I’ve been seeing too much Upworthy in my Facebook news feed lately! Apologies for the sensational blog post headline.
But I really did meet N.T. Wright once. And you might actually guess what he told me, when I tell you what I asked him. I introduced myself to him briefly after a message he delivered a Calvin College worship symposium, and asked him how to improve my Greek. He said, “Read the text, read the text, read the text.”
He told me to really get the feel of the language. I shouldn’t think of Greek just as a one-to-one code for English; I should get into the Greek itself. I asked him what he thought about reading with a diglot, but he encouraged me to check the English translation only after reading an entire Greek paragraph, and then, only as necessary.
It’s challenging, but I’ve benefited from that advice multiple times.
The For Everyone Series
Over the years I’ve made occasional use of his For Everyone Bible commentary series. Written under the name Tom Wright, the series brings Wright’s extensive knowledge of the biblical text and history to a general audience. Anyone wanting to know more about a passage–whether they are preaching from it or reading it in their personal devotions–would benefit from the series. It’s decidedly non-scholarly, but even scholars will find useful information here (if a bit simplified at times). Here is how Wright introduces the series:
But the point of it all is that the message can get out to everyone, especially to people who wouldn’t normally read a book with footnotes and Greek words in it. That’s the sort of person for whom these books are written.
Though Wright is a prolific writer of scholarly works, he writes well for a general audience–a rare combination. Throughout the series Wright puts key terms in bold, which the reader can then look up in a corresponding glossary (e.g., Gehenna/Hell, Covenant, Age to Come, Law, Faith, Son of Man, and more).
Between this package and this upgrade, Logos Bible Software offers the entire 18 vol. set. In a future post I will review Logos’s presentation of the series. Here I post about its content.
A Refreshing (One-Man) Translation
Wright splits each biblical book up into manageable passages. His original translation does a good job of striking the balance he seeks of faithfulness to the original and readability. Here is a passage in Wright’s translation:
Romans 4:18-25
Abraham’s Faith—and Ours
18 Against all hope, but still in hope, Abraham believed that he would become the father of many nations, in line with what had been said to him, ‘That’s what your family will be like.’ 19 He didn’t become weak in faith as he considered his own body (which was already as good as dead, since he was about a hundred years old), and the lifelessness of Sarah’s womb. 20 He didn’t waver in unbelief when faced with God’s promise. Instead, he grew strong in faith and gave glory to God, 21 being fully convinced that God had the power to accomplish what he had promised. 22 That is why ‘it was calculated to him in terms of covenant justice’.
23 But it wasn’t written for him alone that ‘it was calculated to him’.24 It was written for us as well! It will be calculated to us, too, when we believe in the one who raised our Lord Jesus from the dead, 25 the one who was handed over because of our trespasses and raised because of our justification.
Wright explains, “The older language, ‘it was reckoned to him as righteousness’, gives off so many different messages now that it’s hard for us, hearing it, to think the thoughts Paul had in his head.” His translation is fresh, yet is not a paraphrase (like Eugene Peterson’s Message, for example).
“Come to Him, by Whatever Route You Can”
The For Everyone series, though divided into discrete passages, shows a literary sensitivity so that the reader can see how a given section connects to the larger flow of the book. For example, of the above passage, Wright writes:
The last verse of the chapter anticipates something Paul is going to do throughout chapters 5-8. He rounds off every stage of the argument in this long section with a reference to Jesus. This isn’t a mere pious gesture, smuggling in a mention of Jesus in case we thought he’d forgotten about him. It shows, rather, what the whole argument is all about. It brings us back home to the source and power of Paul’s thought.
Though preachers are not the target audience, the series is a good one for preachers to have on their shelves. There is not the same sort of explicit homiletical guidance that Feasting on the Word offers on every passage under consideration, but Wright is not short on practical application. For the Romans passage above, he concludes:
Do we share Abraham’s faith? Do we look in love, gratitude and trust to the creator God who promises impossible things and brings them to pass? Have we learned to celebrate this God, and to live as one family with all those who share this faith and hope?
