Any relatively easy New Testament passages to begin with?

[H.E_Nightingale]

Do you have any thoughts for what I might begin with? I have an edition with the Latin on one side and the Greek on the other, so am able to look at the Latin (or English) if a little tricky. Thank you in advance.

[Barry_Hofstetter]

Most people start with the Johannine literature, and particularly 1st John.

You might find this helpful.

https://koineworkbook.wordpress.com/2018/10/23/books-of-the-new-testament-ranked-according-to-their-difficulty-in-greek/

Anecdote: at one school where I taught students were required to have both Latin in Greek. Chrstmas season, so reading a few familar passages in those languages seemed a good fit. I had one student who had Latin one period and Greek a little later that day. When we were reading Luke 2 in Greek, I realized the student was “cheating” by looking at the Latin text we had just completed earlier…

[H.E_Nightingale]

Most people start with the Johannine literature, and particularly 1st John.

You might find this helpful.

https://koineworkbook.wordpress.com/2018/10/23/books-of-the-new-testament-ranked-according-to-their-difficulty-in-greek/

Anecdote: at one school where I taught students were required to have both Latin in Greek. Chrstmas season, so reading a few familar passages in those languages seemed a good fit. I had one student who had Latin one period and Greek a little later that day. When we were reading Luke 2 in Greek, I realized the student was “cheating” by looking at the Latin text we had just completed earlier…

Thank you, Barry. I’ve made a start on it and have one question:

The end of John 1:1 is traditionally translated as “the Word was God” (this is very famous). Yet in the Greek, it goes θεος ην ο λογος (sorry no breathings); and the Latin Deus erat Verbum. Why is it translated this way round, rather than “God was the Word”? For stylistic reasons?

[paveln]

Most people start with the Johannine literature, and particularly 1st John.

You might find this helpful.

https://koineworkbook.wordpress.com/2018/10/23/books-of-the-new-testament-ranked-according-to-their-difficulty-in-greek/

Anecdote: at one school where I taught students were required to have both Latin in Greek. Chrstmas season, so reading a few familar passages in those languages seemed a good fit. I had one student who had Latin one period and Greek a little later that day. When we were reading Luke 2 in Greek, I realized the student was “cheating” by looking at the Latin text we had just completed earlier…

Thank you, Barry. I’ve made a start on it and have one question:

The end of John 1:1 is traditionally translated as “the Word was God” (this is very famous). Yet in the Greek, it goes θεος ην ο λογος (sorry no breathings); and the Latin Deus erat Verbum. Why is it translated this way round, rather than “God was the Word”? For stylistic reasons?

the article ο indicates a subject - λογος = the Word

[Barry_Hofstetter]

the article ο indicates a subject - λογος = the Word

That’s right, but to elaborate slightly, it’s common in subject/predicate nominative constructions to mark the subject with the article and the predicate to be anarthrous.

[persequor]

Faenum Publishing has a Greek-Latin edition of the Gospel of John with helpful vocabulary and grammar notes.

Link: http://www.faenumpublishing.com/john.html

I’ve made some use of the PDF edition and found it helpful.

[S_Walch]

Thank you, Barry. I’ve made a start on it and have one question:

The end of John 1:1 is traditionally translated as “the Word was God” (this is very famous). Yet in the Greek, it goes θεος ην ο λογος (sorry no breathings); and the Latin Deus erat Verbum. Why is it translated this way round, rather than “God was the Word”? For stylistic reasons?

For what it’s worth, William Tyndale, the first person to translate the Greek New Testament into English (circa 1525 CE), originally translated John 1:1 as “and god was thatt worde.” It was in his later revision that it became “and the worde was God.”

(Above taken from The New Testament Translated by William Tyndale 1534 - A Reprint of the Edition of 1534 with the Translator’s Prefaces & Notes and the variants of the edition of 1525 (Edited for the Royal Society of Literature by N. Hardy Wallis, with an Introduction by the Right Honourable Isaac Foot), Cambridge Uni. Press., 1938.)

[H.E_Nightingale]

Faenum Publishing has a Greek-Latin edition of the Gospel of John with helpful vocabulary and grammar notes.

Link: http://www.faenumpublishing.com/john.html

I’ve made some use of the PDF edition and found it helpful.

Thanks for this.

the article ο indicates a subject - λογος = the Word

That’s right, but to elaborate slightly, it’s common in subject/predicate nominative constructions to mark the subject with the article and the predicate to be anarthrous.

I see - because θεος doesn’t have an article, it is the complement?

[Barry_Hofstetter]

I see - because θεος doesn’t have an article, it is the complement?

That’s right.

[jeidsath]

I like Mark better than John because the sentences are self-explanatory rather than cryptic. You’ll always know when you’ve understood the meaning. On the other hand, neither gave me as much practice as I would have liked in the sorts of characteristic Greek phrases that I saw in the classical channel of Greek literature. The Catholic epistles might be very slightly better for that, but I’ve always had trouble staying awake while reading them. (Though I’ve discovered in the past couple of years that they have become richer and more interesting in Greek than in translation, once I could read them easily, anyway.)

[Isaac_Newton]

the article ο indicates a subject - λογος = the Word

That’s right, but to elaborate slightly, it’s common in subject/predicate nominative constructions to mark the subject with the article and the predicate to be anarthrous.

It’s “common” to “mark” (your word) the Subject with the article only when one substantive in a S-PN construction is indefinite, because indefinite substantives do not have the article and are never the Subject in a S-PN construction to begin with. If both S and PN are definite, for instance, and only one has the article, then you cannot use the article alone as a sure guide to “mark” the articular substantive as the Subject.

[UnsounderFiddle]

John’s gospel is far and away the easiest Greek in the NT. It’s definitely the place to start for beginners. Students at seminary work through John’s gospel and think their Greek is getting pretty decent, then switch to any other book of the New Testament and cry.

Also, it’s not biblical per se but the Greek of the Didache (early Christian writing, maybe the earliest post-NT Christian writing known) is also written in very simple Greek, and uses a lot of biblical language so it’s quite easy to understand. Full text in Greek is available online here

[Loulex]

Mark or I John and, of course, this:

https://www.amazon.com/UBS-Revised-Greek-Testament-Readers/dp/3438051680/ref=sr_1_3?keywords=readers+greek+NT&qid=1638300468&qsid=138-1526703-2127924&sr=8-3&sres=0310516803%2C1433564157%2C3438051680%2C1619706180%2C1433570920%2C1625648634%2C0310205824%2C0801093201%2C1535983205%2C1619708434%2C1942697066%2C1433579642%2C0310236606%2C0718003594%2C0310325897%2C0310109930&srpt=ABIS_BOOK

[paveln]

2 readings from the New Testament with words occurring more than fifty times:

Free graded reader - Listing verses of the Greek New Testament
By order of Frequently Used Words:

https://www.bhacademic.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/Free-Graded-Reader.pdf

And book:
https://www.amazon.com/Beginners-Reader-Grammar-New-Testament-Greek/dp/0801045916