The Story Behind My Books: Intermediate Greek Reader (Book #7)

A Free Open Textbook (A Collaborative Work with My Students)

**Substack Series**

I am kicking off a new series (inspired by Mike Bird’s Substack series on his previous work): “The Story Behind My Books” (2010-2025). Fifteen years is a good time for a rear-view mirror perspective. The general discussion of a book will be free for everyone, but when I get into what I think I might have done wrong or what I might change now, I provide for paid subscribers only. I don’t tend to dwell on regrets, but I will have something to say for most books.

Book #7: A **FREE** Intermediate Greek Reader on Galatians and Related Texts

I am so proud of this collaborative project with my students at Portland Seminary/George Fox University (published 2018). This is an Open Textbook, which means it is completely free forever (download HERE). This actually started out as an intermediate Greek course I was teaching at Portland Seminary. I received some grant money to work on a creative project with my students and I thought—what better way to learn intermediate Greek than to WRITE a textbook? I enlisted the help of a graduate named Jonah (stellar Greek knowledge) and we created a shared GoogleDoc with the students. Each week the 8 students would work on different parts of the Greek reader, and other students would “check their work.” Then, I would check their work, then Jonah would check their work, and we had outside reviewer also check their work (Dr. John Byron, Ashland Theological Seminary).

The vision was: how can we use our learning environment to make a free resource for the world? I want to teach my students to transform the privilege of their education into a gift for others—how can we serve others through our knowledge? How can we preserve that energy and time we put into learning, and provide something that will aid others who cannot afford seminary, or afford even a textbook?

Below you will find the names of the students. I am so proud of each and every one of them (and at least 2 have gone on to PhD programs!).

In terms of how the book is designed, it is a “graded reader,” meaning it is set up to aid students as they read harder and harder texts. First, it goes through all of Galatians (in 15 lessons), then Septuagint texts cited in Galatians with some wider context (lessons 17-18), then a James text that seems related to Galatians (lesson 19), then a lesson on Chrysostom’s homily on Galatians (lesson 20), and finally a lesson on Marcion’s reconstructed redaction of Galatians (lesson 21).

PERK: One of my favorite aspects of publishing this as an Open Textbook is that I can track how many people are downloading it (11,000+) and where in the world they are (US, Canada, UK, India, Brazil, Australia, etc.)

The contributing writers are:

Alexander Finkelson (MATS, Portland Seminary)

Bryn Pliska Girard (MATS, Portland Seminary)

Charles E. R. Jesch (MDIV, Portland Seminary)

Paul C. Moldovan (MDIV, Portland Seminary)

Jenny E. Siefken (MATS, Portland Seminary)

Julianna Kaye Smith (MATS, Portland Seminary)

Jana Whitworth (MDIV, Portland Seminary)

Kyle J. Williams (MATS, Portland Seminary)

Again, the book in pdf/ebook form is free forever, but if you want to have a print version shipped to you, you can purchase it from Amazon.