Lexham Discourse Greek New Testament Bundle...

Mark Stevens

Hello all! I am interested to hear from people who have the "Lexham Discourse Greek New Testament Bundle". 

1. What do you think of it?
2. How does it help YOU with your exegesis and sermon prep?
3. Are you proficient in Greek?
4. Why should I or should I not invest in it?

My interest was prompted by the recent blog post about Steve Runge's new video series. It looks great but I was wondering what others thought.

 

Peace be with you,

Mark

Keep Smiling 4 Jesus :)

Wiki has Lexham Discourse Greek New Testament review page that includes links to many Blog posts and forum threads.

Personally, Lexham Discourse Greek New Testament is my # 1 Greek Bible in Library prioritization.  For Greek, still living and learning; parts of the Greek New Testament are still Greek to me.

Discourse analysis provides visual markings for connecting thoughts.  Also, bold is used for emphasis (typically words out of expected order).  Light grey is used for background information.  Forum thread Lexham Discourse Greek New Testament: helpful for absolute beginners? has an insightful discussion.

Blog article All about μέν! includes links to Waiting for the Next Shoe to Drop, Part 1 and Waiting for the Next Shoe to Drop, Part 2

Chapter 2 is Connecting Propositions in " A Discourse Grammar of the Greek New Testament: A Practical Introduction for Teaching and Exegesis", copying section 2.8 for comparison with All about μέν! blog article:

2.8 μέν

The connective μέν is described in detail in §4.1 in the discussion of point/counterpoint sets. The discussion here is limited to a basic overview. BDAG construe μέν primarily as a marker of correlation working in conjunction with other connectives, “introducing a concessive clause, followed by another clause w. an adversative particle: to be sure … but, on the one hand … on the other hand.”83 It serves primarily to correlate the clause that it introduces with some corresponding element that follows, typically introduced by δέ. In contrast to the other connectives considered so far, μέν is forward-pointing. Its sole function is to create the expectation that some related element will follow.

In many cases, the element introduced by μέν functions as a concession, just as the use of although, inasmuch as, on the one hand, or more colloquially while in English. Levinsohn states,

  "The presence of μέν not only anticipates a corresponding sentence containing δέ but frequently, in narrative, it also downgrades the importance of the sentence containing μέν. In particular, the information introduced with μέν is often of a secondary importance in comparison with that introduced with δέ.84"

There are other instances where μέν simply serves to explicitly correlate two elements that otherwise would only have an implicit relation. In such cases, there is simply a connection made between the two, rather than the downgrading described by Levinsohn.

The use of μέν … δέ to create correlated sets in Koine Greek is found far more frequently than is observed in English using corresponding particles. This difference in usage might be related to the difference between the rather cumbersome inasmuch as and on the one hand in comparison to the tiny particle μέν. The mismatch in usage leads BDAG to state that a direct equivalence translation of μέν is often not possible.85 The fact that we do not use forward-pointing correlatives nearly as frequently in English means that in many cases μέν is left untranslated in English versions.

In terms of linguistic constraints, μέν expresses + continuity. More specifically, it signals a forward-pointing correlation with an element introduced by δέ in most cases. It does not mark development.

 

Runge, S. E. (2010). A Discourse Grammar of the Greek New Testament: A Practical Introduction for Teaching and Exegesis (73–74). Bellingham, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc.

 

Keep Smiling [:)]