Lesson 6 | Phrasing in Greek
[1] Introduction to Phrasing
Congratulations!
You have completed all the verbal ending patterns. Of course, there is always more to learn, but we have covered all the basic forms. Everything from here forward is refining what you already know and working to raise your proficiency at reading Greek with understanding.
In this lesson, we will explore the Phrasing tool as an aid to reading. You have already been using the Phrasing tool as a preliminary step toward translating, by dividing a text into clauses. Now, we want to take full advantage of the tool by dividing the text a little further, indenting subordinate phrases, and adding arrows that point to grammatical relationships.
Let’s try an experiment:
STEP 1 – Open your Greek NT to any passage. Read the first sentence out loud, in Greek, without taking time to work out a translation.
I would guess that, unless it was a very simple sentence, your pronunciation reflected a mixture of individual words slowly sounded out along with a few phrases that blended smoothly together (maybe a prepositional phrase or a genitive phrase.)
STEP 2 – Now read the following sentence out loud: The ultimate goal is that you would be able to readily see and read whole phrases as self-contained units, rather than merely individual words.
You may have varied your natural pauses slightly, but you probably pronounced that sentence in four or five units:
The ultimate goal is that you would be able to readily see and read whole phrases as self-contained units, rather than merely individual words.
Phrasing can help train your eyes to see the text in this way.
Phrasing and Sentence Diagramming
Phrasing and Sentence Diagramming are two complementary tools for careful exegesis.
Diagramming serves to identify the grammatical function of every word. No doubt, diagramming has also raised very helpful exegetical questions for you. The downside of diagramming (if there is one!) is that the word order of the text can be drastically shifted to conform to the formal structures of a diagram.
A Phrase Diagram helps solve this problem. A Phrase will graphically display the grammatical outline of a passage to highlight the structure. The information gained from a Sentence Diagram will serve you well in fully developing your Phrase.
The method for Phrasing that we present here is a simplified version of the method we use in other courses. If this lesson whets your appetite for more, you will want to check out our Phrasing Course.
Let’s take a look at a three-step process for creating a phrase: Divide, Indent, and add Arrows.