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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadJames Hastings Dictionary of the NT: Hellenistic And Biblical Greek
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1. Definition.-The term ‘Biblical Greek’ denotes the language of the Greek versions of the OT, and more especially the Septuagint , as also that of the NT, with which may be associated the Apocrypha and the works of the Apostolic Fathers. This group of writings, however, is separated from the world of Hellenic culture not so much by any peculiarity of language as by the ideas which find expression in them. In point of fact, Biblical Greek is a deposit of the widely-diffused Hellenistic language-the so-called Koine.
2. The term ‘Koine.’-This term is used to signify the Gr. language in its development from the time of Alexander the Great to the close of the ancient period, excluding, of course, the older dialects so far as they survived at all, and excluding also the language of the Atticists (2nd-5th cent. a.d.), who sought to revive the Attic form of speech, but, as children of their age, were unable to free themselves wholly from the influence of the living, i.e. the spoken, tongue. In designating the common language of the Hellenistic period by the single word ‘Koine,’ we are but following the usage of the ancient grammarians, who employed the expression ἡ êïéíὴ äéÜëåêôïò to differentiate the language used by all from Attic, Ionic, Doric, and aeolic.* [Note: A. Maidhof, Zur Begriffsbestimmung der Koine, Würzburg, 1912, and the criticism of Thumb, in Monatsschrift für höhere Schtulen, Berlin, 1913, p. 392 ff.] But as the words êïéíÞ , êïéíüí , êïéíῶò were not employed by the ancients in a uniform way, we may venture to take the term ‘Koine’ as applying both to the spoken tongue and to its literary form. The literary Koine, of which Polybius may be called the most typical representative, is a compromise between the spoken Koine and the older literary language. This holds good of every text written in the Koine, such works differing among themselves only as regards the degree in which the two elements are intermingled. The so-called Atticists, i.e. the grammarians, such as Moeris, who taught the rules of correct Attic, usually distinguished such words and forms of the Koine as they rejected, by the term Ἕëëçíåò , as contrasted with the Ἀôôéêïß , the linguistic forms they approved of; and hence ἑëëçíßæåéí means ‘to speak the Hellenistic language,’ and the Ἐëëçíéóôáß of Act_6:1; Act_9:29 are ‘Hellenistic-speaking Jews’ (possibly applied also to other Orientals).
3. The geographical domain of the Koine.-The native soil of Biblical Greek, i.e. Palestine, Syria, and Asia Minor, forms but a part of the great Hellenistic domain, the furthest boundaries of which were nearly coincident with those of Alexander’s Empire. The hellenization of those parts of this area which were originally non-Hellenic was, of course, not uniform. It was most complete in Asia Minor, which in the Middle Ages became the home of Byzantine-Greek culture. Even in the Roman Imperial period Asia Minor was almost entirely Greek, and dominated by Greek civilization; nor is this contravened by the fact that the old indigenous languages, such as Phrygian, Cappadocian, etc., were still spoken sporadically until the 5th and 6th centuries. Lycaonian is referred to as a spoken language not only in Act_14:11,* [Note: J. H. Moulton, Einleitung, p. 9.] but, as late as the 6th cent., in the Legend of St. Martha, while the Celtic dialect of the Galatians was still a living vernacular in the time of Jerome. Holl† [Note: ‘Das Fortleben der Volkssprachen in Kleinasien in nachchristlicher Zeit,’ in Hermes, xliii. [1908] 240 ff.] rather overestimates the importance of the evidences he gives of this fact, for the dialects in question occupied a position in Hellenic Asia Minor not very different from that of Albanian in Greece at the present day; and, in fact, the importance of these tongues is hardly to be compared with that of Welsh in England, the Phrygian dialect alone surviving in a few short texts (sepulchral inscriptions) dating from the Imperial period. The influence of the ancient languages of Asia Minor upon Greek (i.e. the Koine) was likewise of the slightest.‡ [Note: Thumb, Die griechische Sprache im Zeitalter des Hellenismus, p. 139 ff.] In Syria, as in Egypt, Greek was probably confined in the main to urban districts. In the numerous Hellenistic towns situated between the Phœnician coast and a line to the east of the Lake of Gennesaret and the Jordan-cities like Antioch, Acco, Damascus, and Gadara-the Greek language prevailed, as also did Greek administration, law, and culture. As regards Jewish Palestine, on the other hand, it can hardly be said that there was any real hellenization there at all. The Jews certainly learned Greek as the medium of intercourse and commerce and also for literary purposes, but they retained their Aramaic mother-tongue as well. Jesus and His apostles spoke Aramaic, and preached in Aramaic, though they may not have been ignorant of Greek; as a matter of fact, the ability to use more than one language is not uncommon in the East to-day, even among the lower classes.§ [Note: On the diffusion of Hellenistic Greek cf. Thumb, op. cit. 102 ff.; Mahaffy, The Progress of Hellenism in Alexander’s Empire, Chicago, 1905; on the language or Jesus see, most recently, Moulton, op. cit. p. 10 f.] From the fact that Jesus and the apostles spoke Aramaic it is to be inferred that the ëüãéá Ἰçóïῦ and the earliest records of His life were originally composed in Aramaic, and here too there emerges a special problem regarding the character of NT Greek (as also the Greek of the Septuagint )-a problem which will engage our attention below. But the general character of Biblical Greek can be understood only in relation to its basis in the Koine, and accordingly we must here deal first of all with the sources, the origin, and the character of the latter.
