Lexicons

Hebrew and Greek lexicons are used in translating the Hebrew and Greek scriptures and in the study of the biblical Hebrew and Greek languages.

Greek Lexicons

Hebrew Lexicons

Greek Lexicons

A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature William F. Arndt and F. Wilbur Gingrich. 2d ed., rev. and augmented by F. Wilbur Gingrich and Frederick W. Danker from Walter Bauer's 5th ed., 1958.   (Walter Bauer, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, c1979.)

Bauer's lexicon (BAG) lists the Greek words in alphabetical order. Nouns are in the singular nominative, with the genitive ending and the definite article following; verbs are in the first person singular (indicative). Following the word there may be several abbreviations of authors and texts, in parentheses, which give the breadth of usage of the word. All abbreviations are given in several lists at the beginning of the lexicon. Among these lists is a list of authors, which gives the time period of literary activity of each author. This information can be useful for determining what evidence exists for a particular usage of a word at the time when a NT text containing the word may have been written. M-M. at the end of an entry mean the word is treated in Moulton and Milliagan's Vocabulary of the Greek New Testament [Divinity, Trowbridge RR PA881 M7 1952 (LC)] and B. refers one to Buck's Dictionary of Selected Synonyms in the Principal Indo-European Languages [Divinity, Trowbridge RR P765 B8 (LC)]. An asterisk at the end of an entry means that all the passages in the NT and early Christian literature in which the word occurs are given; double asterisks mean that all the NT passages are given.

 

An Index to the Revised Bauer-Arndt-Gingrich Greek Lexicon  (John R. Alsop, Grand Rapids, Mich.: Zondervan Publishing House, 1981.)

It can be difficult to find the location in BAG where a particular word in a given NT verse is discussed. This index is designed to help one quickly locate the discussion of any given word. The lexical forms are given in the biblical order with the chapter and verse indicated. The Greek lexical form is followed by an indication of the section and subsections in which the discussion of the word is found in BAG, an English gloss and the page number with a letter indicating the quadrant of the page where the discussion of this word is to be found (a - the upper half of the left column, b - the lower half of the left column, c - the upper half of the right column, and d - the lower half of the right column.)

 

Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament: Based on Semantic Domains  (Johannes P. Louw, editor, Eugene A. Nida, editor; Rondal B. Smith, part-time editor; Karen A. Munson, associate editor. 1st ed. New York, NY, USA: United Bible Societies, 1988.)

This lexicon classifies the Greek words and idioms of the New Testament according to shared and distinctive semantic features. The words are grouped in categories called semantic domains, which are listed on pg. xxiv-xxv, following the introduction to the lexicon. The domains are further divided into subdomains, which are listed at the beginning of each domain section. The Greek lexical forms with their definitions are listed under the subdomain headings. For example, the domain "Know" includes subdomains "Know," "Known (the content of knowledge)," "Well Known," "Clearly Shown, Revealed, Able To Be Known," and "Not Able To Be Known, Secret," and under each of these subdomains are listed words which share the main feature of knowing' either positively, or, as in the last subdomain, negatively. The grouping together of these words into domains highlights the differences in meaning of these closely related words or idioms.

The second volume contains three indices; a Greek-English index, an English index, and a passage or scripture index. The Greek index lists the Greek lexical forms in alphabetical order followed by a list of glosses and idiomatic expressions. The domain number and entry number is given in the column to the right of the glosses and idioms. The English index lists English glosses followed by domain and entry numbers where the gloss gives a central meaning of the Greek word of that entry. The scripture index lists all of the domains and entries where a specific biblical verse is discussed. Not all biblical verses are found in the index because only selective occurrences of a word are given in the lexicon.

Hebrew Lexicons (Brown, Driver and Briggs)

A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament: with an Appendix Containing the Biblical Aramaic, Based on the Lexicon of William Gesenius as Translated by Edward Robinson. Edited with constant reference to the Thesaurus of Gesenius as completed by E. Rodiger, and with authorized use of the latest German editions of Gesenius's Handwörterbuch über das Alte Testament by Francis Brown with the cooperation of S.R. Driver and Charles A. Briggs.   Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1978.

 

The Brown, Driver, Briggs Hebrew and English lexicon: with an appendix containing the Biblical Aramaic, coded with the numbering system from Strong's exhaustive concordance of the Bible. Francis Brown with the cooperation of S. R. Brown, and Charles A. Briggs.   Peabody, Massachusetts: Hendrickson Publishers, 1996.

These books are two editions of the Brown, Driver and Briggs lexicon, commonly abbreviated BDB. Both editions are the same lexicon, except that the second one has Strong's numbers in the margins, and includes an index listing Strong's numbers, with the Hebrew word and the page number where it is to be found in BDB in the back of the book.

• Structure
• The lexicon has two sections, a Hebrew section and a much smaller biblical Aramaic section in the back of the book.

  Symbols

• If a form is in brackets the word does not occur in the Hebrew Bible in that form.
• A sword symbol indicates that all occurrences of the word are listed in the entry that follows, so that the lexicon, in part, can be used as a concordance.
• A Roman numeral in front of a word indicates that there are other words in the lexicon with the same spelling but with different meanings (homonyms).
  

  Organization

• The lexicon is organized according to the Hebrew roots, listed in alphabetical order, with the words associated with the root following each root.
  
• The order in which words are listed is from simple (i.e. no afformatives) to complex, roughly as follows:
  • Forms thought to be original biconsonantal forms.
    
  • The triconsonantal root is given in the Qal perfect third person masculine singular, except for the hollow verbs, which are given in the Qal infinitive construct.
  • biconsonantal words derived from the root.
    
  • words with no additional consonants.
  • words with feminine endings
  • words with final affixes ( mem, nun, yod)
  • words with additions to the middle of the word ( yod, doubled middle radical, reduplication)
  • nouns with preformatives ( aleph, heh, yod, mem, nun, shin, taw)
  • compound proper nouns generally follow the verb, preposition or noun which forms the first element of the noun.
  • denominative verbs follow the noun from which they are derived.
    

 

The two mistakes commonly made by beginning Hebrew students using BDB, aside from the difficulty of correctly determining the root from the biblical text, are to not look far enough among the words listed under the root, or to not notice when there is more than one identical root and then to look only under one of the roots.

 

Index to Brown, Driver and Briggs Hebrew Lexicon.  (Bruce Einspahr, Chicago: Moody Press, 1976.)

Einspahr is designed to help one get to the entry in BDB quickly. The index lists the Hebrew word as it occurs in BDB under the biblical verse, with an English gloss, followed by the page number and section number where a discussion of the form can be found in BDB. The order of the books of the Bible is that of the Christian canon.

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