Greek Teacher Prof. Edwin L. Byrd from Washington Missionary College

On the 8th of September 1941 Edwin L. Byrd was in an office in North Hall on the campus of Washington Missionary College. He purchased a Greek book written by J. Gresham Marchen, New Testament Greek for Beginners. New York: The Macmillan Company, 1940. It was the Second World War. 

He was to become the Greek teacher for that year at this Adventist College. 

The textbook was written originally in 1923 and reprinted many times. 

How this textbook of Byrd came into my possession I can only speculate. There are a number of options. 

When the old Seminary was remodeled into the new, there was a main big lecture class closest to the James White Library across from dr. Leona Running’s office and a big steel cupboard was inside the classroom. One Sunday morning they were to threw out all the things in that room when current Pastor K-H Han, Pastor Dongtak Lee and Pastor K-R Park was in the room. They said that the books inside the cupboard will be discarded and we should take what we want. We did. It turned out to be a wealth of good books that is still in my library and books that the others also took. This book may have been from there. 

A second option is when dr. Leona Running was retiring and getting rid of all her books in her office. I bought very valuable books from her. It may be hers. 

Prof. Byrd was a true Adventist. A classical Adventist. He required his students to read John 14 in Greek. 

He said that he will focus on the Aorist Participle one Wednesday. 

There will be a test on the Life of Jesus chapters 16-25. He required from his students to bring 5 references each on the words “Humility”, “Sincerity” and “Courage”.

At lesson one he wrote two names in Greek: Edwin Byrd and Elvin Gibson. 

He taught them the Present Active Indicative on page 20. He taught them stem and endings on page 21. 

He taught them there are three declensions of the noun on page 23. That the noun displays the gender, number, case. That there are three genders: masculine, feminine and neuter. That there are singular and plural. That in cases there are the nominative, genitive, dative, accusative and vocative. 

He taught them the First Declension or a-Declension nouns on page 29ff.

The Second Declension or o-Declension nouns on page 33ff. 

They had to learn the article of the masculine and feminine and neuter on page 34 at number 63. 

On page 43 he wrote that they should decline “allos” which is that famous word for the Trinity Theology in John 14. 

They had to write out for him the pronouns on pages 46-47.

They had to learn the Present Indicative of eimi on page 50. 

They had to learn the Demonstrative Pronoun on page 52.

They had to write ekeinos. They had to learn the declension of houtos on page 52. 

He taught them the principle use of the Adjectives on page 54. 

Voices like Active, Middle and Passive were introduced on page 57. They had to learn the Present Middle Indicative of luo on page 58. Also of the Passive on page 59.

On page 65 they had to learn the imperfect active indicative of luo. 

The imperfect indicative of eimi they have to learn on page 66. 

The imperfect middle indicative of luo is on page 69. The imperfect passive indicative they had to learn on page 70.

They had a vocabulary test until page 73. 

He taught them the future active indicative of luo on page 75. Also the future middle indicative. 

He then taught the First Aorist Active and Middle Indicative on page 81. 

They had to memorize the conjugations on page 82 and 83 related to this. 

He then tested them the following class on the present active, present passive, imperfect active, imperfect passive, aorist active, aorist passive and the future active and passive. 

Next he taught them the Second Aorist Active and Middle Indicative on page 87ff. The conjugation of the active is on page 89 and the middle on page 90. 

The aorist passive indicative of luo as well as the future passive indicative conjugations they had to memorize on page 93. 

He marked especially grapho on page 95. 

The Semester test was until page 96. 

The third declension of consonant-declension was taught on page 97ff. They had to learn it on page 98. He focused on sarx on page 99. 

They were tested on page 100 on the nouns with –ma ending like onoma. 

He felt that it is important in this book to know that the other examples of third declension nouns can be found on paragraphs 555-566. 

He prepared them for a test on page 102 with the Present Participle.

VERB PARTICIPLE NOUN

number         number gender

mood case number

tense gender case

voice voice

They must be able to tell the number of the participle. 