4. Sources for the Koine.-The Koine was a natural outgrowth of classical Greek, yet in its written form, as has been said, it exhibits a compromise between, the traditional literary language and the vernacular of the time, and accordingly the extant texts of the Hellenistic period afford at most but indirect evidence as to the true character of the vulgar tongue. It is only what is new in these texts, i.e. what differs from Attic, that we can without hesitation claim for the living language, while, as regards the element in which the written Koine agrees with Attic, we are uncertain to what extent it is to be ascribed to tradition. Nor are the various texts and classes of texts all of the same value for our knowledge of the true forms of the vernacular.
(1) This holds good in a peculiar degree even of the literary productions of the Hellenistic period. The Septuagint , the NT, and the earliest Christian writings approximate very closely, in a linguistic respect, to the contemporary papyri and inscriptions, and may as a whole be regarded as the most faithful literary reflex of the spoken tongue, while the Atticism which prevailed about the same time took an entirely different direction, and sought to purge literature of all admixture with the vernacular. But even the Atticists, of whom Lucian of Samosata was the most brilliant representative, were unable, with regard to either vocabulary or syntax, to free themselves wholly from the influence of the speech of their day.* [Note: W. Schmid, Der Atticismus in seinen Hauptvertretern, 5 vols., Stuttgart, 1887-97.] But they succeeded in arresting the movement that from the time of Xenophon and Aristotle had been tending to bring the literary language into line with the cosmopolitan development of Attic, that is to say, with the Koine, a development which had been followed even by the New Attic Comedy. The language of Polybius is closely akin to that of contemporary inscriptions; he does justice to the demands which the spoken tongue in its development laid upon literary diction. The philosopher Epicurus,† [Note: P. Linde, De Epicuri vocabulis ab optima Atthids alienis, Breslau, 1906.] and Teles the Cynic,‡ [Note: 3rd cent. b.c.; cf. Teletis reliquiae, ed. O. Hense, Tübingen, 1909.] as also Philo of Byzantium, the engineer (if he was a contemporary of Archimedes),§ [Note: M. Arnim, De Philonis Byzantii dicendi geners, Greifswald, 1912.] may be regarded as the immediate forerunners of Polybius.
(2) Our best sources for the common tongue, however, are the papyri of Egypt and the inscriptions-more especially those or Asia Minor. A comparison of these two documentary groups shows that the Hellenistic Greek of Egypt differs in no essential respect from that of Asia Minor, and we may therefore safely use the copious discoveries of papyri as throwing light upon the general character of the Greek spoken in the age in which they were written (for details see below). Of papyri and inscriptions alike it may be said that, the less educated the writers, the more faithfully do they reflect the current speech, and accordingly we find great disparity between, e.g., the documents of the Pergamenian State and the sepulchral inscriptions of the common people; or, again, between the records of the Egyptian government-offices and the letters written by simple folk. These differences have not yet been studied in detail.
An excellent survey of these sources, with copious references to the literature, is found in Deissmann, Licht vom Osten2, p. 6ff. (Eng. translation 2, 1911, p. 9ff.). Detailed investigation of their language has made remarkable progress in recent years. (a) Inscriptions: E. Schwyzer (Schweizer), Grammatik der per gamenischen Inschriften, Berlin, 1898; E. Nachmanson, Lauts und Formen der magnetischen Inschriften, Upsala, 1903; Dienstbach, De Titulorum Prienensium sonis, Marburg, 1910. A special study of the numerous Christian inscriptions of Asia Minor would be of great advantage in relation to the NT. (b) Papyri: E. Mayser, Grammatik der griechischen Papyri aus der Ptolemäerzeit, Leipzig, 1906; W. Crönert, Memoria graeca Herculanensis, Leipzig, 1903. (c) From the mass of epigraphic material are to be distinguished, as a special class, the imprecatory tablets, which are composed in a very low type of speech. They have been collected by R. Wünsch in the Appendix to the C1A, and by Audollent, Defixionum tabellae, Paris, 1904 (cf. Thumb, in Indogerm. Forsch. Anzeiger, xviii. [1905-06] 41ff.); as yet only the Attic tablets have been studied philologically: cf. E. Schwyzer, ‘Die Vulgärsprache der attischen Fluchtafeln,’ in Neue Jahrbücher für das klassische Altertum, v. [1900] 244ff.; Rabehl, De sermone defixionum attic., Berlin, 1906.
(3) Excellent witnesses to the nature of the vernacular are to be found also in the Graeco-Latin conversation-books or colloquial guides ( ἐñìçíåýìáôá ) and glossaries used for the purpose of learning either language, as e.g. the Colloquium Pseudo-Dositheanum* [Note: Krumbacher, in the Festschrift für W. von Christ, Munich, 1891.] and the Hermeneumata Pseudo-Dositheana.† [Note: G. Goetz, in the Corpus glossariorum, iii. [Leipzig, 1892]; cf. J. David, in Comment. philologae Ienenses, v. [do. 1894] 197 ff.] The abundant Greek material found in the Corpus glossariorum latinorum still awaits expert investigation; it yields much fresh information regarding the vocabulary of the colloquial language.
