This summer, I was inspired to learn New Testament Greek and bought the ESV English-Greek Reverse Interlinear New Testament. This ESV bible presents the English verses on the first line, and then the rearranged original Greek words on a line beneath the English. The Greek words are numbered and have arrows to indicate their original ordering. It's easy to read the English and to see the original Greek words at the same time. In addition to the Greek, the Latin transliteration of the words are provided on a third line to make pronunciation and work recognition easier. On the fourth line is the parsing code indicating, gender, plurality, etc. and then the fifth line has the Strong's Numbers for dictionary look-ups. It has everything!

Here is a sample page:

This bible contains the Greek New Testament, and doesn't contain the Septuagint (LXX) Greek Old Testament; it would be a huge book otherwise! Besides, the LXX's Classical Greek is much different than the NT's Koine Greek. I was surprised how many Greek words I had learned after I had read through this entire bible, as well as how many amazing details can be seen from simply looking at the original Greek words (even without knowing what they meant.) Seeing the Greek word patterns, repetitions and phrases occurring repeatedly allowed me to see significant details that are lost in translation.

For instance, there are many words for "love" in the Greek: philo, agape, eros, etc. but only one ("love") in English. So in John 21:15-19, Jesus asks Peter if he ("agape") loves him, but Peter responds that he ("philo") loves him. Agape is much more significant than Philo, so it's no wonder why Jesus asked Peter three times, "Do you love me?"

The NT Greek has thoroughly impressed me and made me appreciate the importance of learning Greek and Hebrew. I'm not prepared to learn Hebrew yet. But, I have renewed appreciation for the NASB bible for its 97% literacy ratio, because it italicizes words not in the original language and tries to do word for word translations. I'm not ready to start translating Hebrew, so this has become my preferred study bible for the Old Testament. 

I've decided to take my Greek to the next level, and try to understand Greek grammar, rather than only building Greek vocabulary. I found an excellent introduction book to NT Greek grammar that is easy to follow and productive! Basics of Biblical Greek Grammar by William D. Mounce.

This Greek grammar has a CD and workbook to accompany it, but my library only had the textbook. Bill Mounce informs you that there are only about 5,000 distinct Greek words in the New Testament, and he tells you after each chapter what percentage of the words you have learned so far. It's amazing how fast that percentage rises too! I read through the first five chapters in one sitting, and am finally understanding how to pronounce the words, transform them into English letters, and determine if words are plural or feminine, etc.

I highly recommend both books from personal experience! By combining the two, I have learned more in a few months than I thought I would learn in a few years! Learning Koine Greek no longer feels impossibly, but now attainable!

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The Book of Revelation has had a long and rocky road into biblical canonization, and has generated a myriad of interpretations and migraines among its readers. Although I believe John's Revelation is inspired, I first recommend reading what Paul wrote about eschatology (the study of end times)! In two of Paul's earliest, clearest and widely read letters exists two significant end times passages: 1 Corinthians 15:12-58 and 1 Thessalonians 4:13-5:11. I've seen more ink spilled on these two passages than any other eschatological passage (except possibly the Olivet Discourse.) The best part about them are that they are not written in the symbol-laden apocalyptic genre, so they are easy to understand!

After Paul, I then recommend Jesus' Olivet Discourse: Matthew 24, Mark 13, Luke 21. Although the gospel writers wrote much later, they record Jesus' very words on the End Times, and who would know better than Jesus Christ, the Son of God? There are also eschatological versesscattered throughout the New Testament that reveal significant pieces of what is yet to come. Here are a few: Rom 11:25-36, 1 Thess 1:5-2:12; Col 3:4.

Lastly, review a brief history of the bible, before tackling Revelation and there will be far less interpretations and migraines for us all! Also, remember to check out my review of Robert Mounce's commentary on the Book of Revelation.

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Thirteen of the New Testament books internally claim to be written by the Apostle Paul. The Epistle of the Hebrews is anonymous, and is considered inspired, but very few theologians believe it was authored by Paul. We have found many other letters outside of the bible that claim to be authored by Paul, but they are likely pseudopygrapha ("false writings.") In the academic community, only seven of these fourteen books are undisputed as authored by Paul. First Thessalonians, Romans, First Corinthians, Second Corinthians, Galatians, Philippians, Philemon.

If a scholar has rejected six of Paul's New Testament letters as pseudopygrapha, then I don't think you will change their mind, but its still valuable to know. Some of the disputed letters have a dubious history, but by comparing the word-choices, themes, phrases, and theological arguments to those in the undisputed letters we can use textual criticism to prove that the disputed letters are rightly placed in the New Testament canon.