Listen to the whole story, Matthew is saying. Think about what it meant for Jesus to be the true king of the Jews. And then—come to him, by whatever route you can, and with the best gifts you can find.
This application comes after Wright succinctly answers who the Magi were, what the “star” they saw might have been, and what Old Testament passages are at play in the Epiphany narrative.
In Conclusion (So Far): One of the Best Reading Guides
Wright’s style is conversational, engaging, highly readable, and stimulating on both an intellectual and devotional level. As I make my way through more of the series, I’ll post more about it (with screenshots of how it looks in Logos for computer and iOS). But so far I’m a big fan of what I’ve seen. The Luke volume was a frequent reference as I preached through parts of Luke this fall.
If you’re reading through the Bible, and want to have a substantive yet concise reading guide for the journey, Wright’s For Everyone series is hard to top.
Thanks to Logos Bible Software for the review copy of New Testament for Everyone (16 vols. here; 2 vols. upgrade here). You can find my other Logos reviews here.
Words on the Word 
I really agree with exegete77 about the helpfulness of the UBS GNT reader’s edition for getting into reading the text: http://exegete77.wordpress.com/2013/12/27/reading-greek/
Agreed! That is my current edition of choice. Have you seen how deeply discounted it currently is on Amazon and CBD? At a great price now.
I occasionally miss having the word frequency counts, so will sometimes use Burer and Miller’s New Reader’s Lexicon in tandem with the Reader’s GNT, so I can get that information, as well as the benefit of their work being based a bit more deliberately on BDAG.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/3438051540/sr=1-1/qid=1389302482/ref=olp_product_details?ie=UTF8&me=&qid=1389302482&seller=&sr=1-1 is particularly good value, I think. Burer and Miller looks good. I like Abbott-Smith because it gives quite a lot of usage from the LXX with the Hebrew.
Andrew
A few years ago my wife got me http://www.amazon.com/A-Readers-Hebrew-Greek-Bible/dp/0310325897/ which has a reader’s Hebrew OT and a reader’s Greek NT bound together in a single book. I’ve been using that for some reading and it’s worked out pretty well.
Nice! I like that one, too, though find the Greek font a little harder to read than the UBS version. But have you found significant advantage to having both languages bound together? I.e., do you find you read more of each with them both right there?
The only real advantage to this volume is portability. And for those who love every jot and tittle, they think it’s pretty cool :-).
Rant begins here:
I’ve been using a “read the GNT in 2 years” plan from Lee Irons (http://www.upper-register.com/papers/GNT_2yr_calendar.pdf) and a “read the Hebrew OT in 3 years” plan. I’ve been slowly trudging along and I’m noticing some definite improvement in my language skills. This pace is appropriate for my reading level, but your mileage may vary.
I’ll have Accordance open on my iPad with the original language and the ESV open as a split. The temptations for shortcuts are manifold: 1) to fill in the translation with what I know or remember about the text 2) to hit a difficult verb to parse and immediately give up 3) to take too quick of recourse to the grammatical tagging in Accordance 4) to be content with a “mental interlinear” rather than asking how words form phrases, phrases form clauses, and clauses for sentences, etc.
There is no shortcut to reading the Scriptures in the original language. This is a marathon, not a race. It’s not the man or woman who reads the most but who meditates the most who finds the most profit from it. Besides, once you’ve finished reading the Bible your task starts again – we’ll be reading this thing until we’re dead in the ground or the Lord returns. And remember, the worst outcome is to have mastered the text but not be mastered by it. With all of that being said, I commend whatever methods or plans are necessary for being in the text. Tolle lege!
I think it is helpful to read at least one whole sentence at a time out loud, before trying to translate. (Jonathan Robie at B-Greek suggests a whole paragraph, but for me that’s too much if I am not getting the sense as I read). For parsing I try to discipline myself to at least hazard a guess – and preferably think about it a bit – before looking.
Andrew