(4) The remaining sources for the Koine are of second-hand authority, but are not less important. Thus we have the references of the Atticizing grammarians of the Imperial period, as in the ËÝîåéò Ἀôôéêáß of Moeris, extracts from the grammarian Phrynichus, and the ἈíôéáôôéêéóôÞò . The object of these writings was to formulate rules for the correct use of classical Attic, and they contrast the latter with the ‘common’ language. What they reject belongs to the Hellenistic vernacular, as e.g. the forms ἤìçí (for ἧí ), êñýâù (= êñýðôù ), ãñáῖá ( ãñáῦò ), óéê÷áßíïìáé (instead of âäåëýôôïìáé ); what they defend and explain is alien to it, as e.g. ἧí , ἔóôçí , íåïôôüò (instead of íïóóüò ).
(5) We have another source in the Greek elements which have found their way into Latin, Gothic, Ecclesiastical Slavonic, and Oriental languages. These elements exhibit the features of the language current at the time of their adoption. The Greek words in Gothic, and especially in Old Slavic,‡ [Note: Vasmer, Graeco-Slavic Studies (Russ.), 2 pts., St. Petersburg, 1906-07.] reflect certain phonetic characteristics of the Greek current in the North, while those in Armenian, Rabbinical Hebrew, and Coptic exhibit features of the Greek spoken in Asia Minor, Syria, and Egypt. These foreign sources have contributed much to the Hellenistic vocabulary, which is enriched not only by fresh meanings, but also by new words and new forms. The Greek elements preserved in the Oriental sources are, as we should expect, of special importance for the study of Biblical Greek; but so far Armenian alone has been thoroughly studied in its bearings on the history of the Greek language.§ [Note: Thumb, ‘Die griechische Elements in Armenischen,’ in Byzant. Zeitschrift, ix. [1900] 388 ff. For the other languages, cf. S. Krauss, Griechische und lateinische Lehnwörter in Talmud, Midrasch und Targum, 2 vols., Berlin, 1898-99; also Thumb, Indogerm. Forsch. Anzeiger, vi. [1896] 56 ff., xi. [1900] 96 ff.; Perles, in Byzant. Zeitschrift, viii. [1899] 539 ff., x. [1901] 300 ff.; A. Schlatter, ‘Verkanntes Griechisch,’ in Beiträge zur Förderung christlicher Theologie, iv. 4 [1900], 49 ff.; Fiebig, ‘Das Griechische der Mischna,’ in ZNTW ix. [1908]; O. von Lemm, ‘Griechische und lateinische Wörter im Koptischen,’ in Bulletin de l’Académie de St. Petersbourg, 5th ser. xiii. i [1900] 45 ff.; Wessely, ‘Die griechische Lehnwörter der sahidischen und bobeirischen Psalmenversion,’ in Denkschriften der Wiener Akademie, liv. [1909]; Rahlfs, ‘Griechische Wörter im Koptischen,’ in SBAW, 1912, p. 1036 ff.]
(6) The two foregoing sources are surpassed in the value of their contributions by Modern Greek. For the student of the Koine, and therefore also for the investigator of Biblical Greek, a knowledge of Modern Greek is as necessary as a knowledge of the Romance languages for the investigator of vernacular Latin.* [Note: Thumb, ‘Value of Mod. Gr. for the Study of Ancient Greek,’ in Class. Quarterly, viii. [1914] 181 ff.] The more thorough the study of the modern tongue, the greater the gain for its earlier phase. for Modern Greek, with its dialects (exclusive, however, of the Tsaconic spoken in the Parnon Mts., a descendant of the Laconian dialect), is a natural development of the Koine, and its origins are to be sought therein. The knowledge of Modern Greek, accordingly, enables us to understand many features of the Koine, and to put a proper estimate upon its recorded forms. With the help of the modern language we may reconstruct its Hellenistic basis and thereby supplement in many points the knowledge derived from the contemporary Hellenistic texts. The character of the Koine as a whole is in fact to be inferred from the character of Modern Greek; for, since the dialects of the latter are to be traced, not to the various types of the ancient language, such as Doric, aeolic, and Ionic, but to the Koine, the Koine, the direct deposit of which we find in the inscriptions and the papyri, must have supplanted the ancient dialects, and must have been a common language in the proper sense, i.e. a language spoken by all, as is affirmed by the ancient grammarians. And what holds good also of the language as a whole, holds good of its elements in detail. Thus certain forms in Hellenistic documents-as e.g. ἔëåãáí , and the like, in Manuscripts of the Septuagint and other texts-are proved to have belonged to the spoken Koine by the fact that they survive in Modern Greek. This is true also of words like óéê÷áßíïìáé (Mod. Gr. óé÷áßíïìáé ), which is rejected by the Atticists, and of Lat. loan-words like êáëÜíäáé (in inscriptions; Mod. Gr. ôὰ êÜëáíôá ). Some Latin loanwords, as e.g. ( ὁ ) óðßôé (hospitium), ‘house,’ may of course he regarded as having been introduced into the Koine not later than the close of the ancient period. The Hellenistic substitution of ἵíá for the infinitive culminates in the Mod. Gr. loss of the infinitive, and it is therefore quite wrong to regard, e.g., every ἵíá in Biblical Greek as having the force of the classical final ἵíá -a fact which has a direct bearing upon biblical interpretation. Thus the study of Modern Greek may likewise be of considerable service to the biblical scholar, and may often enable him to decide a doubtful case. If, e.g., the form ὕåëïò is attested as Hellenistic by the ancients, while the NT has ὕáëïò , the Mod. Gr. ãõáëß (pron. yalí) shows that the NT form too belonged to the Koine.