They had to learn the participle on page 102. 

Also the present passive participle on page 103. 

On page 111 he drew a wagon around the paragraph with wheels. It is paragraph 239 on page 111 telling how important it is to study the participle in Greek. There are three wheels on one side and three on the other and hooks so that it can go either way. The participle for him is a wagon of a train that can be hooked on anything before or after. 

On the 11th of February 1944 he was teaching the Aorist Participles Active and Middle on page 113. All aorists are past, he wrote. They had to learn the conjugations on page 113. They were tested by it. They had to learn the middle ones too on page 114. Also on page 115. They augment only appears in the indicative mood, page 115. 

The aorist participle denotes action prior to the action denoted by the leading verb, whether the action denoted by the leading verb is past, present or future in paragraph 254 was important for prof. Byrd. 

He mentioned the negative ou on page 119.

They had to learn for a test the aorist passive participle of luo on page 121.

He indicated that like other aorist participles, the aorist passive participle denotes action prior to the time of the leading verb. page 122. 

He taught them the present and aorist participles on page 123. 

The importance of the Genitive Absolute on page 124 which is a noun or pronoun and a participle in a phrase. 

It was on Friday 18th of February 1944 that he started teaching them the Subjunctive Mood. It appears only in the Present and Aorist Tenses page 128.

They were tested on the Subjunctive conjugations on page 129.

The aorist passive subjunctive is dealt with on page 130.

The aorist subjunctive is not saying anything about continuation or repetition but just the action. 

The present subjunctive refers to it as repeated. 

He talked about the protasis in the if-clause on page 133 and the apodosis or (conclusion). 

The next Friday after the 18th of February they had to learn the Present and Aorist Infinitives on page 136. 

They had to memorize paragraph 304 where it is stated that the subject of the infinitive is in the accusative. Four examples are dealt with on pages 138-139: en toi... meta to...dia to...eis to....

On Wednesday the following week one finds him at the contract verbs. They had to write out the present active, Imperfect passive, aorist passive of the verb agapao. 

He tested them on the rules of vowel contraction on page 144, vowel with vowel and vowel with diphtong. 

On Friday he was doing the future and first aorist active and middle of the liquid verbs and future of eimi on page 150.

He tested them on the Friday on the liquid verbs of judge krino. Also the middle indicative on page 151.

The future indicative of eimi was tested on page 152.

Declension of the Reflexive Pronouns was done on page 153 which was tested also. 

He tested the word charis as a 3rd declension Noun. 

They needed to be tested on polis page 158.

Also genos on page 159 and basileus on page 159.

The word alethes and its declensions were also tested on page 160.

In the exam he wanted them to tell the present stem from the liquid stem. 

The Midsemester test was till page 162. 

They had to know the declensions of pas = every.

Also much or many or great as polus on page 164.

They had to do the indefinite pronoun on page 170. 

The interrogative and indefinite pronouns on page 171.

The relative pronouns on page 173 they had to learn. 

He wanted them to know the conditional relative clause used with the subjunctive added with whoever, whichever etc. on page 174.

He went over the imperatives of the present active, middle and passive as well as the aorist active, middle and passive on page 178-179. 

The use of the Imperative was important on page 180.

He then taught them the Perfect active indicative on page 183.

The declension on page 184 they had to learn. 

The perfect middle and passive on page 186 they had to know also. 

The Greek perfect tense denotes a present state resultant upon a past action page 187.

The aorist participle denotes the same act as the leading verb. 

He also explained the words tithemi, didomi, appolumi to them on pages 201-211.

They had to learn histemi and oida on page 216. He wanted them to know histemi on page 217. 

The vocabularies that he selected were:

ago

hairo

akouo

anoigo

apesteila

apothnesko

apostello

aphihmi

baino

ballo

ginomai

ginosko

grapho

didomi

elelutha

erchomai esthio

heurisko

echo

elthon

thaumazo

histemi

lambano

luo

meno

horao

pipto

tithemi

phero

phemi

He selected Revelation 10:6-11 for their reading.