Gog, the Locust King (LXX Texts of Note 3)

Posted on September 23, 2011 by Daniel R. Streett

In Amos 7:1 LXX we have a most intriguing passage. Most English translations read something like this: “The sovereign LORD showed me this: I saw him making locusts just as the crops planted late were beginning to sprout. (The crops planted late sprout after the royal harvest.)” (NET Bible)

Master Po asks, "Do you hear the grasshopper at your feet?"

Gog the Grasshopper
The LXX, however, reads: οὕτως ἔδειξέν μοι κύριος καὶ ἰδοὺ ἐπιγονὴ ἀκρίδων ἐρχομένη ἑωθινή καὶ ἰδοὺ βροῦχος εἷς Γωγ ὁ βασιλεύς. In English: “Thus the Lord showed me, and behold, a swarm of locusts coming early, and behold, one locust, Gog, the king.” Continue reading →

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Greek Immersion in the Seminary Curriculum–What’s Needed to Make it Work? (Basics of Greek Pedagogy, pt. 7)

Posted on September 21, 2011 by Daniel R. Streett

About the Series
This is part 7 in a series of posts laying out the problems with typical Koine Greek teaching methods and proposing a reformation in pedagogy. In my last post, I noted the rise of the “tools” approach to Greek and argued that this shift may actually be salutary if it creates room for serious students to pursue true fluency through immersive approaches. Now, I want to explore ways that seminaries and Bible colleges could realistically incorporate immersive approaches to learning Greek.

NOT Normal

What’s Normal?
First, I think we need a clear idea of what’s normal in language learning situations. So, let’s look at a few examples of how modern languages are approached at American universities. Let’s begin with UC-Berkeley’s German program. If you choose to major in German at Berkeley, here’s what’s expected:

Continue reading →

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Bible Software, Greek Tools, and a Future for Immersion (Basics of Greek Pedagogy, pt. 6)

Posted on September 20, 2011 by Daniel R. Streett

About the Series
This is part 6 in a series of posts laying out the problems with typical Koine Greek teaching methods and proposing a reformation in pedagogy. In the last post, I discussed the amount of time it takes to gain proficiency in a second language—around 1100 hours of immersive class time, depending on the difficulty of the language.

Obviously, that doesn’t fit very comfortably into any seminary or college’s curriculum. So, if we are convinced that fluency is a goal worth pursuing, we need to think of more feasible ways we can create this type of intensive and prolonged immersion. Before I lay out some of those strategies, though, I want to discuss a growing trend in Greek pedagogy and how I think it affects the movement toward communicative teaching.
Continue reading →

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Creatio ex Invisibili? (LXX Texts of Note 2)

Posted on September 18, 2011 by Daniel R. Streett

This post is the second in a series where I note Septuagintal passages of interest to students of Christian origins; e.g. texts where the New Testament quotes an LXX reading significantly different from the Masoretic reading, or texts where the LXX reading is needed to make sense of a NT text.

This week we turn to a text at the very beginning of the Greek Bible: Genesis 1:2, which reads: ἡ δὲ γῆ ἦν ἀόρατος καὶ ἀκατασκεύαστος, καὶ σκότος ἐπάνω τῆς ἀβύσσου, καὶ πνεῦμα Θεοῦ ἐπεφέρετο ἐπάνω τοῦ ὕδατος. Continue reading →

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David Alan Black On the Generational Shift in Greek Pedagogy

Posted on September 16, 2011 by Daniel R. Streett

I am very honored by the recent comments on David Alan Black’s blog. At 6:16 on 9/15/11 he posted:

6:16 PM A groundbreaking new website has been launched by one of our Southeastern grads. It’s all about Greek and especially about Continue reading →

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Signs of Interest?

Posted on September 16, 2011 by Daniel R. Streett

What a first week it has been for the blog! My first real post went up last Thursday, and since then, we have had over 5000 views, including almost 1000 on our top day yesterday. That says to me that there’s a lot of interest out there in changing up Greek pedagogy and striving for real fluency in the language. If you want keep up with the discussion, make sure you subscribe to the RSS feed, or sign up using the button on the right of the page. Thanks for reading!

Thank you, all those who linked to the blog, especially οἱ δύο Ἰάκωβοι, James McGrath and Jim Davila.

Thank you, everyone who commented, as well as those who emailed me personally. Your interest in Continue reading →

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Brian Schultz on Reading Fluency in Hebrew and Greek

Posted on September 15, 2011 by Daniel R. Streett

Brian Schultz, who teaches Biblical Hebrew communicately at Fresno Pacific University and is just an all-around nice guy, has posted some thoughts on what constitutes reading fluency and what helps or hinders its development. Check them out here. They dovetail rather nicely with our recent series of posts on the same subject.

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χοιροπίθηκος (Greek Word of the Week)

Posted on September 15, 2011 by Daniel R. Streett

Compound words are just fun. German may be the best. They have about Zweihundertvierundachtzigtausend long compound words. But, Greek’s no slouch. And, the word for the week is a pretty creative one. Let’s say you were looking at a giraffe and trying to describe it. Continue reading →

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How Long, O Lord, Until I Know Greek? (Basics of Greek Pedagogy, pt. 5)

Posted on September 14, 2011 by Daniel R. Streett

About the Series
This is part 5 in a series of posts laying out the problems with typical Koine Greek teaching methods and proposing a reformation in pedagogy. Part 1 talked about what it means to read Greek or any other language. Part 2 talked about the reality of what goes on in most traditional Greek teaching and testing. Part 3 argued that Greek professors, too, suffer from the ineffectiveness of the traditional method, and as a result are seriously lacking in their own grasp of Greek. Part 4 argued that to solve this problem, we must establish a foundation of listening and speaking skills upon which to develop reading fluency.

In this post, I want talk about the advantages that adult language learners have over children, as well as how long it takes to acquire proficiency in a language, and why this means we need to rethink our Greek curricula. Continue reading →

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James Davila Takes My Greek Quiz

Posted on September 14, 2011 by Daniel R. Streett

Jim Davila

A hearty εὐχαριστία to Jim Davila at PaleoJudaica, one of my favorite blogs, for mentioning my blog and the recent Greek quiz (see also here, where James McGrath notes our quiz). More than that, Prof Davila reports his results — very courageous! 4/10 – not too shabby for a scholar in Early Judaism!

I speculate that if I had given the quiz to a group of Classics scholars, they would have done better on it, as a result of their wider reading. It’s rather appalling how few NT Greek professors, in my experience, spend any real time reading outside of the NT!

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