The entire study package of Basics of Biblical Greek which includes the textbook, the study guide, the vocabulary cards, the summary sheet, and the lecture CD's is a blessed fruit of a long, thoughtful, meticulous, and high-tech labor of one of the world's best New Testament Greek scholars. I have to admit I have not studied Greek from other professors, but after studying Mounce, I simply can not imagine a better way to teach students an introduction to Biblical Greek than the one Prof. Mounce implements in this study packet. The structure and methodology are so impressively organized that I believe, without trying to diminish the role of an instructor, one can study by himself or herself without taking the class at a seminary. From start to finish, Prof. Mounce designs the lessons with solid exegesis skills as the goal in mind. He wastes no time but immediately exposes students with translation exercises using real Scripture passages in the study guide, even early in the first few chapters when he barely starts with nouns.

The lessons are divided into three major parts; nouns, adjectives and verbs. Each chapter begins with exegetical insights related to the topic being taught in that particular chapter. He then moves on by explaining the English and Greek forms. The nouns and adjectives are not too bad. They are usually divided into three types of declensions. While the nouns usually take on one of the three declensions, the most common configuration of adjectives is either 3-1-3 or 2-1-2 where the first, second and third numbers indicate the declension type for masculine, feminine and neuter genders, respectively. There are some discussions on special-case nouns having slightly abnormal endings; pant and ent, for examples. Now verbs are considerably more challenging because they not only have more numerous categories and rules, but the biggest obstacles are the tense stems and when they form the real verbs through a combination of augments, tense-formatives, connecting vowels, and personal endings. The trouble can be illustrated by comparing it to having to memorize the English present, past and perfect tenses of irregular and regular verbs which the Greek version has six; present, future active, aorist active and passive, perfect active and passive, instead of three in English. And each of these six stems has different forms not only depending on the person and number, but also on the voices; active, middle, and passive. On top of these, there is another parameter, called aspect, where these verbs take on other forms, the indicative covered in the early chapters of the verbs, subjunctive, infinitive and imperative. Some are similar if not the same as the indicatives, which make them even harder to distinguish which one is which. Here Prof. Mounce reminds students to always watch for the contexts. Context is your best friend when it comes to translation. There is no easy way of getting around this issue completely except in my view, to get the Greek Morphology text, also by Mounce. At the end of some chapters, there is coverage on extended materials that deal with special cases, additional rules in translation, contraction and morphology.

The summary sheet consists of all important rules involving word formation, verb-ending charts, and all the forms of frequently used verbs. It serves as a handy guide for students when doing the translation so they don't have to flip through the pages of the textbook. Some flipping of pages is inevitable, though, because the last few pages of the textbook has the list of major lexicons.

There are two types of drills in the study guide. The first is chapter-by-chapter review where students are asked to parse ten words in a table having the forms that have been covered up to that chapter. Next, there is a warm-up translation section consisting of seven short phrases or sentences to be translated before the real translation exercise begins with twenty sentences; some are long ones. From my experience, I sometimes had a headache after completing the translation work due to the intensity it involves in figuring out not only what the words mean, but also their forms, and how to restructure the sentence in English format that both are understandable and make sense. The second type of drill is the exam-type where the test materials are combined every five chapters. The tasks include parsing, grammar rules, and translations usually from a New Testament passage.

As in any other languages, learning Greek requires extra memory power, but not brute-force memorization of every single word indiscriminately. Prof. Mounce always warns students only to memory special-case words and rules such as endings and contractions, instead of every single word with all its garden variety of forms. Excellent advise.

Needless to say, I delightfully endorse Prof. Mounce as your virtual Greek instructor. If you decide to homeschool yourself, you can purchase the complete combo set at teknia dot com. I don't think Amazon sell the lecture CD set. But even if you are taking the class at the seminary, I don't see any harm for you to buy the combo set anyway, though you probably won't need the lecture CD's provided you have an excellent instructor.

Recently I decided to teach myself Greek. I've attempted it before using other grammars without much success. The main stumbling block for me was that other authors assumed I knew what sujective case or nominative predicate meant. I didn't, but Mounce gives the reader a crash course in English grammar along with the Greek lessons. Learning has actually turned out to be fun and easy! I simply cannot recommend this text highly enough.

