The Biblical Languages

The Old Testament was originally written in Hebrew with a few passages in Aramaic. The New Testament was written in Greek - specifically Koine Greek, that is, the common Greek of the time.

Most of us rely on translations. People (generally teams of people) proficient in the original languages have done their very best to express the meaning in English. We can be very grateful but there is, of course, an advantage in being able to see what was written in those original languages. Often there are nuances that are hard to convey in the English.

We have basically three options:

  1. Just stick with the English

  2. Stick with the English but use tools that explain the original languages.

  3. Learn one, or both, (or all three) of those original languages.

Tools To Help Understand The Languages

Tools To Help Understand Hebrew

Tools To Help Understand Greek

Paid Courses

  • Bible Study Greek - Bill Mounce. This course helps you learn Greek well enough to do Greek words studies etc. without having to fully learn Greek.

Learning The Languages

Why Learn The Original languages

Why Study Hebrew?

Why Study Greek?

Learning Hebrew

Websites

Paid Options

Learning Greek

Websites and Web Pages

  • Learn Biblical Greek - Logos.com - linked to the Logos Bible software but free videos etc on this page

  • Lingua Graeca Per Se Illustrata - Seumas Macdonald. Non-biblical Greek text that gets increasingly harder but provides practice in reading Greek. Macdonald says that it is not yet useful for learning Greek by yourself but he hopes it will be one day.

  • Hellenistic Greek - Michael Palmer

Paid Options

A Sample of the Bill Mounce course videos - Zondervan