Holy Ghost Greek

Anyone who knows me well knows I am a Biblical Language nerd. I love looking to the Greek and Hebrew, so much so it could be called a personality trait. A Sunday sermon does not go by without making a note to look at that passage in the Greek later or me pulling up Greek on my phone on the spot (yes, I know I am a sinner and get on my phone in church at times).

One of the first things we learn about the Greek of the New Testament is that it is not the same thing as Classical Greek. A misconception about this though is that it is a unique Greek found only in the New Testament. Richard Rothe (19th Century Theologian) called this Holy Ghost Greek. But, thanks to modern archeology, we have discovered many more 1st Century documents that use this same Greek that we call Koine (Common) Greek.

This brings me to my real topic of the day: If your Bible is not written in Common English terminology that you can understand, it is not the Bible for you. That is not to say you shouldn’t have to look up a word every once in a while, even Paul and James coined new terminology at times. But in general, the New Testament was written in the language of the people.

I believe there is a place for Bibles with more technical language (to be used in Theological and Academic circles) but I believe our Standard English Bibles should be written in the language of the people, that a non-believer would be able to pick up the book and understand the words on the page. This is not to say they will understand the deep concepts that need further explaining, but they should know most of the words.

Further, I do not think there is perfect translation. I believe we will continue to learn more about Koine Greek and understand it in new ways. As well, language itself will continue to change and our Bible must continue to stay updated to the current language (not the culture though).

Overall though, the Bible should be accessible to the people of the church and outside the church. The language of the Bible should also be the language of the people, just as the writers of the Bible used the common language of their day.