The workbook, flash cards and vocabulary CD are great adjuncts to the text.

I purchased the book to help with Bible translation work. It is a reasonable resource for this type of work. As with all things there is no easy substitute for hard work. Greek Grammar is probably more difficult than most - so it is not a book that you can pick up and within a short time be able to speak and read Greek. Still requires lots of work. There is a lot of reading, memorizing and studying. You also have to have an extensive understanding of the grammar of your mother tongue.

This is the best grammar I have used in my 18 years in the ministry. I have tutored Greek students on occasion and have found this grammar to be the best grammar available. The "inductive" approach is very easy to follow. I highly recommend this grammar as a primary to anyone reviewing their Greek (or secondary grammar to any student) who wants a clear overview of Koine Greek. I use it as part of my daily reading and study.
After learning Dr. Mounce's noun and verb rules for recognizing the "roots," I no longer need to memorize so many paradigms. Once I learned the morphology of the language, the large amount of memorization other grammars require is greatly reduced. This grammar is a must study (or review) for any preacher or teacher working in the New Testament Greek text.

This book has proven to be an excellent way for me to learn enough Biblical Greek to at least have an understanding of why different interpretations of scripture are debated among scholars. I am a lay reader of Biblical Greek and Hebrew and this more or less beginner course was very helpful. Prof. Mounce keeps the reader encouraged with his count of NT Greek word occurrences and a tally of the number of words in the NT one can read based on vocabulary progress from chapter to chapter. Why, after only learning the vocabulary of 8 chapters and only 72 Greek words, I can read over 50% of the words in a Greek NT. (Of course, that means I must skip around to read half of the NT and I am reading words like "and" and "the" etc. a lot, but it is a fun way to keep up with progress. The exegetical insights at the beginning of each chapter are very interesting ways of gaining a sense of the reasons for varying interpetations of scripture.

I highly recommend this book for pastors who don't know Greek but who want to learn the basics of the language to help them study their Bible for sermons.

From the beginning you use the bible! It is a wonderful course and the CD that comes in the back of the book is puts you right there in the class room. You will need the workbook. He has a website with extras and the answers to the workbook. I have studied 7 languages and attempted Greek once before, this text is wonderful. He has a novel way of presenting material with a fraction of the memorization of traditional methods. Well executed program. I am translating after 3 weeks.

Those two words describe this work. It is put together well, and easy to follow.

I am in a 500 level greek class right now and we are using this book for our text and it is working wonderfully. This is my first interaction with greek , however I am picking it up faster than any other language I have attempted. I have studied both Spanish and German and Greek has been easier than both of them. This is not to say that learning greek is easy, the preface of the book says that the only way to learn is by continuous study, AND HE'S RIGHT! I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to learn the bible in its original language. Get the Workbook too, its a big help!

This book comes w/cdrom that has great helps and resources. The accompanying workbook is also very helpful in learning Greek.

Well, I am not nearly as smart as the other people posting reviews here. I am just an average guy. I am a driver for DHL, married with two kids - this means I don't have a lot of time to learn a language... with that said, with this book (combined with the workbook) I am actually LEARNING the language. So much so that I bought myself a greek new testament and am able to read more and more of it as I continue in my studies.

Take it for what its worth - this book is helping me, and I think it is doing it well. I am not feeling confused or lost. Mr. Mounce seems to be a good teacher, and a good writer. I recommend this book.

Take care,
Rob

This is a great way to learn Greek. It comes with a CD which contains all the Professors lectures and more, but there must be a better way to learn "English Grammar," for it is no easier for me today than it was 40 years ago. I had problems with it then and, though I speak as well as any today, I still do not grasp the concept.

If Bill taught the "meaning of ALL the words" along with the pronunciation, and compared them with their English equivalents, I could have learned it much easier. Still and yet, I am excited over what little I have learned to date. It only took me about 3 weeks to master my Greek "abg's."

Even a hard head like myself can learn with enough repetition, and I have already worn out one of the disks, (Thank goodness I has the foresight to make a duplicate) but I am learning.