Moreover, the text of the Bible will occasionally be elucidated by a knowledge of Modern Greek. Thus Wellhausen (Das Ev. Matthaei, Berlin, 1904) conjectures that the ἡ ὤñá ðáñῆëèåí of Mat_14:15 means, not ‘the time is past,’ but ‘the time is advanced’-an explanation which is supported by the Mod. Gr. use of ðáñÜ in ðáñáðÜíù , ‘above’; while the Greek writer Pallis renders the âñþìáôá of Mar_7:19 not by ‘meats,’ but in the sense of the homonymous Mod. Gr. word, i.e. as ‘stench,’ ‘filth’-an interpretation which at least merits the attention of exegetes. Modern Greek also throws light upon the question of the Semitisms in Biblical Greek (see below).† [Note: On the subject of this paragraph cf. Thumb, Die griech. Sprache in Zeitalter des Hellenismus, p. 10 ff.; also in Neue Jahrbücher für das klass. Altertum, xvii. [1906] 247 ff.; A. Pallis, A few Notes on the Gospels, based chiefly on Modern Greek, Liverpool, 1903 (to be read with discrimination).] The projected thesaurus or idiotikon of Modern Greek, the compilation of which is being subsidized by the Greek Government, will accordingly prove of great service in the study of Biblical Greek, especially as regards the vocabulary‡ [Note: Aids to the study of Modern Greek: G. N. Hatzidakis, Einleitung in die neugr. Grammatik, Leipzig, 1892; Thumb, Handbook of the Modern Greek Vernacular, tr. S. Angus, Edinburgh, 1912 (with a bibliographical appendix).]
5. Origin of the Koine.-In its essential character the Koine is the natural development of Attic. As early as the time of the Delian Confederation, Attic had spread beyond the confines of its native region, and Ionic elements-an important feature of the Koine-had already begun to find their way into the Attic vernacular.* [Note: Xenoph. De Republ. Athen. ii. 8.] In the Attic spoken outside Attica-‘Great Attic,’ as we might call it-the process of rejuvenescence and fusion was much more rapid, and it was here that the foundations of the Koine were laid.† [Note: the researches of J. Schlageter in his Zur Laut- und Formenlehre der ausserhalb Attikas gefundenen attischen Inschriften, Programm, Freiburg i. B., 1908, and Der Wortschatz der ausserhalb Attikas gefundenen attischen Inschriften, Strassburg, 1912.] The resultant modification of Attic appears most clearly in the vocabulary. Similar features had already manifested themselves in the diction of Xenophon and the New Attic Comedy. This modified Attic was used at the Macedonian court before the time of Alexander the Great. But it was in reality the conquests of Alexander and the institution of kingdoms by his successors that diffused the new idiom throughout the Oriental world, and made it the universal language of Hellenism. It is nevertheless quite wrong to assert that this language was created by the Macedonians. The Macedonian contribution is barely discernible, and cannot in any case have been large; it perhaps included the suffix - éóóá in âáóßëéóóá . In this process of expansion the Attic, as might be expected, lost some of its characteristic features. Thus the óó found in most of the dialects, including Ionic, more and more superseded the Attic ôô (which is almost obsolete in Mod. Gr.), and non-Attic forms showing ñó intermingled with forms showing ññ . Hence óó prevails-in accordance with the papyri-in the Septuagint , which, however, still retains ἤôôùí and ἐëÜôôùí ; while we also find here ἄñóçí and (rarely) ἄññçí , èáññῶ , and (rarely) èáñóῶ . In the NT likewise ôô occurs rarely, while e.g. èáññῶ and èáñóῶ are both in use. That the use of ññ was not due to the influence of the literary language is shown by Mod. Gr. èáññῶ alongside of óåñíéêüò (= ἀñóåíéêüò ).
The Koine developed more rapidly in the hellenized lands outside Greece than upon its native soil, where the indigenous dialects offered some degree of resistance to its growth. But by the time when the uniform Ionic-Attic alphabet was adopted (400-350 b.c.), the Attic was asserting its power everywhere, and from the 4th cent. b.c. till about the 2nd cent. a.d. the dialects were gradually dispossessed, and at last swallowed up, by the Koine; in its foreign domains, however, the Koine had prevailed from the outset, and had thus gained a marked ascendancy alike as regards culture and as regards the numbers of those who spoke it. The absorption of the dialects did not proceed everywhere at the same pace. The Ionic succumbed most rapidly; the Doric resisted longest: in the Doric area, in fact, there emerged first of all a Doric Koine, which wedged itself also into the non-Doric Arcadia, between the ancient Arcadian dialect and the common Attic tongue. The various aspects of this whole process of development may be traced in the inscriptions. In many localities, as e.g. Crete and Rhodes, the gradual subsidence of dialectic forms which is traceable in the inscriptions reflects the changes in the living language. In other parts, as e.g. Bœotia, the inscriptions reveal a marked linguistic break, thus indicating either that the local dialect, though no longer spoken, was kept alive for a time as a literary language, or that the Koine had been introduced as a written language before the dialect had entirely disappeared.‡ [Note: Thumb, Die griech. Sprache im Zeitalter des Hellenismus, p. 28 ff.; Wahrmann, Prolegomena zu einer Geschichte der grichischen Dialekte im Zeitalter des Hellenismus, Programm, Vienna, 1907; Kieckers, ‘Das Eindringen der Koine in Kreta,’ in Indogerm. Forsch. xxvii. [1910] 72 ff.; Buttenwieser, ‘Zur Geschichte des böotischen Dialekts,’ in ib. xxviii. [1911] 1 ff.]
