Online New Testament Greek I and II

September 2012 - April 2013

This web page was last updated on 24 June 2013.
Susan Jeffers will not be teaching online Greek in the 2013-14 academic year.
The information on this page pertains to the course as it was offered in 2012-13.

Any questions about the course itself, contact the instructor, Susan Jeffers, susan.jeffers@utoronto.ca

Questions about registration, fees, deadlines, etc, contact the Knox College registrar, Ruth McCarten, at knox.registrar@utoronto.ca. Students must register either for credit or audit by the first day of class (September 12 for Greek I). 2011-12 tuition was $540 per course for Canadian students, $1,460 for Visa/International students, $200 to audit. Check with the Registrar for tuition and fees for 2012-13.

INSTRUCTOR: Susan Jeffers, susan.jeffers@utoronto.ca

PREREQUISITE: None

COURSE DESCRIPTION:
Taken in sequence, Greek I and II provide an introduction to the basic elements of New Testament Greek. Students will master essential aspects of Greek morphology and syntax and acquire a substantial reading vocabulary. The courses employ both deductive and inductive methods, with increasing emphasis on the latter as students progress through the year. By the end of the first semester, students will have mastered first and second declension nouns, pronouns, adjectives, and indicative verbs, and have experience analyzing Greek sentences and simple literary structure. Students will be expected to use audio recordings and practice listening to and reading Greek aloud, as well as writing Greek both by hand and using a word processor with Greek fonts. These courses will be conducted online. Evaluation: Weekly written assignments, frequent closed-book quizzes, mid-term translation project, proctored final exam.

STUDENT LEARNING GOALS:

Upon successfully completing these two courses, the student will have demonstrated:

1. Ability to analyze (parse) Greek nouns, pronouns, adjectives and verbs.

2. Facility sight-reading Greek sentences, and writing Greek script both by hand and using Greek fonts in a word processor.

4. Ability to analyze and translate New Testament Greek passages with some helps provided.

5. Acquisition of a basic New Testament Greek vocabulary.

REQUIRED BOOKS:

You can order these books through Crux Bookstore, either locally in Toronto or to be shipped anywhere in the world. If you use a different online or local bookseller, be sure to get the correct edition, particularly for the Lexicon. Older editions of Croy differ only in not having the CD - the textbook itself is the same. For the GNT, you need the Fourth Revised Edition so the "textual apparatus" will match what we'll discuss in class, as well as the Dictionary, to which we will refer frequently. Check the ISBN carefully - there are many many editions of this GNT, and you must have the one specified.

1. A Primer of Biblical Greek, by N. Clayton Croy (Eerdmans). Any edition, including ISBN 9780802860002, 9780802846280 and others.

2. The Greek New Testament, Fourth Revised Edition with Dictionary (Deutsche Biblegesellschaft/United Bible Societies/American Bible Society) ISBN 3438051370 or 978-3438051370.
NOTE: The Canadian Bible Society, through the generosity of its donors is proud to provide scriptures in Greek New Testament and/or Hebrew Bible for Theology students studying the Original biblical languages at any Seminary or Theological college in Canada. To receive your free copy, contact Ruth Stewart, RStewart@biblesociety.ca

Here are sample pages so you can be sure you have the correct book:
GNT pp 382-383 - the beginning of John chapter 15
GNT Dictionary pp. 8-9

3. Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature, 3rd edition, by Walter Bauer, William Arndt and Frederick W. Danker (University of Chicago Press, 2000) ISBN 0226039331.

OPTIONAL BOOK:

A Textual Commentary on the Greek New Testament. Fourth Revised Edition. By Bruce M. Metzger. (Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft / United Bible Societies). ISBN 3438060108 or 978-3438060105.

COURSE REQUIREMENTS AND POLICIES:

Our work will proceed on a weekly cycle, with each week covering particular textbook lessons(s) and/or reviews. Each week runs from Monday through Friday, with a firm deadline of 6 a.m. Eastern time Monday morning for posts or other assignments in the preceding week. It's fine to work ahead, but do NOT get behind!

It is the usual policy of Knox College to assess a penalty for late assignments, with four percentage points to be deducted per week that an assignment is late and partial deductions for partial weeks. However, due to the nature of this on line course and the critical importance of keeping abreast with learning a language, all assignments must be submitted on time and cannot be revisited after their due date.