I don't know just how long it takes most people to get through this course, but I expect to have made it completely through in about a year. Though I currently plan to continue studying Greek till I master the lingo, if what Bill says is correct, I will be able to read through the entire NT in it's original language by then. Then it is on to the LXX and the OT.

I am already over a half century old. I wonder if I will live that long... If so, hopefully our Lord will bless me with being able to share what I will have learned with someone willing to listen and learn.

This is different, not better or worse, than Machen's classic "New Testament Greek for Beginners." Whereas Machen is simple, systematic, and small, Mounce is wordy, complicated, and bulky (you need a separate work book for the exercises.) To learn Greek, you need both Machen AND Mounce.
Mounce gives lots of basic, helpful tips (e.g., datives always have iota, only second person singular verbs end with sigmas, the third declension dative plural ending is the inverse of the corresponding second declension ending, almost all third declension nouns end in alpha, etc, etc.) He gives much fuller explanations than any other grammar I have seen. His font is clear and large and his paradigms at the end of the book are worth the price of the book. His comments throughout help you get motivated to learn NT Greek.
I question his wisdom in waiting so long to introduce verbs and I'm not convinced it is worth memorizing the endings separate from the paradigms, but then again, I have not written my own Greek text book as Mounce has! He had the courage to write a new-style grammar aimed at evangelicals but which really does give Machen a run for his money. Mounce is not perfect, but his is the best grammar of its kind. Even if you think you already know Greek very well, I would recommend this book, and if you are learning it yourself nothing compares to this in fullness of treatment.
I'm not a big fan of his exercises in the work book, but you can't have everything. I would recommend supplementing Mounce with Machen who does a better job drilling the vocab and paradigms, but Mounce does have you read a lots of real Greek.
Mounce's analysis of principal parts is by far the best treatment I have every seen.
I give this four instead of five stars only because no grammar is perfect. None is better than this. It is well worth the extra money and the c.d. rom is also cool.

This is the best grammar for learning Greek NT. Dr. William Mounce as done a great service for the body of Christ, and the students of the NT. It's great for self teaching and easy to use and learn from. This type of work only shows you how good of a teacher Dr.Mounce is. I love it.

God Bless

This is an excellent NT Greek grammar. Unlike some Greek grammars (notably Hansen and Quinn's Attic grammar, one I have experience with), this is ideally suited for the self-learner. Here's why:

- Mounce tries to minimize the amount of memorization required. Greek is a difficult language, no two ways about it: but the way the material is presented can make learning easier or harder. For those of us who come at it as adults, memorization is difficult. Some grammars require massive amounts of rote memorization; Mounce takes instead the tack of giving you a number of rules to apply, then only requiring memorization where the rules don't apply. Using this method, the amount of memorization is cut dramatically, and the effort required is reduced accordingly.

- To ease the remaining memorization, Mounce includes lots of good vocabulary helps. Unfortunately, vocabulary acquisition is usually another rote memorization affair. Mounce includes either derivations or cognates in other languages (drawing in some cases on Metzger's "Lexical Aids for Students of New Testament Greek"), or silly little memorization aids. An example of the latter is Mounce's memorable word play on the word ELPIS (="hope"): "Some people HOPE that ELVIS did not die." I think I can safely say I will never forget the meaning of ELPIS.

- In many ways (including the previous two items) Mounce includes the fruit of his years of experience as a teacher of New Testament Greek. Many books that I'm sure would be just fine when learning from a professor completely fall apart when an autodidact (like myself) attempts to use them. With this book, it's almost as good as Mounce being right there.

- Although I would not have believed it, Mounce has successfully integrated devotional sections at the beginning of most chapters. A combination textbook/devotional? Yes, believe it or not. The section for chapter 10, for example, is simply amazing - building off John 1:14, KAI hO LOGOS SARX EGENETO ("And the Word became flesh.") This answers another big problem for autodidacts, which is that you don't have much of an inducement to continue when the going gets tough. These devotional sections (I am assuming a Christian student, of course) add greatly to your experience and make you look forward to new chapters.

The end result is that this book makes it possible to learn New Testament Greek on your own to just about the same depth as you would get at a seminary. That's an amazing feat in itself.

But be aware, this book has no exercises in it. Rather, you need to buy the companion workbook, which has all the exercises.

