First-Declension Nouns

A noun is a word that refers to a person, place, thing, or idea (e.g., Paul, Rome, ship, or peace). Greek nouns are different from English nouns. Most significantly, Greek nouns appear with many different endings. Word order was very fluid in ancient Greek; speakers added “case endings” to nouns to indicate to their listeners how these nouns were functioning in sentences. For example, a specific ending could cue the listener/reader as to whether a noun was the subject, the direct object, or the indirect object. English, by contrast, primarily communicates such noun functions through word order.

In this chapter, we will study the first of three noun ending patterns (case endings). To properly understand Greek nouns, we must also consider the gender (feminine, masculine, or neuter) and number (singular or plural) of nouns. Finally, we will discuss the forms and functions of the Greek article. We will see that the Greek article often functions similarly to the English definite article, “the.”

In Acts 9:7, we read Luke’s report of the apostle Paul’s Damascus road conversion: “The men who were traveling with him stood speechless, hearing (ἀκούοντες) the sound (τῆς φωνῆς) but seeing no one.” Later, in Acts 22:9, Paul recounts the same event and says, “Now those who were with me saw the light, but they did not hear (ἤκουσαν) the voice (τὴν … φωνὴν) of the one who was speaking to me.” Both verses use the same verb for hearing (ἀκούω) and the same word for voice/sound (φωνή)—a first declension noun that will serve as a key word for this chapter. So, did Paul’s traveling companions hear or not hear the Lord speaking to him?

One solution to what seems an apparent discrepancy is to note the different case endings for the word translated “voice/sound.” In Acts 9, the noun has a genitive (often showing possession or relationship) ending (-ης), while in Acts 22, the noun has an accusative (often indicating the direct object) ending (-ην). Even if you do not know the genitive and accusative case endings yet, you can clearly see the spelling differences in the words above. It is then suggested by some commentators that the verb ἀκούω followed by a genitive object (τῆς φωνῆς, Acts 9:7) conveys simply the fact of hearing (without implying understanding), while the accusative object (τὴν φωνήν, Acts 22:9) implies both hearing and understanding. A careful look at additional biblical and extra-biblical texts from the time period of the New Testament, however, does not support this grammatical pattern. A better solution is to recognize that all words do have a range of meaning (both “hear” and “understand” are frequently used to translate ἀκούω), and the broader context supports a harmonizing view whereby Paul’s companions witnessed both a supernatural light and sound but were not privy to the personal appearance and instructions given to Paul. In his commentary on Acts, John Polhill makes a similar observation:

The most significant difference between Paul’s account and the earlier conversion narrative occurs in 22:9, where it is said that Paul’s traveling companions saw the light but did not understand the voice speaking to Paul. In 9:7 the companions are said to have heard the sound but not to have seen anyone. Paul’s account emphasizes their seeing; the earlier account, their hearing. Both accounts make the same point. The companions were witnesses to the experience and could verify that something objective took place. It was not merely an inner experience of Paul’s psyche. On the other hand, the companions were not participants in the experience: they heard a sound but did not receive the message, saw a light but not the risen Lord. The vision itself was solely Paul’s experience.

When we talk about the number of a noun, we are indicating whether it is singular or plural. In English, plurality is usually communicated by adding an “s” or “es” to the end of a word: boy → boys; box → boxes. In Greek, number is also usually communicated through the ending.

Although English has become, for the most part, a language in which nouns are unmarked for gender, there are still remnants of masculine and feminine noun forms: host → hostess; actor→ actress; prince → princess. Unlike English, every Greek noun has a gender, though it is usually only a grammatical gender and thus does not correspond to any particular gender/sex in the real world. A small number of Greek nouns that refer to gender-specific persons (e.g., ἀδελφή, “sister”) correspond in grammatical and natural gender (although the masculine ἀδελφός can be used for both “brothers and sisters”). As you grow in knowledge of Greek, you will begin to note additional patterns with grammatical gender. Abstract nouns, for example, are usually grammatically feminine (ἀγάπη, “love”; ἀλήθεια, “truth”; ἁμαρτία, “sin”; δόξα, “glory”). An abstract noun is “a substantive that signifies a concept, quantity, quality or state (among other things), as in hatred and sportsmanship. It is the opposite of a concrete noun, which refers to something tangible (wall, ocean, etc.).”