The process of absorption, of course, could not but react upon the Koine itself. But it is quite wrong to suppose, with P. Kretschmer (Die Entstehung der Koine), that the Koine arose from a manifold intermingling of the various Gr. dialects. This hypothesis finds no real support either in the documents of the Koine or in Modern Greek. Thus, to take but a single instance, Kretschmer, in citing the Mod. Gr. accentuation in ἀíèñῶðïé (= ἄíèñùðïé ), ἐöÜãáí (= ἔöáãïí ) as a survival of the ancient Doric accentuation, overlooks the fact that other Mod. Gr. accentual changes of the same kind, as in ἄíèñùðïõ , ἔöáãáìå , have nothing to do with Doric at all; so that, if the latter forms are due to the operation of analogy (in conformity with ἄíèñùðïò , ἔöáãáí ), the examples cited by Kretschmer must be explained in the same way, i.e. as due to accentual shifting on the analogy of ἀíèñþðïõò , ἐöÜãáìåí . What took place in the districts of the ancient dialects was simply that the Koine was at first slightly coloured by the native idiom; and doubtless this local character showed itself still more plainly in the pronunciation, just as, e.g., the domicile of those who speak English-whether it he the north of England, the south of England, Scotland, or North America-can be inferred from their ‘accent,’ even though they use the forms of the literary language. But the recognizable provincialisms of these local Koine types left only the slightest traces in the process of development towards Modern Greek, the reason being that they had no source of support outside their native region. Thus, e.g., as early as the 3rd cent. b.c. the veterans in the Arsinoite Nome of Egypt-men drawn from the most diverse quarters of Greece-wrote the Koine without any admixture of dialectic forms. Taken all in all, the elements derived from the local dialects of the Koine-apart from the Ionic-are confined to certain forms, such as ëáüò , íáüò , ëáôïìßá , the preposition ἔíáíôé , and a few special words, as e.g. âïõíüò (attested for Cyrene and Sicily by the ancients).
We cannot easily determine the influence of the vocabularies of the various dialects, as these vocabularies are much less known to us than that of Attic. It was the Ionic dialect alone that, from the period of the Attic naval league, made a distinct contribution to the development of the Koine. But even in the case of Ionic, the extent of its dialectical influence cannot always be defined with precision. Thus, while forms like óöýñçò in the Septuagint and the NT, or ἀñïýñçò in early Christian literature, seem to bear a genuinely Ionic character, they may well be later variations formed on the analogy of äüîá , äüîçò ; èÜëáôôá , èáëÜôôçò , and the like (cf. Moulton, Einleitung, p. 70f.). On the other hand, words like âÜèñáêïò , ðÜèíç , íïóóüò indicate clearly the phonetic form of Ionic, while, again, e.g. the aorist ἔíéêïí (in the papyri) instead of ἤíåãêïí , and the preference for nouns in - ìá are Ionic, or at all events not Attic, features. A specially characteristic indication of Ionic influence appears in the inflexion of nouns in - ᾶò , - ᾶäïò and - ïῦò , - ïῦäïò . Such syntactical usages as the preference of ἵíá . to ὅðùò and the final infinitive (e.g. Mat_5:17 : ïὐê ἦëèïí êáôáëῦóáé , ἀëëὰ ðëçñῶóáé ) may likewise be shown to be Ionic. Of most importance, however, are the Ionic elements of the vocabulary, as it is these that give the Koine a character different from that of Attic. Thus a calculation of Sehlageter (Der Wortschatz, etc.) shows that the Attic inscriptions outside Attica (till 200 b.c.) contain 18% of Attic, 18% of new (Hellenistic), and a little over 6% of Ionic, but only 75% of distinctively Doric words. The proportion of Ionic words increases till about 250 b.c., and then decreases, so that the process of interfusion virtually ceased about the middle of the 3rd cent. b.c.
