Joseph Henry Thayer’s Greek–English Lexicon of the New Testament is one of the greatest achievements in biblical scholarship at the turn of the twentieth century. As the culmination of nearly three decades of work, it contains more than 5,000 entries, references to hundreds of grammatical and exegetical works, detailed etymology, and complete summaries of both biblical and extra-biblical word usage. The publication of the revised edition of Thayer’s Greek–English Lexicon in 1889 represents a watershed event in nineteenth-century Greek lexicography, and it remains an important tool for students and scholars of the Greek New Testament more than a century after its first appearance.
Thayer’s Greek–English Lexicon is a revised and translated edition of C.G. Wilke’s Clavis Novi Testamenti, which was first published in 1841. After numerous revisions by both Wilke and his successor, C.L. Wilibald Grimm, Joseph Henry Thayer took over the project. Thayer devoted nearly thirty years to the translation—making thousands of revisions based on the latest Greek scholarship. The first publication of Thayer’s Greek–English Lexicon appeared in 1885, and an updated edition was published in 1889—the edition available from Logos Bible Software.
