Tools of the Quest

I am very excited about the resources I have so far. I'm at the stage where I am gathering resources to use. These won't be the only resources I have on this quest, they are just the ones I have right now, at the beginning. I think this will be so interesting to come back a few months from now, or maybe even years from now, to the first posts that I wrote about this quest and how this got started. I don't have a ministry reason for wanting to learn biblical Greek; I just have realized that sometimes the meaning of a verse changes in translating it from Greek to English and I want to know what ti originally said.

Below are the resources that I currently have to learn Greek! I think I picked some good ones, if I do say so myself. I like that since I'm teaching myself Greek, I can pick resources that I know will help me, it all comes down to my judgment, what I think I need to help me learn this language,etc. I don't have to learn it with the resources that a teacher that doesn't know me or how I learn picked for me.I really think that is a plus. 

• Basics of Biblical Greek(textbook, 3rd edition)

•  This is the textbook that I believe the bible department uses to teach Greek. it seemed like a good one, and I didn't know a lot about Greek textbooks, so I decided to go with what the bible department uses. also, I figured it would be in the campus store. turned out it wasn't, because it's the spring and so the beginning class is in the fall, so I ordered it online.
•  Basics of Biblical Green(workbook, 3rd edition)
• this is the workbook that goes along with the 3rd edition text. it seems pretty good from flipping through it, good exercises to really help me learn the language. 

• Basics of Biblical Greek (textbook, 2nd edition)
• this is the first textbook that I ordered because it has the CD-ROM, while the 3rd edition doesn't because they put everything online.I wanted to have the CD-ROM. 

• Basics of Biblical Green(workbook, 2nd edition)

• this is the workbook that goes with the 3rd edition. pretty similar to the 3rd edition, but I like having two workbooks to really help me hammer in the language.
•  Basics of Biblical Greek Vocabulary Flashcards
• these flashcards go with the textbook, and they seem really good! they have the greek word with the English on the back, and how to say it, and also how many times it appears in the New Testament, a feature I really like! 

• Greek lectures (dvd video): $149
•  I am SOOOO excited! These DVDs are by William D,Mounce, who is the author of the textbooks and the flashcards and the workbooks, and he's so good!these textbooks are among the most used for biblical Greek learning. anyways, these are his class lectures for 2 FULL semesters of Greek! on DVD! there are 35 of them, for 30-35 minutes each. I love this feature because I am getting the same lectures that his students get, but for WAY less and like he said on the video online, I have the stop button, and I also love that I can watch these as often as I like and I don't have to go back to notes or something. I am very excited about this. it's my favorite resource, and I think a really good one since I am self-teaching. 

• Answers To Workbook, 3rd edition
• I download the answers from the Teknia website! this was SO cool because I was wondering how I would check the answers to the workbook, and now I don't have to email them to Brent ask him to check it! it's the entire 3rd edition workbook, which is another reason I bought the 3rd edition workbook(the 3rd edition text because that's what the DVDs go off of. 2nd edition is the same, but I thought it would be worth it and easier to have the edition he refers to on the DVD).it was for free! didn't have to pay anything which is so SWEET!!

• FlashWorks
• this is a flashcard program, and it was for free! just had to download, no costs at all. it doesn't have sound unfortunately, but the website said they are working on it and the newest edition with sound should be up in November. But I am sure the CD-ROM has pronunciation stuff on it, and for free software it's a pretty good deal. it has different difficulty levels, and you can limit it to Verbs, to Nouns,etc. it's a good resource. 

• Teknia Greek
• This was another free resource. it's Greek font! I am SO excited about this because once I start learning how to write, it will come in so handy, especially when I am writing on this blog, and I want to discuss a particular word or write something in Greek you know? it's so cool! I downloaded a "map" of  my keyboard for the Greek font, which is very helpful!

• Basics of Biblical Greek Vocabulary CD

• I just bought this resource right now! it goes with the 3rd edition textbook, and it covers the vocabulary, the alphabet, some of the readings,etc. it seemed a good resource to have. since I am on my own, it's important to have resources that help with pronounce things like vocabulary since I won't  have a professor or an awesome Greek tutor like Brent to go to.

• Interlinear Greek Bible
• I found this in the campus store, and It'll be VERY helpful when I actually am able to read a bit, translate a bit. It's a Greek/English bible, but it does line by line, word by word translation. the English is on the left side of the page, and then on the right there's the Greek with word by word/phrase by phrase English translation underneath. it'll be so helpful to have a word by word translation easily seen like that since I'm on my own, and so am very excited to have found this bible. maybe someday, I'll be able to read it :)

I am VERY excited about  these resources, or as I call them, my tools of the Quest. along the way, am sure I'll pick up more tools, or find that some of these I no longer need but for me, I think I made some good choices.

The Beginning

This might be one of my craziest ideas to date, but I am very excited about it! I have lots of friends who are bible majors and they have to take two years of biblical Greek. I have watched them stress and struggle and worry and study like crazy. sometimes it seemed like Greek was the only class they were taking because that's all they would ever seem to be studying. I have always been relieved I never had to go through that since I stopped being a bible major(simply because I was double majoring in education and bible at the time and it would have taken me an extra 2 years to graduate)after one semester, but I did always wonder what it would be like to learn biblical Greek. However, a part of me also never really saw the need, but lately I have really begun to see that sometimes the original Greek words and how they were translated makes a huge difference on what the text says and what it was meant to say. so a few days ago I made the very impromptu decision to teach myself Greek. I don't want to have to pay $10,000 for two years of Greek, and there is also no time for that since I'm graduating in May(yay!). Also, I am currently taking Mandarin so I doubt that any language can be more difficult to learn than Mandarin(except maybe Russian) so Greek doesn't intimidate me(not yet anyways). I also have noticed while studying Mandarin that when I have plenty of time to study, to study at a slower pace, I do learn it really well. So I think that if I learn biblical Greek on my own time, by myself, I will be able to learn it better because I can take my time, work at a slower pace, my pace,and not be rushed to learn a ton of it at once. I think that's what bible majors freak out over the most, what makes the class so hard, that they are learning so much of it in so short a time, it's all packed in together. the background for this blog, though you can't see all of it, is of a hand dropping in one coin into a piggy bank.this picture really captures how I am approaching this: one coin at a time. bible majors can do their $100 bills at a time into their Greek piggy bank and that's fine, but I'm going to do it one coin at a time. will be MUCH slower but no hurry and I'll learn best this way.

     Brent Bailey does have something to do with this. I always believe that there is nothing I can do that he can't do just as well,most likely better than me and more easily than me. I don't resent him or anything for it, but that is what I believe. I want to change that. I want and need to prove to myself and to him, that I can do something he can do just as well as he can. it's not that he agrees with, he actually doesn't, not even close. but  I need him to see me doing something that he's good at, and doing it just as good as he. and he's really good at Greek. I'm not about to start jogging/running to prove this to him. Greek is a much more preferred choice by me.   

I am excited about this quest. it'll probably take my a year just to learn the alphabet,but it's on my time so that's okay. there are so many resources  for biblical Greek, and a lot of those are made with the idea that not everyone that is learning biblical Greek is going to be in a classroom but that some are also going to self-learners. I'll write a separate post on the resources I have already, because I think that'll be good to write about separately. am VERY excited about this, and maybe someday, I'll be able to read the New Testament a bit in Greek :)