This is a wonderful book for learning how nouns, verbs, participles, etc. are formed and what they look like. He goes through each very slowly and very clearly. My problem with this book is there are no readings from the greek. I realize that there is a supplemental book, which I purchased, but even there there aren't very many examples and since they are NT examples you already know what they are supposed to say before you go through all the words. I think this book is tailored more towards people who want to translate verses instead of just sitting down and reading the Greek NT. So my advise would be to buy this and buy Athenaze by Balme or download grammars such as A First Greek Course by Smith from www.textkit.com to learn to read greek fluently. (I'm talking about the 1st edition)

Mounce does a great job of keeping what you need to memorize to a minimum and explaining things clearly and focusing on the key points. I had a year of classical greek 20 years ago but never really mastered it. When I picked up Mounce a couple of years ago it was a breath of fresh air and I have since reached a point where I can read koine with some proficiency (you can never learn enough vocabulary!). I did run into a roadblock at about chapter 25 but I put it down for a while then started again at the beginning and worked through it all the way the second time.

For me many of the nuances of syntax have become fairly intuitive after seeing them a couple of times so I don't think a lack of more detailed explanation of them ala Wallace is a disadvantage of Mounce. Memorize what he tells you to memorize and as much vocabulary as possible and you will be able to read koine. I recommend A Summer Greek Reader as a follow-up for practice reading with easy syntax and additional vocabulary memorization. After that Mounce's Graded Reader and then the New Testament, focusing more on the gospels or Acts initially and with A Reader's Lexicon to cut down on time spent thumbing through a lexicon.

If you've read "Greek for the Rest of Us" by William Mounce and decided that you really wanted to learn the basics of Biblical Greek including vocabulary then this is the book that you will want. William Mounce has a gift for taking the Greek language and making it approachable even to those who have tried before but not succeeded in learning Biblical Greek. While there are many, many grammar details to learn such as whether something is dative, nominative, accusative, genitive, active, passive, dependent, independent, etc. Mr. Mounce actually makes it interesting and finds ways to keep the student interested and feeling positive about their progress. All those grammar rules are very important in correctly interpreting the Greek texts and in understanding English translation. Sometimes there is no English equivalent for a Greek word, sometimes we can only approach a correct translation by approximating a similar word in English, but then our personal prejudices and beliefs affect the word that we choose. Understanding Greek is important to a serious level of study of New Testament writings. This book gives you the basic ability to look through a Greek text or Interlinear Translation of the Bible and understand not only what is said, but also what is actually meant but the text. This is a very highly recommended text for anyone desiring to learn Biblical Greek and one of the best books on the subject that I have ever read.

Mounce's Basics of Biblical Greek sets the standard for introductory biblical Greek grammars. While there is a plethora of introductory grammars I believe this one is the most thorough, clear, and user-friendly. Zondervan has produced an excellent Greek curriculum of which Mounce's Grammar is but the beginning of the journey in learning the original language of the New Testament.

There are many positive dimensions, which set Mounce's grammar above the rest. First, for today's modern reader he does not assume that English grammar is known. He has two chapters (5 & 15), which provide broad overviews to English grammar, and its correspondence to Greek grammar. Then each chapter also contains introductory English grammar and shows it relationship to Greek.

Secondly, this work is generally very clear and understandable. A student seeking to learn Greek on his own should with the grammar, workbook, and included CD-Rom be able to successfully master the concepts of beginning Greek. Another advantage is the amount of tools and commitment to progress exhibited by Mounce and Zondervan in this series. It is clear that they want the student to learn Greek in order to glorify God. Such resources would include the companion workbook, the CD-Rom and the additional materials found on the website (see below).

A basic chapter flow is as follows: Each chapter is introduced with an "Exegetical Insight." A well-known scholar provides an insight into the significance of the Greek grammar about to be discussed in the chapter. It helps show why learning Greek is important to understanding the Bible. Secondly, the English grammar concepts are introduced and then the Greek grammar closely follows. Paradigms and explanations are provided in the Greek grammar section. Next, there is a helpful chapter summary which sums up all of the important concepts covered in the chapter. Following is the vocabulary to be memorized. Lastly, there may be a section on advanced information, which is usually not essential material to be mastered.