In the Greek language, there are three genders: masculine, feminine, and neuter (i.e., from the Latin, meaning “neither”), though each individual noun has only one gender. The ending of a noun usually indicates its gender. All the first declension nouns in this chapter are feminine and end in -η or -α.

Greek nouns contain much more information than English nouns. How an English noun functions in a sentence (e.g., as a subject or direct object) is usually communicated by the word order of the sentence. For example, the sentence “The apostle rebuked the demon” means something very different than “The demon rebuked the apostle,” even though the same words are used. The word order of the first sentence indicates that the apostle is the subject of the verb and the demon is the direct object. Word order is important for communicating the function of words in English.

Imagine that we want to change the English language so that we can put the words in any order. We might say, “Rebuked the demon the apostle.” But, how would we know which word was the subject and which was the object? We could tweak our language so that we add suffixes (endings) to our English words to let us know what they are doing in a sentence—“SU” for subject, “DO” for direct object, “IO” for indirect object, etc. Thus, we could say and write our new transformed sentence this way: “Rebuked the demonDO the apostleSU.” Or, we could say, “The apostleSU the demonDO rebuked.” If we all adopted this new system of noun suffixes, we could communicate just as clearly, but be liberated from set word order! This is akin to what Greek nouns do. They have a series of case endings (suffixes) that inform the hearer or reader how the nouns are functioning in the sentence. A noun listed with all possible case endings for both singular and plural forms is called a “declension” (noun pattern).

The function of Greek nouns depends on the case ending of the noun. For example, the word φωνή communicates that the noun functions as the subject of the sentence whereas φωνήν indicates that the noun functions as the direct object. (There are, in fact, many functions of the different cases, but for now, we are going to oversimplify and focus on the main ones.)

It can be helpful to see that English pronouns have distinct forms to communicate different functions in the sentence—similar to Greek nouns with case endings. You would never say, “This is me book” (unless you are Scottish, perhaps). The proper way to communicate possession is with the form “my”—“This is my book.”

Similar to the distinct spellings of English pronouns, Greek case endings likewise indicate the function of nouns in a sentence (not word order). There are five cases in Greek. (Note that we will discuss the fifth in the next chapter). The nominative case is typically the subject of the verb, answering “who?” (“The Son of God gave the gift to the man”). The genitive case expresses possession or family relationship, which is often indicated by adding “of,” answering “whose?” (“The Son of God [or God’s Son] gave the gift to the man”). The dative case often functions as the indirect object of the verb (“The Son of God gave the gift to the man”). The word “to” or “for” is added to convey this function in English, which answers the question, “to/for whom?” The accusative case often functions as the direct object of the verb, answering the question “what?” (“The Son of God gave the gift to the man”).

A paradigm is a representative pattern or example chart. The following two paradigms represent the eta (η) and alpha (α) patterns, respectively. Note that the feminine article (the same for both charts) also has distinct spellings depending on the gender, number, and case of the noun it modifies. The feminine article has only eight possible forms, all of which occur in the charts below. You will notice that the spelling of the article frequently matches the noun ending with either a tau (τ) or rough breathing mark added at the beginning. In the English translations below, the Greek article is rendered as “the.”

Morphology refers to the study of the parts of a word, and a morpheme is the smallest meaning-unit of a word. Unlike English, Greek is a highly inflected language. An inflection refers to a change or addition made to a word that alters its meaning or function in a sentence. The various case endings (i.e., morphemes) in the paradigms above alter its meaning (singular or plural) and function (subject, possession, indirect object, or direct object).