This feature of the Koine appears, as we might expect, also in Biblical Greek. Words like ἁðáñôßæù (in ἀðáñôéóìüò ), ἔêôñùìá , êïðÜæù (of the wind), ὄëõíèïò , óáíäÜëéïí , óêïñðßæù , etc., in the Septuagint or NT are of Ionic origin. The Ionic element includes, further, the so-called poetical words of the Koine, i.e. Hellenistic words which formerly were to be found only in the poets, but which from the fact of their occurrence in papyrus texts concerned with matters of everyday life, and partly also from the fact of their survival in Modern Greek, are now seen to have belonged to the colloquial language. They include, e.g., âáñÝù , ἐíôñÝðïìáé , èáìâÝù , ìåóïíýêôéïí , ðåéñÜæù , ῥÜêïò , ὠñýïìáé in the Septuagint and the NT, and ἀëÝêôùñ , âáóôÜæù , ἔñéöïò , öáíôÜæù , öçìßæù in the NT. Words of this class were imported, first, from the literary Ionic of the earlier period into the language of poetry, and then again from the vernacular Ionic of the later period into the Koine, and there was no direct link of connexion between the two processes.* [Note: There exist as yet no works (except those of Schlageter, mentioned above) dealing specially with the vocabulary of the papyri and the inscriptions. For the NT cf. T. Naegeli, Der Wortschatz des Apostels Paulus, Göttingen, 1905.] In the literary criticism of the Hellenistic writers, and especially of the biblical books, the facts just indicated yield an important guiding principle, viz. that their use of Ionic words does not argue a knowledge of, or any dependence upon, the earlier Ionic literature. The fact, e.g., that St. Luke makes use of medical terms found in Hippocrates and other physicians in no way implies a study of medical writings (‘Luke the physician’), but only some acquaintance with the ordinary terminology of his age; many such medical words, indeed, as e.g. ἔãêõïò , óôåῖñá , or âåëüíç (‘the surgeon’s needle’) had passed into such general use in the vernacular that they prove nothing more than St. Luke’s familiarity with the language of his time.
6. The influence of foreign languages.-The Koine may thus be defined as a development of Attic under the influence of Ionic. But as it spread to non-Hellenic lands, such as Asia Minor and Egypt, we must, finally, inquire as to the influence upon it of the languages of these countries, and as to foreign influence generally. Just as the Celts of Gaul exercised an influence upon the grammar and vocabulary of French (the vulgar Latin of Gaul), so, we might expect, would the Koine be affected by the native populations of Asia Minor and Egypt. The Greek spoken by these ‘barbarians’ shows traces of their own manner of speech in the confusion of i and e sounds, and of tenues, mediae, and aspirates ( ô , ä , è ). Of such modification, however, very little found its way into the general development of Greek. Probably the pronunciation of ðÝíôå as pende, and of ëáìðñüò as lambros, and the like, which make their first appearance in the dialect of Pamphylia, as also the development of õ into é , arose in Asia Minor; the disregard of the distinction between long and short vowels ( ù and ï , etc.) perhaps in Asia Minor and Egypt. It was once more the vocabulary that was appreciably affected by foreign languages-the natural result of intercourse. Yet, after all-apart from the local use of Egyptian words in Egyptian Greek-the Oriental languages contributed to the Greek vocabulary in Hellenistic times hardly any more than in the classical period; the converse influence, e.g. in Rabbinical Hebrew, was incomparably greater. In Biblical Greek likewise, Semitic elements are scarcely more prominent than elsewhere. We note, e.g., ἀããáñåýù and ðáñἀäåéóïò , which are of Persian origin; ἀññáâþí , èÞâç , êÜâïò , íÜâëá , óþñáêïò (Sem.), and âÜúïí , óôßììé (Egypt.); but these words are also found in other documents of the Koine; while, of course, words like ἀââᾶò , ἀìÞí , ãÝåííá , ðÜó÷á , óÜââáôïí ( óÜìâáôïí ) found their way into the Greek world through the Jewish Christian sphere of ideas. It was form this sphere also that the names of the days of the week ( ἡëßïõ ἡìÝñá , óåëÞíçò ἡìÝñá , etc.), together with the week of seven days itself, came to the Greeks, and then spread to the rest of Europe.* [Note: Thumb, ‘Die Namen der Wochentage im Griechischen, in Zeitschrift für deutsche Wortforschung, i. [1900] 163 ff.; Schürer, ‘Die siebentägige Woche in der christl. Kirche des ersten Jahrhunderts,’ in ZNTW vi. [1905] 1 ff.]
As contrasted with the Oriental, the Latin contribution forms a noticeable element in the Koine. Again, it is true, the grammatical influence was of the slightest. A number of suffixes, such as - áôïò , - áñéò , - ïõñá , - éóéïò (Lat. -atus, -arius, -ura, -ensis), were introduced into Greek through the medium of Lat. loan-words, and came to be used with Gr. stems. From the beginning of the Roman sway in Greece to the close of the ancient period, Roman politics and traffic imported a constantly increasing number of Latin words into Greek, and how effectively many of these became naturalized is shown by their survival in Modern Greek. In this respect likewise Biblical Greek reflects the conditions of the common Hellenistic language; in the NT we find, e.g., êáῖóáñ , êåíôõñßùí , ëåãåþí , ðñáéôþñéïí , êῆíóïò , êïäñÜíôçò , äçíÜñéïí , ìßëéïí , ëÝíôéïí , óïõäÜñéïí , öñáãÝëëéïí . That the influence of Latin on Palestinian Greek was by no means slight is attested indirectly by the number of Lat. words more or less naturalized in the Rabbinical literature, and, as appears from their form, introduced through the medium of Greek. Latinisms were occasionally formed by translation (‘loan-renderings’), and just as the êåíôõñßùí is called a ἑêáôüíôáñ÷ïò in Luk_23:47, so we may regard ôὸ ἱêáíὸí ðïéåῖí (Mar_15:15) and ἐñãáóßáí äïῦíáé as translations of Lat. satisfacere and operam dare respectively. The extra-biblical literature of early Christianity likewise shows the influence of Latin, and is as yet free from puristic tendencies; thus, e.g., Ignatius does not hesitate to adopt äåóÝñôùñ , äåðüóéôá (‘pledge’) from military usage, or ἐîåìðëÜñéïí (‘legally valid copy’) from the language of law.† [Note: T. Eckinger, Die Orthographie latein. Wörter in griech. Inschriften, Munich, 1893; Wessely, ‘Die lat. Elemente in der Gräzität der Papyri,’ in Wiener Studien, xxiv. [1902] 99ff., xxv. [1903] 40 ff.; D. Magie, De Romanorum iuris publici sacrique vocabulis sollemnibus in graecum sermonem conversis, Leipzig, 1905; and especially L. Hahn, Rom und Romanismus im griechisch-römischen Osten, Leipzig, 1906 (reviewed by Thumb, Indogerm. Forsch. Anzeiger, xxii. [1907-08] 39 ff.), also ‘Zum Sprachenkampf im römischen Reich,’ in Philologus, Suppl. x. (1907).]