As previously mentioned, one of the most helpful aspects of this grammar is the many companion tools. The CD-Rom contains software programs called Flashworks and Parseworks. The Flashworks program is basically an electronic flashcard system, which allows the user to tailor the vocabulary to the specific vocabulary in the Mounce chapter. Personally, Flashworks was a big help in providing another medium to learning the vocab. Parseworks was not as helpful. While I would encourage the student to work with Parseworks I often became tired of having to select each tense, voice, mood, etc... from the drop down menus. It was not as user-friendly as Flasworks.

The website ... also has a good amount of helpful resources. There you will find chapter revisions (definitely download the revision for chapter 20 - it will make a lot more sense!). You can also download the Language Learning Tools (Flashworks and Parseworks); and a very helpful 35-page summary of the first 25 chapters of Mounce's grammar. There is also a revision of the workbook, which allows for an early introduction of verbs. The teacher will find downloadable overheads, quizzes, and the answers to the workbook.

A few negative comments: First, in his attempt to bring together a textbook which incorporates both a deductive and inductive method of learning there is a tendency to de-emphasize memorization. While Mounce is at pains (in sympathy with the student) to minimize needless memorization sometimes it just has to be done. There is no avoiding the vast amount of memorization in learning a language. Painful as it may be I believe it is the key to learning the language.

Secondly, while Mounce is usually clear he is not always concise. He tends to lose the forest for the trees. In the footnotes it is clear that he loves morphology, but it is questionable as to how this will help the beginning student. The beginning student is already facing information overload and such excursions as interesting as they may be may prove unhelpful at this time for the student.

How then should this text be used? Following are a few suggestions, in no particular order, which I found helpful in my study of Biblical Greek. First, use the companion workbook. The grammar and the workbook were meant to go together. Secondly, the workbook section should be treated as a test. One should not progress to the workbook until the corresponding chapter has been mastered. Only then should one tackle the workbook. When the workbook section has been completed then check your work with the grammar and a good English translation.

Thirdly, use the software. Flashworks is easy to use and vocab is best memorized through a variety of mediums. Parseworks can be tedious but still helpful to use. The rest of the CD-Rom is less useful. Fourthly, review, review, and review. I found it helpful to read the chapter numerous times and then also outline the chapter in my own words (even writing out the full paradigms). Repetition is the best way to get the material to sink in. I would suggest not buying vocab cards, but cutting 3x5 index cards into quarters (1/4) and writing them out on your own. Then carry these cards with you wherever you go and whenever you have a chance pull them out to review. You should also pick up Jonathan T. Pennington's New Testament Greek Vocabulary on CD. These two CDs encompass all the words in the New Testament 10x and up. I only wish I had discovered this resource earlier.

Remember, Mounce is not the end but only the beginning. Move onto immersing yourself in the New Testament. Pick up Mounce's Graded Reader of Biblical Greek and Wallace's Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics.

Most of all seek God in prayer. After all you are learning Biblical Greek to be able to read the New Testament in its original language. Learning Greek is to be an act of worship! Study therefore to the glory of God.

I used a diffrent text for the first year of college koine greek to prepare for our seminary entrance qualifier. I was totally lost and dropped my Greek class thinking Koine Greek was far beyond my capabilities. In an act of desperation I picked up BBG and taught myself the fundamentals within a year. I rejoind my Greek class and am now an A student. I ABSOLUTELY COULD NOT have done it without Mounces grammar. Thanks for a wonderful grammar. It has unlock the language of the New Testament Scriptures for me.

When I started studying Greek, I read two standard grammars, then this one. I never went back to the other two, and I read this one three times. It is so easy to read, and so unique in its approach, that I don't know why anyone would use any other. Every college and seminary library I visit uses this grammar -- it is the new standard. If you use this book, you will not have to memorize near so much as the other grammars require. After taking eight hours of Greek at seminary, it was obvious to me that I did not know Greek at all, and so I turned to Mounce's book for help. Mounce's approach is so revolutionary (using morphology), that my previous Greek knowledge had to be scrapped. I had to start over with Greek, and I can't imagine a better way to learn than with this book. This is the book to get if you want to learn Greek.

