Learn Greek: John 1:1 (Lesson 1)

The FIRST lesson of our Learning Greek by Reading the Greek New Testament series! By the end of this video, you will know how to read and translate John 1:1 in Greek, with a bonus point of understanding the theological emphasis in the verse on the Divinity of Christ.

Be sure to download the free Readers Gospel of John here:

If you've not watched the playlist introduction video, watch it here:

[IHeIReigns]

Brother, the Lord bless you, I ask He will continue to use you and your videos to simplify greek, get men and women excited to study God's word in the original language. The way you teach is so easy to understand, very broken down into digestible terms and examples. Thank you kindly for you videos, keep it up. I'm excited to watch more.

[brianponikvar]

I'm only 5 min in and already know I'm going to really enjoy this. A little disappointed with the Erasmian pronunciation but I understand it dominates the seminary world. Coming more from the language learning world I'm happy to see a move towards a more historic pronunciation within NT Greek studies... but I'm splitting hairs. The whole idea of this project is great.

[elarryeiss]

Thank you so much for taking this approach. Grammar-forward teaching makes learning much harder. After years of exposure to Greek, I have begun to arrive at a place where grasping it more fully seems possible. This teaching style is accelerating my apprehension of things I have been struggling to understand for some time.

[georgewebb]

Brother my the lord bless you all throughout your life, thank you so much🙏🏻❤️

[reddapologetics]

This is the most clearly and simply articulated explanation I have heard on John 1:1 and the JW mistranslation of it. Thank you so much for this! God Bless!

[Meoo]

You are a perfect teacher. Love, Kryios Evangelos.💗

[nodi]

One of the best videos I have ever seen! ❤

[michaelmatejka]

Just got my Greek New Testament book, I just finished learning the alphabet an hour ago and have come here! Already I'm very encouraged based on my progress due to this video. Thanks for having this up for free! It's so helpful

[accylshane]

Thanks A lot, it was a joy to learn greeks to understand clearly NT for spreading the gospel.

[learnbiblicalgreek]

Καλὸν Πάσχα; Καλὴ Ἀνάστασις; καὶ Χριστὸς ἀνέστη!

[kramsdrawde]

Thank you brother, just a baby studyin Greek but you have been very helpful, Thank You and PTL...

[landygreene]

May I suggest “Was Christ God?” by Spiros Zodhiates. You will then understand why John chose the words he used.

[drewlayman]

Great series so far. I’ve been wanting to get back into my study of biblical Greek as a lay-person but didn’t think I’d be able to find the drive to do so by looking at one of my older academic books on biblical Greek. I love this approach of just jumping right in.

[donaldpritchett]

Besides the Greek lesson, an excellent commentary on the meaning of the verse!

[davidpetersonharvey]

Wow! I mean, it's powwrful enough in English but this understanding shook me and brought tears to my eyes. Wow! Thank you for this video! It makes me excited about going forward in Greek and your making it so much easier teaching it this way!

You mention the JWs but I thought of the gnostics and their belief in a demi urge and how all the gnostic pretension at knowledge is just totally blown out of the water by this one verse.

[rosamiralian-ghvn]

The Father and The Son And The Holy Spirit are all one God
Amen

[NicholasproclaimerofMessiah]

There is much that I like about how you have done this. In fact, in general, I like everything about it. I especially like the explanation of the accusative and nominative cases. Another excellent way to help clarify the accusative and nominative case, is to refer to the distinction between "him" and "he" as well as "them" and "they" etc. Your analogy is better than those examples, but using both ways of conveying the matter provides further ease of clarity.

I would like to offer how I would use details to give clearer understanding to those who are brand new to Greek.

If we start with an even more wooden translation, then we get intuitive insight into some matters, and we also introduce a few concepts, and this will preempt some future questions to simplify those matters when it becomes necessary to address them. What is nice about addressing a matter before it becomes necessary, is it provides some exposure and primes for when it is necessary.

If we write it three times, progressively, then we offer an easy bridge to all of the details.

-"In first had been being he the statement and he the statement had been being toward him the God and God had been being he the statement."


-"In beginning was the statement, and the statement was toward the God, and, God, was the statement."

-"In the beginning was the Statement, and the Statement was toward God, and the Statement was God."

I think it's confusing to teach that "logos" means "word" without explaining exactly what we do not mean by "word". I prefer to translate "pros" more literally; whether we say "toward" or "with" we are really not conveying the full semantic of the contextual application, but at least "toward" builds an accurate vocabulary. I also think that the definite articles are absent from "arche" and "theos" for intuitive semantic reasons (though I assumed your explanation in the final translation). I openly admit, especially in the case of "theos", that I may easily be wrong, so I am hearing you and I will carefully consider what you have taught here.

I really like what you've done here. I happen to be a stickler (ask anyone who knows me), and I like to offer details; but that has more to do with me, rather than indicating any posture of criticalness toward you. I can take what I dish out, so if you have any details or correction to offer me, I'll receive such discussion gladly.

Shalom.

[linlu]

It is so impressive to listen to the NT in ancient greek. Thank you for your detailed explanation on the original text. What a wonderful work you did. I will follow your channel from now on.

[thelthrythquezada]

I would tell people to look into the word pros(with) I believe there are about 4 word for out ONE "with" and pros(with) is really cool cause it denotes that the Word and God are "facing each other" in a trajectory that moves together. They are interfaced together.

[maroualaaziz]

En Greek language there are two types of articles : definite articles and indefinite articles
1- Ο Η Το
2- ένας - μία - ένα
For example: θα ήθελα έναν καφέ
Τhanks