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GETTING STARTED

 
Your first lesson will be to learn the Koine Greek alphabet, letter pronunciation, punctuation, and a few basic rules. The best way to learn the alphabet is to practice writing it by hand on paper while saying the name of each letter and its sound. They say that setting words to music helps people with memorization; so if it will help, you can sing the Greek alphabet to the tune of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, which is the same tune used to teach children the English alphabet. You will not be ready to move on to the next page until you are able to recite the alphabet and their sounds by memory - without looking at the letters. It's not as hard as you might think. Give it a try!

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THE "H" SOUND
 
The poor H is one of the most abused consonants in the world. Some languages, like a few of the British and American dialects, pronounce H where it shouldn't be, or ignore it altogether - like HEIR, HONEST, HONOR, and HOUR. Other languages, like Spanish, apply it to multiple letters, such as X and J in MEXICO (Meh-hee-koh) and JALEPINO (hah-leh-pee-no). Sometimes the H is impotently stuck behind other consonents, as in RHINOCEROS, RHINESTINE, CHRISTMAS, and CHAMELEON. It's almost as if the world is ashamed of the H. Koine Greek follows that tradition of abuse by making it the most obnoxious NON-existent letter of the alphabeta. Rather than just created a letter foor he H sound, every single Greek word that begins with a vowel must be fronted with a special symbol to indicate whether or not it should begin with the H sound. 
 

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Typically all words that begin with a vowel will have one of these two symbols over them. Sometimes, if the word begins with two vowels, the mark will be placed over the second vowel, though the H sound will still be at the front of the word. However, we are going to make this course extremely easy for you and only include the  `  when the H sound is required, and only at the front of the word. Remember, you aren't learning conversational Koine Greek - and since no one speaks it anymore, who would you hold a conversation with anyway?

You're welcome.

 
 
 

DIPHTHONGS

No, a Diphthong [dif-thong] is not some weird type of Bikini. Diphthongs are your friends. In fact, you've known Diphthongs since the very day you learned to speak - you just probably didn't even know it; so don't let the name rattle you.

A diphthong is two or more letters placed together that create a different sound than when they are pronounced individually. Some English diphthongs include EIGHT, ELEPHANT, TOOL, CHEW, SHOE, SALVATION, TIGHT, THOROUGHLY, and THIGH. On rare occasions the letters of a Diphthong are pronounced individually, as in PEORIA. Below is a list of Koine Greek diphthongs. It is vital that you memorize these.

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ACCENTS

Ah, the nightmare of Greek accents.....

No, we are not talking about foreign dialect accents, but the stress accents on a word, such as the way we pronounce "bible" as "bi-ble"  With rare exception, every Koine Greek word contains one of three - yes, three - different kinds of accent marks to indicate where the stress accent is in a word. The accent system is so complicated that I've seen Greek scholars refuse even to teach the subject. Why the ancients Greek felt the need for this, only they truly know. There is a reason, but it's so stupid that no one who is anyone really cares. In fact, throughout this course, to save your sanity, we have completely removed the accent marks altogther, indicating the accent in the word's pronunciation with italics as mentioned earlier. The only reason we are even telling you about it is because we do not want you to be confused in the future when you come across the accent marks in ancient Greek writings. If you are seriously interested in learning the accent system, I highly recommend the exhaustive book GREEK: AN INTENSIVE COURSE available in our Valuable Resources section.

Again, your welcome. Didn't I tell you this would be easy? 

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Memorize these!!! There are only four.

For the record, the question mark is also used for exclamation points.

CAPITAL LETTERS

Capitol letters are only used in two instances:

  • as the first letter of a paragraph
  • as the first letter of a proper noun

All other sentences in a paragraph begin with lower case, as well as titles accompanying a name. For example:

Thousands of people were at the mall, including governor Smith and mayor Johnson. no one bought anything. all of the stores went out of business, except Dillards department store.

 

NAMES AND TITLES OF GOD  

In the New Testament, God's Hebrew name "Jehovah" (or "Yahweh", which ever pronunciation you prefer) is written as "Kurios", meaning "The Lord".  The word "God" is written as "Theos".

 

"THE" AND "A/AN"

The use of these in English and Greek are very different and can become confusing in translation.

First it should be noted that there is no such word in Greek as "A" or "An", such as "a hat" or "an apple". In English "A/An" denotes a quantity of "one". In Greek, just the word hat or apple would be used. In other words, you would say, "I have hat" or "I have apple". If there is a specific thing or specific number of things that must be specified, the Greek will write it as, for example,  "the/that/this/those/his/her/its/their  hat", "one/two/three/etc  hat(s)", such as "I have the hat" or "I have her hat" or "I have 5 hats".

However, "A/An" are words that are required in English grammar, and without them some sentences cannot be completed. Therefore, if the context requires and allows, it can be added when transliterated from Greek to English. Also, it is typical that Greek uses the word "the" where we would not use it in English, and therefore, in certain instances it is grammatically appropriate to drop the word in transliteration. For example, often the word "God", referring to Jehovah God, is written "the God" in Greek. The context implies "the one and only" God - that is, "the God" in which the entire biblical text has been referencing all along. It even further differenciates it from all other gods, because if there is no other REAL gods, then the only real God must be "THE" God. But this is not how we speak in English. In English, the one and only Almighty God is differentiated from all other gods by using a capital or lower case for the first letter (God/god), and therefore we drop "the" from "the God" when transliterated from Greek to English.

 
 
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