometimes call them the LID or Dat case. While the Gen case is the of/from case some students call this case, "all the rest" meaning all the rest of the prepositions.
    4. Acc = Acusative. This is the case of limitation or extension and is often the direct object of a verb idea.
    5. Voc = Vocative. This is the case of address or exclamation.
  4. Verbs have tense, mode or mood, and voice.
    1. Tense: In Greek, the tense describes the kind of action as much as the time of action. They include
      1. Present tense describing on-going action usually in current time
      2. Imperfect tense describing on-going action usually in past time
      3. Future tense describing on-going or punctiliary action in future time
      4. Aorist tense describing punctiliary action at some time
      5. Perfect tense usually describing punctiliar action with on-going results
      6. Pluperfect tense is the perfect tense in past time
    2. Mode or mood can be indicative, subjunctive, optative, or imperative.
      1. The mode/mood tells whether an action is actually happening or possibly happening.
      2. Indicative: the action of the verb is actual
      3. Subjunctive: the action of the verb is objectively possible
      4. Optative: the action of the verb is subjectively possible
      5. Imperative: the action is volitionally possible (i.e., a command)
    3. Voice can be active, middle, or passive
      1. Active: the subject is producing the action
      2. Middle: the subject is participating in the action
      3. Passive: the subject is receiving the action
      4. Often the middle and passive forms are identical
      5. Sometimes a verb will have a middle/passive form but be active in meaning. The verb is called deponent.
  5. Participles are adjectives with a verbal idea and a noun form
    1. Thus they are built from the verb stem so that they have tense and voice (but not mode/mood)
    2. The tense reveals the kind of action, not its time. The time of action is dependent upon the time of the main verb.
    3. They also have noun endings which give them case, number, and gender

Greek Tutorial

Greek tutorial is now on line at GreekDoc. Click this line.

Abbreviations

Click here for abbreviations.

The Text

  1. You can help
    1. When you discover a word missing in the lexicon, please contact me at
      GreekCadillac at gmail . com
      Replace "at" with the correct symbol and remove the spaces.
      Include the word "Greek" in the subject line so that I know it is not spam.
    2. Look up the word in BAGS or another good lexicon and send me the word and its meaning.
    3. If you are able, also send me the parsed description of that word.
    4. Please indicate the reference where the word is found