7. Local variations of the Koine.-In order to answer the question whether Biblical Greek shows a definite local character, we must first of all inquire whether local variations or even dialects existed in the colloquial Koine. We certainly cannot look for such differences in the written texts of a cosmopolitan language, as it lies in the very nature of a written language to tend towards uniformity. Our investigation must therefore carefully take account of all phenomena that could be regarded as pointing to local variation. In view of the wide expansion of the Koine, it is natural to suppose that local varieties would exist, i.e. that the common language would not be spoken in exactly the same way in Egypt, Asia Minor (Syria), and in the ancient Attic, Ionic, and Doric areas, since the ancient dialects themselves or the languages of the barbarians who had just learned to speak Greek would lend a certain colouring, in pronunciation at least, to the Koine of the various regions. And, as a matter of fact, we are able, partly with the help of Modern Greek, to determine the existence of a number of such local variations. Thus the Greek-speaking Egyptians and Asiatics could not keep the e and i sounds* [Note: Vowels (a, e, i, etc.) as in German.] distinct (a phenomenon which, however, had nothing to do with itacism), and confounded tenues, mediae, and aspirates, probably substituting tenues, or unvoiced mediae, for the last two groups. The ç had a close and an open sound, the latter probably in the East, as may be inferred from the pronunciation of ç as e in the modern dialect of Pontus; õ was pronounced as i, ü and u (iu), though it is impossible to define the local limits of the variations. Similarly, the intrusion of an inter-vocalic ã (as in êëáßãù [= êëáßù ] found in a papyrus of the 2nd cent. b.c.) was merely local, as is shown by Modern Greek; while the sound-change of ë into ñ as in ἀäåñöüò = ἀäåëöüò , and the substitution of a single for a duplicated consonant, cannot have been universal in the Koine, since the ë is still retained in the East (Cappadocia and Pontus), and the double letter in the south-east (Cyprus, Rhodes, etc.), of the Modern Greek area. Finally, the retention and omission of final í must each have had their own local distribution. As regards inflexions, we may draw attention to the Egyptian declension in - ᾶò , - ᾶôïò as compared with the Ionic - ᾶò , - ᾶäïò (imparisyllabic nouns of this class are not found in the NT). Further, forms like ãÝãïíáí on the one hand, and ἑðÞëèáóé on the other, as also ἤëèïóáí and the like, indicate that, as in Modern Greek, different regions of the Koine levelled the personal endings in different ways. As yet, however, the clearest evidence that by the end of the ancient period the Koine had already split up into actual dialects, in which lay the germs of the dialects of to-day, is found in the imprecation-tablets of Cyprus (3rd. cent. a.d.), the language of which shows traces of both the ancient and the modern dialect of that island.† [Note: Thumb, Neue Jahrbücher für das Klass, Altertum, xvii. [1906] 257.]
But while recent investigation has thus succeeded in proving the existence of local varieties of the Koine, it must refuse to recognize the so-called varieties whose existence has been maintained from ancient times, viz. the Alexandrian and Macedonian dialects. What was regarded, alike in ancient and in modern times, as characteristic of these dialects is found to have belonged to no special region, but to the common Hellenistic language. Not even the stock example ἐñáõíÜù (= ἐñåõíÜù ) can be claimed for the Alexandrian dialect-let alone Alexandrian Jewish-Greek-as that phonetic form has been traced, e.g., in the Koine of Thera.
8. Biblical Greek as a local variety of the Koine.-We now come to the question how Biblical Greek is related to these local idioms. It is not possible to describe the Greek Bible as the monument of a distinct dialect of the Koine, and still less as the monument of an Alexandrian or Palestinian Jewish-Greek, or of a special ‘Christian Greek.’ Of the existence of an Alexandrian Jewish-Greek there is no real evidence at all, as was first explicitly proved by Deissmann (see Lit.). Psichari (see Lit.), who has recently investigated the problem, could find no support for the theory that in particular the translators of the OT spoke a Jewish Greek, and so occasionally introduced Hebraisms into their version. The language of the Septuagint is in reality a ‘translation-Greek,’ and cannot therefore be adduced as proving the existence of a Jewish variety of the colloquial Koine; nor is all our wider knowledge of the Greek spoken in Palestine, whether derived from direct or indirect sources, sufficient to warrant us in speaking of it as a distinct type; at most it may be described as the Syrian Koine. Biblical Greek, moreover, is by no means identical with what we have been able to establish regarding the Greek of the Palestinian Jews, for the particular change of meaning which certain Greek words underwent in Rabbinical usage does not appear in those words as used in Biblical Greek; thus, e.g., ëåéôïõñãßá in the Rabbinical literature means ‘service rendered’; in the Bible (as in Greek generally), ‘religious service.’
