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Re: Wallace Indices and "Please be seated!" (was Re: Romans 9:22)

At 02:35 PM 6/2/97 -0400, JohnBARACH@aol.com wrote:
>What would be really handy would be a massive index of all the great Greek
>grammars....  Baker published one a while ago with Scripture references,
>which saves all the trouble of looking in the back of every volume on your
>shelf, but it doesn't include Wallace or any of the newer grammars.

I could provide a place on the web site, but we would have to find a way to
get the information typed in. I wonder if we could get enough people who
would be willing to do this? It would involve lots of typing,
though...unless someone has OCR and experience to match? 

>Another question:  I've recently graduated from seminary, and my Greek is
>okay but needs work.  It was good enough to get me through a 3-hour
>comprehensive (translate 20+ verses and parse a number of verbs), but ....  I
>have Dana and Mantey, BDF, and Machen.  What (preferably in order of
>importance) should my next purchases be?  Wallace?  Moulton-Turner?
> Robertson?

I'm sure a lot of the more experienced people will have useful things to say
here.

I have information on my "Little Greek Home Page" which may be helpful. Take
a look at this URL:

        http://www.mindspring.com/~jwrobie/littleGreek.html

Personally, I would start by buying the two Zerwick books that I mention,
since they will *really* help you read the GNT more easily. I would also get
Smyth. That would be my first set of purchases. At the same time, I would
start reading NT Greek every morning for 1/2 hour, choosing books which are
relatively easy to read, but always reading new material. If you get those
books and establish this one habit, you can safely ignore the rest of this
email.

But if you choose to keep reading...

Later, when you have more time, money, and energy, you might consider both
Robertson's longer grammar and his Word Pictures. Robertson is really very
good, but not as the first place to turn on a given question, because his
explanations are sometimes confusing. On the other hand, his examples and
exposition of those examples is as good as it gets. I would ignore his short
grammar, which leaves out the longer expositions.

I would avoid Wallace until you feel competent to compare grammars and make
your own judgments, because although I think Wallace has lots of good stuff
in it, it also has things which I personally find misleading or just
confusing. I don't know Moulton-Turner first-hand, so I can't comment on
him. Edgar Krentz, whose opinion I value, had this to say: "Add to your
grammars the four volume grammar of NT by James Hope Moulton, W. F. Howard,
and Nigel Turner. It is one of the best."

Hope this helps!

Jonathan

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Jonathan Robie   jwrobie@mindspring.com  http://www.mindspring.com/~jwrobie
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