Aside from apologetics, knowing that letters like Romans are undisputed allows me to take every word as if it came directly from Paul. I read 1 Timothy today, and there are several verses that Paul wrote to Timothy that if taken alone, apart from the undisputed letters, may lead you to believe in Pelagianism or even Universal salvation! This is also applicable to other non-Pauline passages of scripture like Mark 16, where some have developed strange doctrines about poisonous snakes.

Very few people have read the extra-biblical letters of Paul (part of the New Testament Apocrapha) and just because they are not in the bible, doesn't mean they have no value. The most important thing about Pseudopygrapha is that the author wants you to believe that Paul wrote their false letter, so they will write in a believable way that may reveal several facts along with their lies. By considering the way they argue, or what they are arguing, we can learn about the problems of the time period or some revealing details of contention that may give interesting background info toward understanding the undisputed letters better.

Non-canonical Pauline Epistles:

1. Third Epistle to the Corinthians (canonical for a time in the Armenian Orthodox)
2. Epistle to the Laodiceans (found in Codex Fuldensis)
3. Epistle of the Corinthians to Paul (addressed to Paul, not written by him)
4. Epistle to the Alexandrians

Non-epistle text claiming Pauline authorship:

1. Acts of Paul and Thecla
2. Acts of Peter and Paul
3. Apocalypse of Paul
4. Coptic Apocalypse of Paul
5. Prayer of the Apostle Paul
6. Epistle to Seneca the Younger

Last of all, there is certainly a chance that one day an archeologist will discover a previously unknown letter by Paul. There are many lost books that are referred to in the bible, including several Pauline letters. If one of these were unearthed, we may find it very valuable, even if it is never included in our bibles! Here's a list of lost Pauline epistles:

1. The first Epistle to Corinth (cf. 1 Cor 5:9)
2. The third Epistle to Corinth aka "Severe Letter" (c.f 2 Cor 2:4; 7:8-9)
3. The Earlier Epistle to the Ephesians (cf. Eph 3:3-4)
4. The Epistle to the Laodiceans (cf. Col 4:16)

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I'm reading Paul: In Fresh Perspective by N.T. Wright. It's a short 170pg book that briefly covers N.T. Wright's conservative (and reasonably orthodox) version of the New Perspective on Paul that is different from the liberal extremes of E.P. Sanders and James Dunn. In "Paul", N.T. Wright discusses the three worldviews of Paul: Second Temple Judaism, the Roman Empire, and his association with Jesus Christ as the Messiah. Each of these world views are analyzed against N.T. Wright's meta-narrative approach to understanding Paul: Creation vs Covenant, Messiah vs Apocalyptic, and Gospel vs the Roman Empire. The worldviews and the meta-narratives fuse together Paul's theology into a Covenantal Nomism where Salvation History soteriology is stressed as building throughout history rather than an a-historical view of salvation. The cross of Christ is still defined as the unexpected event that has always been a part of the plan that causes the election of God's people. The cross extends the holy people and land to all peoples and the entire earth by consider creation and covenant as synonyms in the dikaiosune theou ("righteousness of God").

N.T. Wright uses his meta-narrative approach to prove that Colossians and Ephesians and the Pauline portions of Acts are correctly ascribed to Paul. This wins him favor with conservative scholarship (and myself!), but I fear it is at the consequence of clouding our understanding of Paul over all. N.T. Wright's three-fold analysis of Philippi does add clarity by explaining the pros-and-cons of the city's annexation by the Rome Empire, and I found Wright's exegesis of Philippians 2 very good when he used his hermaneutic to exegete the church's charge to "work our their salvation when it is God who actually works." Wright's methodology also demonstrates that the letter to the Galatians was among the first books written in the New Testament. So I find the book valuable two fold, for using the world-view of second-Temple Judaism to read Paul's literature, and second to put down disputes against Paul's authorship.

N.T. Wright also considers 2 Baruch, 4 Ezra and a few other Jewish Apocalyptic writings. I believe this would be informative to many Christians who do not know about these letter's existence, but my reading of those letters didn't bring me to the same conclusions that he arrived upon, so I was skeptical rather than intrigued. I am no expect, so maybe I should read those letters again.

Lastly, my overall gripe against N.T. Wright is that I would value his literature far more if he didn't put me on the defense all the time. I feel that the New Perspective on Paul has some value but its forced at the loss of a plain reading of Paul's writings. This is also my concern with Karl Barth as well. Reinterpretation is very valuable as long as it doesn't interpret away what is obviously before our face.

Overall, I consider N.T. Wright's view orthodox and very good, with only a few hesitations. I recommend this book as an introduction to N.T. Wright.

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