Notice that there are two different (but related) paradigms for this lesson: (1) the eta pattern (φωνή) and (2) the alpha pattern (καρδία). Each word in the paradigms above includes the stem and an ending. Thus, for φωνή, the stem is φων- and the ending is -η. Likewise, for καρδία, the stem is καρδι- and the ending is -α. The alpha pattern applies to words with stems ending in rho, iota, or epsilon. This is sometimes called the alpha pie rule (which sounds like “apple pie”) because rho (ρ), iota (ι), and epsilon (ε) written together (ριε) look somewhat like the English word “pie.” If you memorize the lexical (dictionary) forms in the vocabulary lists, the last letter of the first declension forms will almost always indicate to you which pattern the noun will follow.

Observe above in the paradigm chart that for the first declension alpha pattern (καρδία), the genitive singular and accusative plural have the same form (καρδίας). The reader can determine which case an author intended by (1) the use of the article (the genitive singular is τῆς whereas the accusative plural is τάς) or (2) the context.

The noun δόξα is somewhat irregular since it uses a combination of both eta and alpha pattern endings in the singular forms: δόξα, δόξης, δόξῃ, δόξαν. The first declension feminine plural forms are the same for all eta, alpha, and irregular forms. The irregularity of δόξα is caused by the xsi (ξ), a double consonant. Nouns that end in a double sigma (σσ) also follow this pattern (γλῶσσα, “tongue,” and θάλασσα, “sea”).

We should note that the endings of the nouns in the paradigms above have been simplified. From a historical and morphological perspective, the actual stems of φωνή and καρδία are not φων- and καρδι- but φωνη- and καρδια-. Thus, the case endings for these forms are technically not -η, -ης, -ῃ, -ην, -αι, -ων, -αις, -ας. Rather, the real ending has often contracted with the eta (η) and alpha (α) ending of the stem. Most students learn more easily the simplified explanation of noun stems and case endings presented above, but we present below the actual endings and contractions for the sake of comparison. If you find this morphological nuancing confusing, feel free to ignore it.

The accent on first declension nouns tends to remain on the same syllable as in the lexical form. But if the ultima is long, the accent will move to the penult (ἀλήθεια → ἀληθείᾳ). The genitive plural is always accented with a circumflex on the ultima (ἁμαρτιῶν).

English has a definite article (“the”) and an indefinite article (“a/an”). Greek, however, only has one article, which functions similarly to the English definite article and is frequently translated as “the.” The Greek article should not be called a “definite article,” though, because it also has other functions. There is no indefinite article in Greek (though a few words in the Koine period are beginning to function that way). When a noun in Greek is not preceded by the article, it is often necessary to add “a/an” for an English translation (e.g., ἐκκλησία = “a church” or “church”; ὥρα = “an hour” or “hour”). A Greek noun that has no article is called anarthrous. A Greek word preceded by an article is technically termed as arthrous or articular.

Whereas the English definite article is always spelled the same way (“the”), the Greek article changes spelling to match the noun it modifies (ὁ, ἡ, τό), one for each gender.

Note, too, that these three forms of the article are only for the nominative singular forms of the respective genders! In fact, there are specific forms to match each case, number, and gender of a noun (3 genders x 8 forms of each noun = 24 forms of the article!), with some overlap in spelling among them. Know that in this chapter you are introduced to one set of feminine articles that will be the exact same eight forms for any feminine noun. In the next chapter, you will learn the eight forms of the masculine article and the eight forms of the neuter article.

Because of its frequency (almost 20,000 occurrences in the New Testament) and because it will help you identify the gender and case of nouns, the article must be mastered. It helps to learn the memory paradigms with the articles. When reading English text that has been translated from Greek, you will notice that sometimes the article is included in Greek when it is not needed in English (e.g., ἡ ἀγάπη μακροθυμεῖ, “love is patient”; 1 Cor 13:4) and, conversely, sometimes it is omitted in Greek but needed in English (ἑαυτοὺς ἐν ἀγάπῃ θεοῦ τηρήσατε, “keep yourselves in the love of God”; Jude v. 21). Finally, proper names and abstract nouns will often have an article which is usually not needed in English. Here are two rules of thumb for translating: (1) If translating the Greek article into English and “the” sounds weird, drop it. (2) If an article is needed for the sentence to conform to normal English usage, add one. Languages are not like algebraic equations. Don’t expect a one-word English equivalent in your translation for every underlying Greek word.

