A Grammar for New Testament Greek

Lesson II

 

So far, no errata.

 

The approach to verbal aspect that I expound here owes most to Mari Olsen, whose work on verbal aspect differs from that of Porter, McKay, and Fanning; her work frequently comes up on the Biblical Greek mailing list.

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On the whole subject of verbal aspect, see:

Fanning, Buist. Verbal Aspect in New Testament Greek. Oxford, 1993?
Fanning and Porter brought verbal aspect to the fore in recent grammatical studies on New Testament Greek.

McKay, K. L. A New Syntax of the Verb in NT Greek. Peter Lang, 1994.
A valuable discussion of verbal aspect from a scholar trained in classical Greek. He has several noteworthy articles in scholarly journals as well.

Olsen, Mari Broman. A Semantic and Pragmatic Model of Lexical and Grammatical Aspect. Garland, 1997.
A dense treatise on verbal aspect that sketches the approach that looks soundest to me.

Porter, Stanley. Idioms of the Greek New Testament. Sheffield, 1992.
This is Porter's update of C. F. D. Moule's Idiom-Book.

Porter, Stanley. Verbal Aspect in the Greek of the New Testament. Peter Lang, 1993.
Porter's entry in the verbal-aspect argument.

Carson, D. A., and Porter, Stanley, ed. Biblical Greek Language and Linguistics. Sheffield, 1993.
A collection of essays, including a readable argument between Fanning and Porter with commentary from several respected scholars. (Olsen's position is not represented.)

Greek-to-English Exercises

1 I am leading

2 They are saying

3 I am teaching

4 Y'all are writing

5 They know

6 You are finding

7 they believe

8 he/she/it sees

9 we believe

10 he/she/it has

11 we see

12 you are releasing

13 he/she/it is saying

14 they are receiving

15 y'all hear

16 we have

17 y'all are receiving

18 you hear

19 he/she/it is finding

20 we are leading

21 you have

22 I am writing

23 I am releasing

24 y'all are teaching

25 I am teaching and writing, but I do not believe.

26 You see and y'all hear, but they know.

27 Is he/she/it leading and finding?

28 They are receiving and they are not releasing.

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