Done with Greek (the class, that is)

Ahhhhh.....

Can you feel it? The lightness of step. The carefree look to the horizon. The wind at your back. The whistle on your lips. The smile at rush-hour traffic. The emptiness of thought.

Three quarters, 30 weeks - all done! The final wasn't too bad, and I am so glad it's finished. This last weekend did me in, so I was ready to put my lexicon and grammar on the "courses finished" book shelf.

Now, I have to figure out ways to keep all of it from completely leaving my memory. I know some (ok, maybe a lot) will, but I've already purchased this and this to help. In fact, one of my upcoming new spiritual practices (which I'm going to write about in the near future) is continuing to expand my knowledge of the language so that I can read the NT in Greek.

I'm so glad I decided to take this 3-quarter series. I had difficulty deciding to spend three of my nine electives on a language, especially without knowing what lay ahead of me after this degree. And to be perfectly honest, the overriding initial reason was to meet a language requirement in most doctoral programs - something I'm considering in the distant future. But once we started, and especially in this last quarter where so much came together in our translations, I got hooked. Besides, I met and became friends with four great people in the class!

Greek is a beautiful language, and it's filled with subtlety which is often hard to translate into English. So, I now completely agree with what I had heard from several people and seminaries: if you really want to study the New Testament, do so in Greek. For old(er) dogs like me, it can be trying to learn another language - but it's worth it!