Evidence from History and the Gospels that Jesus Spoke Greek

The evidence is as yet inconclusive as to what language Jesus would have normally spoken to the Jewish crowds or to his disciples. However, for nearly the last century, “it has become practically a generally accepted tradition that the mother tongue of Jesus, the language he knew best and therefore usually spoke, was Aramaic.”1 This is mainly due to the conclusions of Dalman,2 “who stated that, though Jesus may have known Hebrew, and probably spoke Greek, he certainly taught in Aramaic.”3 Some New Testament scholars have even gone as far as to say that “Jesus only spoke in Aramaic.”4 Based on more recent historical research and linguistic data, the purpose of this paper is to show that Jesus spoke Greek, had the linguistic ability to teach in Greek, and at times may indeed have taught in Greek. There may, in fact, exist instances recorded in the Gospels where Jesus conversed and possibly taught in Greek. After this fact is established, this paper will call for a more serious consideration of the implications of this possibility by New Testament scholars and highlight the need for more research in this area. This paper will focus on the Biblical text from both an historical and literary perspective. First of all, it will give a brief overview of what is known historically of the languages spoken in first-century Palestine. This will serve to establish the scope of Jesus ’ linguistic possibilities an