An Innovative Greek Reader Textbook-Part 2 (Gupta)

Why Galatians? 

We built our intermediate Greek reader on Galatians. I have used many different kinds of Greek reader textbooks in the past, and even though having different types of texts was pedagogically helpful, it felt very choppy. Most reader walk you through short snippets of biblical and non-biblical texts. There is something especially satisfying for me in reading a whole text from beginning to end. So, we chose to build our textbook with a bulk of reading in a complete text.

But why Galatians in particular?

There are many advantages to strengthening your Greek by reading Galatians. It is relatively easy Greek. Most of the time the syntax is straightforward. Also, it is not too long. Six chapters is digestible in a semester. Thirdly, it happens to be one of the most important pieces of literature in all history. Galatians touches upon lots of important NT concepts foundational to Christian theology. Fourth, within Galatians you have different types of discourses; it begins very narrative heavy (chs 1-2); then you get more argumentation (chs 3-4), and it ends with paraenesis and more concentrated “epistle-y” material (chs 5-6). Lastly, it was especially helpful that Galatians contains numerous interactions with the Septuagint. (More on that in the next post)

To be honest, though, I chose Galatians as the main text of the reader because I love it. I am writing a commentary on Galatians and this project gave me a chance to dig deep into the Greek text with the help of my students. I have the luxury of setting up classroom experiences where I get to learn from my students and then utilize those insights in my research and writing.