The Value of Language Study

Since I started studying Greek and Hebrew at ETCW I have been wondering when the "pay off" for all this hard work is going to come. Various people have said to me that as long as they can consult a lexicon or two then they are satisfied. These comments have made me wonder whether it is worth pursuing it any further than basic Greek/Hebrew grammar.

I have been reading Don Carson's Exegetical Fallacies over the last couple of days. At the end of Chapter 1, 'Word-Study Fallacies', he says this:

Perhaps the principal reason why word studies constitute a particularly rich source for exegetical fallacies is that many preachers and Bible teachers know Greek only well enough to use concordances, or perhaps a little more. There is little feel for Greek as a language; and so there is the temptation to display what has been learned in study, which as often as not is a great deal of lexical information without the restraining influence of context. The solution, of course, is to learn more Greek, not less, and to gain at least a rudimentary knowledge of linguistics. (p. 66, emphasis mine)

I knew there was a reason for persisting and I just could not find it. Now I know. It's not just a case of knowing the words in order to literally 'translate' and sound clever. It's a case of knowing how the language works and getting inside the minds of the writers. Ultimately, it's about knowing God's mind better.