Pisteuomen - πιστευομεν - T. Michael W. Halcomb

For the most part, today has been stressful.  Why?  Because I spent it preparing for my 4pm dissertation defense.  Having the whole day to do that is draining.  But it was worth it.  I'm glad to share the news with you all that I successfully defended my dissertation.  I was so pleased to hear my doctoral supervisor, Dr. Ben Witherington, greet me back into the defense room (I had to step out for a few minutes while the profs deliberated) and say, "Dr. Halcomb, come on in."  It was also nice to hear my examiner, Dr. Craig Keener, and my Reader, anthropologist Dr. Steve Ybarrola, say the same. It has been a long time coming but I'm glad that it has come!  Thanks to everyone who has supported me along the way, especially my lovely wife.  Blessings to you all and Merry Christmas.

At least, that's what these two hilarious (but unsettling) videos might suggest: HT: F&T HT: SL

I just got word today from the Department of Post-Graduate Studies at ATS that it's time to start planning for my Theological French exams. Here's what the email said: " Dear PhDBS Student, Now that you have passed your German Exam, its time to look forward to the required French Exam. Please remember you must take your first attempt prior to August 31, 2010 . Allow plenty of time in scheduling, as summer availability with vacation time and special office projects can be challenging. The French Exam information sheet is attached. " No sweat right? In addition to a semester of Aramaic, Advanced Greek of the Septuagint and Hebrew comps, what's a French comp exam, right? Whatever! All of this language stuff is rather overwhelming at times. Well, maybe it's time to get crackin' on the "Getting French" site!

Portion 28 of my "Notes On Koine Greek" is up and ready for use. In this section of my "Notes", I focus on the Koine Greek Prepositions. There are some useful tables, charts and mnemonic devices. Check it out!!! To see the other "Notes" in this series, go to the bottom of this post and click the links. Enjoy! + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 1 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 2 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 3 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 4 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 5 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 6 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 7 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 8 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 9 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 10 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 11 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 12 "...

The 27th installation of my "Notes On Koine Greek" is up and ready for interacting with. This section of my "Notes" focuses once again on the Koine Greek Definite Article and offers a new, non-traditional image along with some tips for memorizing the the functions of the indefinite article. To see the other "Notes" in this series, go to the bottom of this post and click the links. Enjoy! + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 1 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 2 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 3 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 4 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 5 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 6 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 7 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 8 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 9 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 10 " + Link: " Notes On...

The 26th installation of my "Notes On Koine Greek" is posted. This section of my "Notes" focuses once again on the Koine Greek Definite Article and offers a new, non-traditional image along with some tips for memorizing the the role of the definite article and its generic uses. To see the other "Notes" in this series, go to the bottom of this post and click the links. Enjoy! + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 1 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 2 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 3 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 4 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 5 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 6 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 7 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 8 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 9 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 10 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek,...

The 25th entry of my "Notes On Koine Greek" is posted and ready for review. This portion of my "Notes" focuses more on the Koine Greek Definite Article and offers a new, non-traditional image along with some tips for memorizing the the role of the definite article as a function marker. To see the other "Notes" in this series, go to the bottom of this post and click the links. Enjoy! + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 1 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 2 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 3 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 4 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 5 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 6 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 7 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 8 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 9 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 10 " + Link: " Notes On Koin...

The 24th portion of my "Notes On Koine Greek" is posted and ready for reading. This portion of my "Notes" focuses more on the Koine Greek Definite Article and offers a new, non-traditional image along with some tips for memorizing the the uses & functions of the definite article in relation to substantives. To see the other "Notes" in this series, go to the bottom of this post and click the links. Enjoy! + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 1 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 2 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 3 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 4 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 5 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 6 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 7 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 8 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 9 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 10 " + ...

The 23rd round of my "Notes On Koine Greek" is up. This portion of my "Notes" focuses more on the Koine Greek Definite Article and offers a new, non-traditional table and some tips for memorizing the case-number suffix morphemes. To see the other "Notes" in this series, go to the bottom of this post and click the links. Enjoy! + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 1 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 2 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 3 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 4 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 5 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 6 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 7 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 8 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 9 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 10 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 11 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Gree...

The 22nd installment of my "Notes On Koine Greek" is posted. This portion of my "Notes" focuses quite a bit on the Koine Greek 1st Declension Noun but I also supplement the Case-Number Suffix Morpheme Table that I started building in the 16th group of "Notes". To see the other "Notes" in this series, go to the bottom of this post and click the links. Enjoy! + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 1 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 2 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 3 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 4 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 5 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 6 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 7 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 8 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 9 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 10 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 11 ...