It is a controversy some centuries old whether the language of the Bible bears a ‘Hebrew’ colouring or not; the so-called ‘Purists’ sought to demonstrate the classical, the Hebraists the hebraizing, character of Biblical Greek. The theory of the ‘specific quality’ of NT Gr. acquired a certain theological importance in virtue of the pointed expression which it received at the hands of R. Rothe, viz. that the NT speaks in the language of the Holy Ghost, who ‘framed for Himself a quite distinct religious idiom by transforming the linguistic elements which lay ready for Him, as also the already existent concepts, into a medium appropriate to Him.’* [Note: Thumb, Die griechische Sprache im Zeitalter des Hellenismus, p. 181.] The research of the last fifteen years has shown more and more conclusively that the question in debate was wrongly put, since neither classical Greek nor a supposed Jewish Greek is to be regarded as the foundation of Biblical Greek. To Deissmann (see Lit.) is due the merit of having brought clear principles to bear upon the subject, inasmuch as he showed that Biblical Greek cannot be treated as an isolated phenomenon, and assigned it a place in the general process of a great natural development of language. First of all, as regards the so-called Hebraisms, or, more accurately, Semitisms, the examples usually adduced are either simply fallacious or else indecisive. Leaving out of account the pedantic and barbarous literality in translations of certain parts of the OT (as e.g. the translation of Aquila, who renders àֶäÎ , the sign of the Heb. accusative, by óýí ), we must admit that the syntax of the Septuagint has not been modified by the original in any undue degree; thus even the construction ðñïóôéèÝíáé with the infinitive (Heb. åַéåֹñֶó ìÎ with inf.) cannot be regarded as non-Greek.† [Note: Helbing, Grammatik der LXX, p. 4.] Detailed investigation shows that the translators were quite able to keep themselves free from bondage to their original, and that they strove with success to represent the Hebrew form of expression by an excellent Greek diction (cf. Johannessohn, in Lit.). In the NT, again, evidences of a Hebrew ground-colour have proved even less cogent, as is now increasingly recognized. The statement of B. Weiss that the Fourth Gospel has a ‘hebraisierender Grundton’ has been recently challenged by Wellhausen (Das Evangelium Johannis, Berlin, 1908). In point of fact, the more thoroughly we work through the papyri, the smaller grows the number of alleged Hebraisms; we need cite only the constructions ἐí ìá÷áßñῃ and ἐí ôῷ ὀíüìáôé . That modes of expression which really occur in Greek, though but rarely, or only in special circumstances, should be found more frequently in Biblical Greek when they happen to coincide with Hebrew usage (as e.g. ἰäïý ) need occasion no surprise; it is natural enough in translations or reproductions from foreign languages.‡ [Note: also Moulton, Einleitung, pp. 26, 31.] Even the vocative ὁ èåüò , the use of which in Biblical Greek is explained by Wackernagel § [Note: Über einige antike Anredeformen, Göttingen, 1912.] as an imitation of Hebrew, may be brought under this general law, since ὁ èåüò occurs as a vocative-though with a different shade of meaning-also in Greek; while the predicative åἰò , and such expressions as êñéôὴò ἀäéêßáò , ‘the unjust judge,’ have likewise certain points of contact with Greek, and therefore cannot rightly be described as non-Greek Hebraisms or barbarisms.
In the NT, the phenomenon just explained, viz. that relatively rarer forms of expression occur more frequently in Biblical Greek, is one that may be expected with special frequency in those parts that rest on an Aramaic original. But the question whether certain parts of the NT go back to an Aramaic original is one in which the Hebraisms necessarily play a leading part, and which cannot be effectively solved until the full complement of the Hebraisms has been established beyond dispute. Thus, e.g., the monotonous sequence of narrative by means of êáß clauses in no sense proves the presence of the Semitic genius of language-often as that assertion has been made. Exact statistical investigations, such as alone could avail us here, are still lacking. Probably the best foundation for such investigations would be the arrangement of words, and especially the position of the verb; and, as a matter of fact, the frequent occurrence of the verb at the beginning of clauses in the Gospel narrative seems to be at variance with ordinary Greek usage, and to have been influenced by the Hebrew diction, though at the same time it is not unknown in Greek.* [Note: E. Kieckers, Die Stellung des Verbs im Griechischen, Strassburg, 1911, p. 5.]
The influence of Hebrew upon the phraseology of Biblical Greek is clearly manifest only in the Septuagint , though there also every particular instance demands the most careful scrutiny.† [Note: , e.g., Thackeray, A Grammar of the OT in Greek, i. [Cambridge, 1909], p. 31 ff.] In the NT the formation of new words to represent special Christian ideas is quite an unimportant element. Deissmann estimates the number of ‘biblical words’ in the NT as no more than one per cent. Christianity was able to formulate its distinctive conceptions (e.g. óùôÞñ , åὐáããÝëéïí ) in the spirit and with the linguistic resources of the Koine; as Deissmann rightly observes, it had not so much a word-forming as a word-transforming power. But such alteration in the meaning of existent words takes place in all cases where a profound change occurs in the civilization-including, of course, also the concepts and ideas-o