Greek for the Rest of Us: Mastering Bible Study without Mastering Biblical Languages

Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society, Sep 2004 by Wilson, Dan

Greek for the Rest of Us: Mastering Bible Study without Mastering Biblical Languages. By William D. Mounce. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2003, xx + 289 pp., $34.99.

William D. Mounce, best known for the Basics of Biblical Greek curriculum from Zondervan, is now the preaching pastor at Shiloh Hills Fellowship in Spokane, Washington and was formerly Professor of New Testament at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary and Azusa Pacific University. Greek for the Rest of Us (GRU) is intended for Bible students who have neither time nor money to master Greek in an academic setting but who still want to understand the Word of God better. Mounce's main goals are to enable students to understand why translations differ, to discover the Greek and Hebrew word meanings lying beneath the English, to learn the basics of exegesis, and to read and digest good (exegetical) commentaries. Mindful of the adage "a little Greek can be dangerous," Mounce warns students not to expect "to learn enough Greek to make complicated grammatical pronouncements that aren't supported by the commentaries" (p. xix). He contends that, when Greek mastery is not feasible, learning a little Greek is good and that "a little bit of pride" is actually what proves dangerous.

GRU is designed to be a six-week study used in churches for lay teachers and Bible students eager to go the next level. GRU is divided into "weeks," and each week is divided into chapters. The early chapters in each week typically discuss grammar while the final chapter shows students the application to their Bible study. GRU comes with an interactive, multi-media CD-ROM containing nine hours of Mounce's non-technical lectures, texts, audio pronunciations of words and verses, memory songs, and overheads. GRU and it's "talk-through-the-book" CD-ROM aim at minimizing the intimidation and fear in the minds of lay people or pastors whose Greek turned to rust years ago.

Week 1 focuses on the alphabet and pronunciation and also tackles translation theory, offering copious examples. Mounce demonstrates the good faith of the English translations and speaks sensibly about the values of both formal and dynamic equivalent versions. Week 2 does what most first-year grammars do not do and what most Greek instructors must do. It re-lays the foundation of English grammar since most students have a poor grasp of English, which makes grammatical comparisons difficult to impossible. Mounce also introduces "phrasing," a method of diagraming that indents subordinate clauses to the right and that also shows parallels and transitions. The English exercises in week 2 are followed by diagramed Greek examples in later weeks. The approach is similar to William G. MacDonald's "textual transcription" in Greek Enchiridion (Peabody: Hendrickson, 1986). In week 3 Mounce covers modifying phrases such as conjunctions, adjectives, and prepositional phrases and gives many English and NT examples of various constructions.

In week 4 Mounce surveys verbs-person and number, tense, voice, and mood. With this background students can for the first time make sense of a commentator's point about an imperfect passive indicative. He also shows how to use concordances and Bible software programs. Week 5 is about non-indicative verbals, such as participles and the subjunctive mood. It also provides an excellent overview of semantics, outlines steps for conducting word studies starting from interlineare, and discusses common word study fallacies. Week 6 ambitiously surveys the five-case system. Here Mounce also discusses how to read a commentary, provides a helpful description of top evangelical commentary series, and lists preferred commentaries for each NT book for both lay and advanced readers. Then Mounce briefly discusses the basics of textual criticism to make students aware of the development of text families, textual variants, and how to handle disputed passages like the long ending of Mark. Finally, Mounce adds an appendix entitled "Hebrew for the Rest of Us" and points students to standard Hebrew word study tools.

Mounce's writing style is appropriately down-to-earth, his examples are numerous, he cites all the major English versions, even recent ones such as NET, TNIV, NIRV and ESV (thus not singling out any one translation as particularly troubled), and his assignments seem attainable for each "week." Students are able to grow in their confidence that they can progress to the next level of Greek proficiency. Throughout the text Mounce notes how GRU can be complemented by other user-friendly tools (also published by Zondervan) like his own NIV English-Greek New Testament (a "reverse interlinear" keyed to concordances), his Analytical Lexicon to the Greek New Testament, and Verlyn D. Verbrugge's NIV Dictionary of NT Words (the recent abridgment of Colin Brown's NIDNTT).

GRU is "Baby Greek" at its best, especially since it so consistently cautions students of their exegetical limitations wbile at the same time raising and stretching their exegetical skills. Many "average" pastors would do well to work through GRU and rekindle the skills and passion for true exegetical preaching. GRU would not do for a first year grammar in a typical seminary M.Div. program, but could be ideal for Youth or Christian Education tracks, in lay-oriented certificate programs, or in courses tailored for Bible minors in Christian colleges. GRU ought to be applauded for its pedagogy (actually androgogy-teaching adults) and how it is intentionally and creatively designed to meet the practical discipleship needs of the church. Credentialed Greek instructors can easily take GR U to their own church settings. GRU would be ideal for night extension type ministries targeting pastors who have never had formal theological education. GRU, with its CD-ROM, might even be a suitable tool for Christian classical schools and home schooling families eager to give advanced teens an exegetical and Greek foundation. Mounce should be seen as a model to the members of our Society in the way he has answered the call for the academy to equip and edify the church more directly.