Conjunctions are indeclinable words used to link words, phrases, clauses, and larger discourse (communication) units. Thus, conjunctions designate the relationship between various parts of a discourse. The three conjunctions learned for this lesson (δέ, καί, μέν) are all coordinating conjunctions—meaning they communicate a parallel (or equal rank) relationship between the words, phrases, or clauses that they link. In contrast, subordinating conjunctions link words, phrases, or clauses in a dependent (or unequal) relationship with another word, phrase, or clause (e.g., ὅτι, “that”). Additionally, δέ is a postpositive conjunction—meaning that it never will occur as the first word in a clause but is usually found as the second word (though when translated into English, it should be put first). Sometimes δέ is also called a postpositive particle. In grammatical terminology, “particle” just means a small indeclinable word that communicates grammatical relationships.

Parsing is a crucial skill when learning Greek. It is similar to playing scales when learning a musical instrument. At first, playing scales is difficult and time consuming, but such repetitive work is essential if one is to become proficient with an instrument. Playing scales is not the goal, but such practice enables one to play beautiful music eventually. Similarly, parsing is not the goal, but it gives one the tools to become proficient in Greek. To practice parsing, we recommend visiting the free website www.mastergreek.com.

To parse a word involves describing all the grammatical elements of that word to determine its meaning. Some grammars prefer to retain the term “parse” for verbal forms and instead speak of “locating” or “declining” a noun. Regardless of the terminology adopted, to parse or locate a noun involves identifying its (1) lexical form, (2) gender, (3) case, and (4) number. Once this is done, a proper translation of the noun can be offered. Eventually, you will develop a more intuitive grasp of Greek nouns, but for now, it’s good to rigidly hold yourself to demonstrating your knowledge through parsing.

Here are a few examples of how to parse a noun:

A. Paradigms: Memorize the paradigms for φωνή and καρδία (see section 2.6), and then write out each paradigm ten times from memory. (Include the article and the English meaning.)

B. Eta and Alpha Nouns: Circle the forms that are incorrect.

C. The Article: Parse the following nouns, circling the examples in which the article does not match the noun (in gender, case, and number), then supply the correct article.

1. τὴν ἀλήθειαν

2. τῆς ζῶης

3. αἱ ἡμέρα

4. τὴν ἁμαρτιῶν

5. ταῖς ἐκκλησίαις

6. τὰς ἀγάπης

7. ἡ γῇ

8. τῇ βασιλείᾳ

9. ταῖς καρδίας

10. τὴν δόξαν

D. Case: Circle the Greek word that best translates the English phrase.

E. Translation: Underline the first declension nouns learned for this chapter. Then parse and translate each one.

1. ἡ φωνὴ τὴν γῆν ἐσάλευσεν (Heb 12:26).

2. λέγει αὐτῷ [ὁ] Ἰησοῦς, Ἐγώ εἰμι ἡ ὁδὸς καὶ ἡ ἀλήθεια καὶ ἡ ζωή (John 14:6).

3. τὸ δὲ τέλος τῆς παραγγελίας ἐστὶν ἀγάπη ἐκ καθαρᾶς καρδίας καὶ συνειδήσεως ἀγαθῆς καὶ πίστεως ἀνυποκρίτου (1 Tim 1:5).

4. Ἐγένετο δὲ ἐν ἐκείνῃ τῇ ἡμέρᾳ διωγμὸς μέγας ἐπὶ τὴν ἐκκλησίαν τὴν ἐν Ἱεροσολύμοις (Acts 8:1).