The 21st installation of my "Notes On Koine Greek" is up and ready for reading. This group of notes focuses on how to, morphologically speaking, break down (or, as I call it "attack") a Koine Greek sentence. Here, I offer 10 Tips for how to begin to successfully "attack" a Koine Greek sentence; I also provide an example from the Gospel of Mark. To see the other "Notes" in this series, go to the bottom of this post and click the links. Enjoy! + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 1 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 2 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 3 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 4 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 5 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 6 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 7 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 8 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 9 " + Link: ...

The 20th section of my "Notes On Koine Greek" is up and ready for review. This group of notes includes all 15 of the tables we've looked at so far, including: 1) Koine Greek Present & Future Active Indicative Person-Number Suffix Morphemes 2) Koine Greek Movable νυ Table 3) Koine Greek Amalgamation Table 4) Koine Greek ειμι Table 5) Koine Greek Accent Rules Table 6) Koine Greek Verb Parsing Key Table 7) Koine Greek Verb Parsing Table 8) Koine Greek Case Names Table 9) Koine Greek Noun Parsing Key 10) Koine Greek Noun Parsing Table 11) Koine Greek Noun & Case Functions Table 12) Koine Greek 2nd Declension "ος" Table 13) Koine Greek 2nd Declension "ον" Table 14) Koine Greek 2nd Declension Suffix Morphemes Arranged Alphabetically by “Family” 14) Koine Greek Conjunctions Table To see the other "Notes", go to the bottom of this post and click the links. Enjoy! + Link: " Notes On ...

The 19th section of my "Notes On Koine Greek" is up and ready for reading. This group of notes looks at Indefinite Article of Koine Greek as well as the Koine Greek Conjunction. To see the other "Notes", go to the bottom of this post and click the links. Enjoy! + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 1 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 2 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 3 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 4 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 5 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 6 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 7 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 8 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 9 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 10 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 11 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 12 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 13 " + Link: ...

The 18th installation of my "Notes On Koine Greek" is up. This group of notes looks at Definite Article of Koine Greek. I've created a "Koine Greek Definite Article Song" which is accompanied by sheet music, lyrics and a pictoral mnemonic device. To hear the song, click the audio player below. To read section 18's notes, go just below that. To see the other "Notes", go to the bottom of this post and click the links. Enjoy! + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 1 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 2 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 3 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 4 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 5 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 6 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 7 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 8 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 9 " + Link: " Notes On Ko...

The 17th portion of my "Notes On Koine Greek" are ready for reading. This group of notes discusses the Koine Greek Complement, especially as it relates to ειμι. Anyway, to see other "Notes", go to the bottom of this post and click the links. Enjoy! + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 1 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 2 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 3 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 4 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 5 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 6 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 7 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 8 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 9 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 10 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 11 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 12 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 13 " + Link: " Notes O...

While refreshing myself on the Greek language, I decided to take a couple of minutes and create this timeline. The timeline lays out the history of the Greek language. I only go back as far as the Classical Period. Enjoy!

Here's the 16th entry in my "Notes On Koine Greek". This group of notes offers a new mnemonic / memory device to help with the remembering all of the 2nd Declension Case-Number suffixes. I really do think this is an incredibly easy way to remember the 2nd Declension suffix morphemes of Greek nouns. As I say in the "Notes", the idea is to add on to this table as the other declensions are encountered. Anyway, to see other "Notes", go to the bottom of this post and click the links. Enjoy! + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 1 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 2 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 3 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 4 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 5 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 6 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 7 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 8 " + Link: " Not...

The 15th entry in my "Notes On Koine Greek" are now up. This group of notes offers a few mnemonic / memory devices for help with the 2nd Declension Case-Number suffixes ending in "ον". To see other "Notes", go to the bottom of this post and click the links. Enjoy! + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 1 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 2 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 3 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 4 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 5 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 6 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 7 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 8 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 9 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 10 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 11 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 12 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 13 ...

Well, installation 14 of "Notes On Koine Greek" are up and ready for use! I just got a nice email from Dr. Dave Black thanking me for the series and offering some encouraging words! How humbling! This group of notes offers a few mnemonic / memory devices for help with the 2nd Declension Case-Number suffixes ending in "ος". Enjoy! + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 1 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 2 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 3 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 4 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 5 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 6 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 7 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 8 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 9 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 10 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 11 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt...

And...the 11th installation of my "Notes On Koine Greek" is now LIVE!!! In this set of notes, I offer some mnemonic devices or ways to help memorize the "eimi" (ειμι) verb paradigm. To see other "Notes" go to the bottom of this page and click the links. Again, as always, enjoy! + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 1 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 2 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 3 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 4 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 5 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 6 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 7 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 8 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 9 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 10 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 11 " + Link: " Notes On Koine Greek, Pt. 12 "