Linguistics and New Testament Greek: Key Issues in the Current Debate. Edited by David Alan Black and Benjamin L. Merkle (Baker Academic, 2020), 276 pp. Reviewed by William Varner, Professor at The Masters University.
I anticipated the release of this volume because I attended the conference where most of these chapters were delivered as lectures. The conference was held at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary, April 26-27, 2019. The conference was an attempt to bring New Testament studies up to speed with how linguistics can inform both our understanding of New Testament Greek and how it can also be taught more effectively utilizing linguistic insights.
The chapters are written by the conference speakers, with opening and closing chapters written by the editors of the volume. David Black first attempts to lay out the field and exhort the readers not to ignore linguistics because of its great value. “It is obvious that students of NT Greek can and should have a working knowledge of linguistics” (10). He is aware that there yet remains a few who feel threatened by this approach (5, fn 9), but students and profs should get on board because linguistics is alive and well and is here to stay and will not go away.
Stanley Porter leads off with a chapter on the various “linguistic schools” and how they impact the language (11-36). Constantine Campbell effectively surveys the relationship of aspect and time in the language (37-54). Michael Aubrey explores the usage and meaning of the perfect tense in light of linguistic theory (55-81). Although he sought to simplify his data-driven lecture, my guess is that readers will find his chapter as heavy as I found his lecture! Jonathan Pennington calls us to rethink the concept of deponency in the middle voice and effectively lays to rest (hopefully) the use of that term (83-102). Middle voice verbs are true middles! Applied linguist Stephen Levinsohn and disciple Steven Runge apply an eclectic model of linguistics to a discourse analysis of Galatians (103-124) and to interpreting constituent order in Koine Greek clauses (125-146). Greek pedagogy is served by Michael Halcomb’s survey of living language approaches (147-168) and Randall Buth’s description of the importance of Greek pronunciation (169-194). The formal chapters conclude with practical information about electronic tools, presented by Thomas Hudgins (195-212) and Rob Plummer’s description of the “ideal’ beginning Greek grammar (213-226). Nicholas Ellis then provides an informed overview of how all the above relates to Biblical exegesis (227-246).
In the last chapter, Ben Merkle organizes the chapters into three main subject areas: (1) Linguistic Schools; (2) Verbal Aspect; and (3) Pedagogy and the Living Language Approach. In the first two areas, the shadow of Stan Porter looms large. The two main “schools” are the Systemic-Functional approach propounded by Porter and the Cognitive-Functional and more eclectic approach represented by Levinsohn and Runge. In truth most professors are rather eclectic in how they apply theory to practice, especially in the burgeoning discipline of discourse analysis. The debate here was not so much on the merits of each “school” but rather on the wisdom of eclecticism rather than the following of a school! In my opinion, Merkle sides with the eclectics, favorably citing Runge that we must be open to “incorporating new insights from other approaches” (250). He suggests that such an eclectic approach has widespread practice within the broader linguistic field. I have often observed that discourse analysts are better at actually doing it than defining it! My biggest criticism of the conference and the book is its scarce attention to showing the student and the reader how to apply linguistics to the discourse analysis of whole NT books. In this regard, do not miss the new volume, Discourse Analysis of the New Testament Writings, published by Fontes Press and edited by Todd Scacewater. (This reviewer contributed the chapter on James which also was a luncheon talk I delivered to students during the conference).
The second major subject that Merkle mentions is that of “Verbal Aspect” and its relationship to tense forms and the conveying of time by the Greek verb. He synthesizes well the ideas of presenters Porter, Campbell, and Aubrey as well as scholars like McKay and Fanning who have written on the subject. He mentions three areas of agreement among scholars. Those areas are (1) its definition: the subjective viewpoint by which the author communicates the action of the verb; (2) that aspect has prominence over tense; and (3) the meaning of the perfective and imperfective aspects, namely viewing the action as a whole or as in process. Some would add that perfective aspect views the action from a distance (externally?) while imperfective aspect views the action closer up (internally?). Merkle points out that this is not some new idea dreamed up by profs drunk on linguistic theory, but can be found in an earlier form in that grammarian of grammarians from a century ago, A.T. Robertson (252). There is disagreement on aspect, namely the specific nature of the aspect conveyed by the perfect tense form. Is it also “imperfective” (Campbell) or is it “stative” (McKay and Porter, 253)? The influence of Stanley Porter in so many areas can be seen again. Like him or hate him (I like him on the stative), he cannot be ignored.
Another major area of the verb and verbal aspect debate relates to whether the indicative conveys time. Here again Porter has argued that it does not, but it appears that he is almost standing alone in the field in this regard (he is not). Merkle makes it clear that the majority of grammarians are not willing to surrender the conviction that the augment in the indicative verb conveys past time.
The third general subject in the chapters that Merkle summarizes is that of how linguistic awareness impacts how professors communicate the Greek language to their language learners in the classroom. Here the contributions of such pedagogues as Halcomb (living language) and Buth (living language/pronunciation) are acknowledged. All of us who teach are aware of these methods and like Merkle many tend to shy away from them. Merkle does not criticize their new methodology but is troubled by the insistence that these methods are the best way to teach. It is sometimes forgotten that we are not teaching students to speak these languages but to read them and since we do not have any native Koine speakers alive today, how do we really know for sure how the details of these languages were actually pronounced? Modern Greek speakers would be as perplexed at hearing “Reconstructed Koine” as in hearing my Erasmian pronunciation! The giants of Greek scholarship over the last few hundred years have done pretty well without these modern pedagogical aids.
In conclusion, my only substantive criticisms of this book are not in what the chapters say, but in what is omitted. I would like to have seen in the conference and in the book a greater emphasis on discourse analysis and how it can actually be applied to whole texts. In my opinion, that is the greatest benefit that linguistics can provide to students and teachers of the Greek New Testament. I also think that a chapter on semantics would also have been helpful – something along the lines of Carson’s semantic fallacies. Linguistics has some things to tell us about rhetorical features and tropes in the original language of the NT. Although he probably did not want to mention it, Black’s own Linguistics for Students of NT Greek contains these important matters that may have been overlooked in the conference and in this otherwise excellent volume.
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