All work other than quizzes and the final exam will be open book and open notes; students are encouraged to help one another, ask questions online or whatever else you want to do to help your understanding. You are welcome, for LXX and NT exercises, to consult an English translation. However, if you use such helps as a short-cut, be sure to also figure out why and how the sentence works in Greek!

The final exam will consist of translating a passage from the Greek New Testament, with some words underlined to be parsed. Some helps will be provided for the more difficult words or grammatical structures. Students who live within 200 km of Knox College will write the final exam at the college; all others must arrange for a local proctor. No books or other resources will be allowed during the final exam.

STUDENT EVALUATION

The instructor will make every effort to give students timely feedback as we go through the course, and students are encouraged to help one another whenever possible. Our primary goal is to learn as much New Testament Greek as possible, and to learn how to learn NT Greek; anyone who applies him or herself to that task should have no trouble passing the course.

You need 700 points or more in order to earn credit in each of the two courses in the sequence.

Points for Greek I are assigned as follows:

160 - Participation and assignment for each lesson, 10 points per lesson
16 - Audio recordings, after every second lesson, 2 points per recording
64 - Vocabulary and grammar quizzes, after every second lesson, 8 points per quiz
200 - Four cumulative quizzes, 50 points each
160 - Mid-term exam/assignment
400 - Final exam (proctored)
-----
1000 total possible points

All work for each week must be completed no later than 6 a.m. Eastern, Monday after the week (Mon-Fri) ends. Full participation credit depends on adequate participation by 6 a.m. Saturday.

At the end of the course, students will receive both their numerical average (%) and a letter grade:

A note on Greek pronunciation: This course will present both modern Greek and the "Erasmian" pronunciation taught in many seminaries and universities in North America. Each student is welcome to use both sets of audio recordings; however it is important that each student choose one or the other pronunciation system to master and use. Students planning to continue their studies at Knox College MUST use modern Greek pronunciation in this course. Others may choose either system.

For those choosing modern Greek pronunciation:
* Skip chapter 1 in the required Croy textbook (see above).
* Use this Modern Greek Pronunciation document and accompanying audio to learn the basics.
* Then use this audo recording and pdf to practice listening and reading along with John 1:1-8:
John 1:1-8 - audio - excerpted from Spiros Zodhiates' modern Greek New Testament CD set; I've added a 2-second pause between verses, to help you keep your place. The full CD set is available at www.christianbook.com.
John 1:1-8 - text from the UBS/NA text we will be using in the class

For those choosing Erasmian pronunciation:
Use chapter 1 in the required Croy textbook (see above), along with these audio recordings:
http://jeffers.bethanyseminary.edu/NTGreek1/longer.htm
You will need to install the "bwgrkl" font (see below) in order to see the Greek characters on your computer screen.

Displaying Greek characters and typing in Greek: In order to learn Greek over the Internet in this course, you will need to install the "bwgrkl" Greek font on the computer you will be using. Fonts are the computer's way of handling Greek letters, so you see the Greek alphabet on your computer screen rather than English. If you're not particularly computer savvy, get someone to help you, or just try following the instructions at the link. If you get stuck, you can email or call the instructor, but try it on your own first.

Bwgrkl is a font that comes with the computer program BibleWorks. It will be the primary font I'll use when I post examples, exercises and quiz questions. You will use it to type your assignments. You can also use it for incorporating Greek script into your academic or other writing, for example if you want to discuss a particular Greek word or phrase. Download Bwgrkl at http://www.bibleworks.com/fonts.html. When you have it properly installed, you should see the following displayed in Greek characters:

evlqe,tw h` basilei,a sou\ genhqh,tw to. qe,lhma, sou( w`j evn ouvranw/| kai. evpi. gh/j\ (Matthew 6:10)

If you have questions about the course itself, contact the instructor, Susan Jeffers, susan.jeffers@utoronto.ca

Questions about registration, fees, deadlines, etc, contact Knox College, University of Toronto.

Questions about Blackboard or other computer issues, contact St. George Campus Information Commons, First Floor, Robarts Library; phone: 416.978.HELP (4357), email help.desk@utoronto.ca.