Greek for Bible Readers

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It’s not as hard as you might think to learn to read the Greek alphabet. Greek is written left to right like English. Almost all its sounds are easy to make, and Greek spelling is logical and always follows the phonetic values of its letters.

The chart shows the Greek alphabet, along with a pronunciation guide. Many Greek letters are similar in form and pronunciation to their English counterparts—though there are many “false friends” (for example, r is not p but r). Don’t worry too much about the capital letters. They are rarely used. Many of them are identical to the English forms, but beware especially of H, P, C and U because they are not pronounced like the English letters they resemble. Two consonants have peculiar quirks. When g comes before k, c or another g, it is pronounced as n rather than g (for example, a[ggelo~ [angel] is pronounced angelos, not aggelos). Greek s is peculiar in that it is written ~ when it is the last letter of a word (for example, ajpovstolo~ [apostle]).

Greek vowels, too, have their peculiarities. When two vowels come together, they make the following sounds:

The letter i, which is never dotted in Greek, can be written beneath a, h and w (aó, hó, wó). This so-called iota-subscript is not pronounced, but can affect the meaning of a word (for example, basileiva means “a kingdom,” but basileivaó means “for a kingdom”). Finally, if a word begins with vowel, it will be preceded by either a “rough breathing” symbol (‘) or a “smooth breathing” symbol (’). The smooth breathing is always silent, but the rough breathing is pronounced as an h. Thus ejn (“in”) is pronounced en, but eJn (“one”) is pronounced hen.

Representing Greek letters by English ones is called transliteration. Transliteration is important because it is frequently employed in commentaries and other New Testament study aids. Transliteration is also helpful in learning the pronunciation of Greek and in learning to recognize English words that are derived from Greek. A few examples will illustrate the close connection between transliteration and English derivations:

Upsilon is transliterated as u in combination with other vowels and as y elsewhere. Thus oujk (“not”) = ouk, but kuvrio~ (“lord”) = kyrios. Accents written above Greek vowels are generally ignored in transliteration. Their function is to indicate which syllable is to be stressed in pronunciation.

Here are some intriguing bits of alphabetical information:

Read aloud the following lines, keeping the English transliteration covered up. Then test your pronunciation by reference to the next line.

ejn ajrchóß hn oJ lovgo~

en archeµ eµn ho logos,

kai; oJ lovgo~ hn pro;~ to;n qeovn,

kai ho logos eµn pros ton theon,

kai; qeo;~ hn oJ lovgo~.

kai theos eµn ho logos.

Congratulations—you have just read John 1:1 (“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God”) in the original Greek! In our next column, you will learn how to arrive at the translation.