Lexical Aids for Students of New Testament Greek

by Bruce M. Metzger

According to the psychologist, man learns by associating the new with the old, the strange with the familiar. In studying a foreign language, therefore, the beginner will do well to observe whatever similarities may exist between his own and the other language. Part I of the following Lexical Aids makes use of this principle of associative learning by supplying, after the English definitions of Greek words, such English derivatives as may be of assistance in remembering the meaning of the Greek vocabulary. The Greek words in the list, furthermore, have been selected and arranged in accord with their frequency of occurrence in the New Testament. Part II makes a different application of the same psychological principle. Here are exhibited the family relationships among words of frequent and less frequent occurrence. After a student has become acquainted with a minimum working vocabulary of words that occur many times in the New Testament he can make more rapid progress in acquiring a larger vocabulary by learning such additional words as resemble in general meaning and form those which he already knows. --- excerpt from book's Preface

Genres: Reference, Biblical Studies, Language, Theology, New Testament, Nonfiction, Christianity

100 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1955

About the author

Bruce Manning Metzger (February 9, 1914 – February 13, 2007) was an American biblical scholar and textual critic who was a longtime professor at Princeton Theological Seminary and Bible editor who served on the board of the American Bible Society and United Bible Societies. He was a scholar of Greek, New Testament, and New Testament textual criticism, and wrote prolifically on these subjects. Metzger is widely considered one of the most influential New Testament scholars of the 20th century.[1][2]

Reviews

[Derek Woodall · Rating 5 out of 5]

As I’ve attempted to increase my Greek vocab base and keep up with grammar and syntax as I read the Greek New Testament, this was an excellent next step.
It includes helpful mnemonics, frequency lists, word stem groupings, and word endings indicating certain word formations.

[Chandler Kelley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Contains some extremely helpful linguistic analysis that I will keep on hand when studying the GNT.

[Sam James · Rating 5 out of 5]

Slightly cheeky of me to count this book as 'read' in that the first half is purely a vocabulary list of greek words ordered according to their frequency (Which I am working through on Memrise). But appendices I and II are fantastic, on the Indo-European family of languages, and the use of prepositions in composition with verbs respectively. The others I found less helpful, but only because I'm such a beginner student of the language. Still, anyone wiling to learn their principle parts and obscure second declension feminine nouns I imagine will be greatly helped by this book. I expect to return to it frequently.

[Bruce Langley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Laying aside any weaknesses that the book, by some, is reported to have, I have found it an extremely good help to prioritizing my learning of the Koine vocabulary for more than forty-five years. It was a tremendous help in my reading the New Testament through in Koine Greek because of its excellent treatment of prepositions. It has served as a check-list of learning by frequency and is worth buying for that reason alone.

[Bill Tillman · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent resource for Greek

[Eli · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very helpful resource for learning NT Greek vocabulary. Recommended.

[Matthew Rawlings · Rating 4 out of 5]

Helpful but the best book I have found for vocabulary is Trenchard's.

[Josh Kannard · Rating 5 out of 5]

The best tool for making progress with Greek vocab. Gave me a tangible track for progress. I love Metzger.

[Bfleegs · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very helpful overview of the basics for Koine Greek morphology.

[Ashley · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was required to purchase and use this book for a graduate-level NT Greek class. What I thought to be a waste of money became a life-saver as the course progressed. This book will work only as a companion book to other NT Greek course books, but it will save the student many hours, especially when it comes to vocabulary and verbal roots.

I highly recommend this book even if one only uses it for the vocabulary section. The vocabulary words are separated by frequency of usage in the New Testament, which will help the student learn the more frequently used terms first.

[Dave Maddock]

I found the section on common suffixes the most useful. My intent was to type the word frequency lists into Anki for studying, but my vocabulary from the Teach Yourself book is a very large overlap anyway.

[R. Fox · Rating 3 out of 5]

Great content, but the format is really, REALLY outdated.

[Jonathan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Essentially a Greek-English lexicon of words used ten or more times with some other helpful information.

[Charlie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Every student of New Testament Greek ought to own this book and memorize the two chapters on word roots and prepositions in verbs.

[Jacob Aitken · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tells you which words occur most frequently and how one is to memorize vocab. I had memorized every word on every page of this book at one time. Definitely worth getting.

[Brent · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent lexical handbook by Princeton's own Metzger! It serves always for a quick reference or check while I am reading my Greek New Testament or doing a devotional.

[Kevin · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great resource for getting down Greek vocabulary--a must have.

[Daniel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent vocab resource