I last took Greek in seminary in 1989, a long time to let the cobwebs grow. I was frustrated that I had lost much of my two years of study in the language and decided to get back into it over the summer, retaking a class at the seminary. Mounce's book beats the book that I previously had been assigned, the classic by Machen, hands down. "Basics of Biblical Greek" was easy to use, went in a systematic order, and, while there are certainly some areas that could be better polished, it was quite understandable. I have found myself encouraged to continue on with the language, and I hope to get to a point where I won't need to keep flipping through my lexicon as much. I also appreciated the CD-ROM that was included in the back as it helped me to tackle the vocabulary, just one of those details that needs lots of work if you want to have more fun in the translation. I also suggest purchasing the workbook because it goes hand-in-hand with the book. Don't kid yourself: Greek is not easy. However, it's wonderful to better understand the nuances of our Bible, and that includes the languages. So if you want to learn Greek, I do recommend this book as your introductory text.

I was disappointed when I had to switch teachers following my first semester of Greek. However, it was well worth it--because I switched to a class using Mr. Mounce's book: "Basics of Biblical Greek." It is excellent!

Mr. Mounce is a genius at teaching Greek. It is simple that he should re-title the book to "Greek for Dummies" (lets face it--when it comes to Greek, we're all dummies).

The text book completely divides the nouns and verbs into two semesters. As a student who spent a semester trying to do both verbs and nouns at the same time with no system like the one Mounce uses...let me tell you: this book is very helpful.

Along the way Mr. Mounce explains concepts first in how they are used in English grammar. He then teaches the Greek grammar. This was most useful to me because my English grammar is a little sub-par.

Another quality of this book that I really enjoyed were the exegetical insights at the beginning of each chapter-it is always nice to know why what you are learning is of importance.

All in all, the "Basics of Biblical Greek" is a great book. I cannot recommend it highly enough. If you want to learn Biblical Greek, this book is the first book you will want to get a hold of.

Having studied German, Arabic, Akkadian, Hebrew (in modern and ancient forms), and several Aramaic dialects in addition to Greek, I feel that I should say that this intro grammar is not only the best New Testament Greek grammar there is, but it is the best intro grammar that I have every seen for any language that I have studied. And I have used scores of them written in both English and German. Huehnergard's Akkadian grammar comes in second. Though Mounce's techniques are not fully applicable to all the world's languages, every author of any intro grammar for an ancient language should adopt as much of his methodology as possible.

here it is folks, the best available introductory grammar for the nt. for those who don't know, greek is an inflected language with similarities to latin and sanskrit; that means lots and lots of endings and exceptions to memorize. the system mounce offers is optimal, facilitating learning of the mechanics of the language (if one understands how letters change when endings are added, then the apparent exceptions are not really exceptions). this text treats all major verb forms that one will need to know. it does not deal extensively with less common forms such as the future participle or pluperfect tense and an intermediate level grammar (d wallace's "beyond the basics" is good)will be necessary as well for serious students. incidentally, it is written from an evangelical perspective and offers some introductory applications for exegesis.

One of the most helpful and easy-to-use Greek grammars available.

Begin your study here.

I was one of Dr. Mounce's students. I studied Greek with him in the 98-99 school year and I still have retained almost all of what I learned through this book and Dr. Mounce. The book is informative and easy to use and study.

The CD ROM is excellent as well, and is a good tool for review.

If you want to learn Biblical Greek, but don't want to memorize the many, many paradigms that the traditional method requires, you should get this book.

"Memorize these paradigm charts, and you will know Biblical Greek," were the words of my first-year Greek teacher. Oh, how I wish now that William Mounce's grammar was available back then! Mounce offers a new, inductive approach to learning Biblical Greek that actually makes learning Biblical Greek exciting and fun! The student will no longer have to rely on mere rote memorization to "learn" Greek. Mounce explains why some Greek words do what they do when they change tenses/cases. Even the most diffcult of forms become sensible. Thank you Dr. Mounce for making learning Greek enjoyable. PS: If you're beyond the basics of Biblical Greek but wish to dig a little deeper, check out Mounce's Graded Reader of Biblical Greek and Morphology of Biblical Greek. Also part of the Series is Daniel Wallace's monumental work, Greek Grammar Beyond the Basics. Amazon.com has them. You need them.