Category: lessons

Comments on particular lessons in my online grammar appear here.

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Lesson 19: Semantic Roles and Voice, The Aorist Passive

I’ve uploaded a slightly revised version of Lesson 19: Semantic Roles and Voice: the Aorist Passive.

The changes are designed to make it clear that what has traditionally been called the Aorist Passive is a set of forms that, while they often suggest a passive interpretation, are not exclusively (or even primarily) passive.

The middle voice will be introduced later, and at that point I will have more to say about Greek voice, and I’ll introduce the notion of transitivity. My goals for this lesson are simply to introduce the notion of the semantic roles AGENT and PATIENT—establishing their independence from specific morphological Case forms—and to introduce the forms traditionally called aorist passive.

I would love to hear from readers about how well you think I have accomplished these goals and about how clearly (or unclearly) I have handled the issue of insuring that students do not equate these forms exclusively with passive voice interpretations.

Lesson 19: Semantic Roles and Voice: the Aorist Passive

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Navigation in My Introductory Grammar

I have completed my revisions of the navigation system in my introductory grammar of Hellenistic Greek. The 18 lessons currently available all have a navigation bar at the top and bottom as well as a link to the topical index at the bottom.

It will be quite some time before I am able to complete the grammar, but the lessons that are currently available are 100% free. No adds. No fees. Use them as you please. If you quote them, though, please include the URL in your citation.

Micheal Palmer’s Hellenistic Greek

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Delay of Online Grammar

I regret that I have not been able to add to the online grammar for some time now. Responsibilities at work have made it impossible to make the kind of progress I would like. Unfortunately, it will probably be late spring before I am able to make significant progress on it. I regret the delay.

Currently there are 18 lessons up and running. The complete grammar has over 30. I hope to complete converting the remaining lessons from paper to HTML this summer.

http://greek-language.com/grammar

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Lesson 9 (First Aorist)

I have redesigned lesson nine (First Aorist) to provide a more complete, yet clearer discussion of the first aorist forms. If you have already read that lesson, I suggest you read the new version to review and to gain a clearer understanding of some of the forms you are seeing in the later lessons.

Lesson 9: First Aorist

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Lesson 15: Third Declension Consonant Stem Nouns

I have revised lesson 15 to reduce the size of the vocabulary list and clean up the discussion of third declension nouns. I have entered some revisions for lesson 16 as well, but will complete those over the next few days—long distance, from Peru.

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Lesson 15: Third Declension Nouns

Yesterday I completed my rewrite of Lesson 15: Third Declension Nouns (Consonant Stems), for the online grammar at Greek-Language.com.

The lesson comes complete with several automated exercises to help you recognize these nouns as well as automated vocabulary flash cards to help you learn fully half of the third declension nouns that appear fifty times or more in the New Testament. (That’s thirty nouns.)

If you are learning Greek, I hope you will like it. If you teach Greek, or are an advanced student, I’d love to have your feedback.