Conjunctions and word order

Small words that hold sentences together

Greek sentences are stitched together by small words. You already know καὶ, δέ and ἀλλά. Now add two more that appear everywhere in the New Testament: γάρ (gar), "for, because", about 1,040 times, and οὖν (oun), "therefore, so, then", about 500 times. The panel labels both as a Conjunction.

John 3:16 opens with "so" (οὕτως), and γὰρ follows at once. It ties the verse to what came before by giving an explanation or reason. In Matthew 6:9 the οὖν means "therefore": Jesus draws a conclusion from what he has just taught.

Notice something about the position of these words. γάρ, οὖν and δέ do not stand first in their clause. They usually stand second: οὕτως γάρ, Οὕτως οὖν. English puts "for" and "so" at the front, but when you look for them in Greek, look right after the first word. That is a habit of these words, with a few exceptions.

μέν … δέ and ὡς

μέν (men) rarely stands alone. It usually pairs with δέ to mean "on the one hand … on the other". Matthew 9:37 is a clear example.

ὁ μὲν θερισμὸς πολύς, οἱ δὲ ἐργάται ὀλίγοι means "the harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few". The μέν and the δέ set "plentiful" and "few" against each other. The panel calls μέν a Particle or Disjunctive. That is the database's own label, and for reading purposes it is enough to know that it works much like a conjunction.

The word ὡς (hōs), "as, like", carries the same label. You can see it in the Lord's Prayer: in Matthew 6:10, ὡς is the "as" of "on earth as it is in heaven".

Subordinating conjunctions and the relative pronoun

Some conjunctions place one clause inside another. ὅτι (hoti), about 830 times, usually means "that", and sometimes "because", depending on the context. In John 3:2 the ὅτι introduces what "we know": "we know that you have come from God". εἰ (ei) means "if", as in Romans 8:31.

εἰ ὁ θεὸς ὑπὲρ ἡμῶν, "if God is for us". You met ἐάν, "if", with the subjunctive. εἰ, by contrast, usually goes with the indicative. And you met ἵνα, "so that", in the lesson on the subjunctive and imperative.

Now the relative pronoun ὅς (hos), "who, which, what", about 1,400 times. It attaches a clause to a noun. John's first letter piles up examples.

Ὃ ἦν ἀπ᾽ ἀρχῆς is "that which was from the beginning", and ὃ ἀκηκόαμεν is "that which we have heard". A good rule of thumb: the relative pronoun takes its gender and number from the word it refers to (its antecedent), but its case from its own job in its own clause. The first Ὃ is the subject of "was", so it is nominative. The second ὃ is the object of "have heard", so it is accusative. The same shape can have different cases. Do not confuse it with the article ὁ: the relative pronoun usually carries an accent, while the article does not.

John 3:2 offers a clear example. ἃ refers back to "these signs", so it is neuter plural like σημεῖα and accusative because it is the object of "you do".

Word order is free

English tells you who does what by word order. Greek mostly tells you by case endings, so the order is free, and Greek uses that freedom to emphasise: the word at the front is often the one the author wants you to notice. John 1:1 ends with a famous example.

θεὸς ἦν ὁ λόγος is literally "God was the Word". The word order does not tell you which noun is the subject; the article does. ὁ λόγος has the article and is the subject, and θεὸς, without it, says what the subject is. Putting θεὸς first gives it weight. Scholars explain in more than one way what the article-less θεός in front adds, but the BSB ("the Word was God") and the 개역한글 both translate it "God".

An adverb at the front can be emphatic too. John 3:16 begins with οὕτως (houtōs), "in this way, so". This οὕτως (about 210 times) is an Adverb modifying "loved", and placing it first gives it weight. Whether to read it as "in this way" or "so much" is a question we return to in Reading John 3:16–17. Matthew 6:9 begins the same way, Οὕτως οὖν, putting "in this way" in front: "Pray like this."

Summary

Small words reveal the skeleton of a sentence. γάρ gives a reason, οὖν a result, δέ a shift; they stand second. μέν and δέ pair up to contrast. ὅτι introduces content, εἰ means "if", and ὅς attaches a clause to a noun, agreeing with it in gender and number. Order is free, so the first word is often the emphasised one.

Words in this lesson

• γάρgarfor1,041 times in the NT
• ὅτιhotithat/since: that832 times in the NT
• οὖνountherefore/then497 times in the NT
• ὡςhōsas/when503 times in the NT
• ὅςhos, hēwhich1,408 times in the NT
• εἰeiif376 times in the NT
• μένmenon the other hand178 times in the NT
• οὕτωςohutō, ohutōsthus(-ly)208 times in the NT

Practice