166 Volumes of Greek Goodness!

Jacques Paul Migne’s Patrologia Graeca is a massive series of 166 print volumes of Greek writings from the 1st century through the 15th century. We’ve been asked many times if we’d consider making this indispensable set available, and we’re finally ready to give it a shot.

As you can imagine, digitizing 166 volumes of small Greek and Latin text—each volume ranging anywhere from 500 to 1,500 pages—is no small undertaking. Print sets are next to impossible to obtain. When we last looked into getting one, the price tag was in the $40,000 range!

Instead of trying to Pre-Pub the whole thing at once and putting it out of the range of just about everyone of our users, we’re going to release it in chunks. This will make it more affordable for you, allow you to pick and choose the sections you want, and make it so you don’t have to wait a decade for the completed project!

The first chunk, volumes 1-18 (20 print volumes), covers the pre-Nicaean period and features the writings of Clement of Rome, Ignatius of Antioch, Polycarp, Melito of Sardis, Papias, Justin Martyr, Tatian, Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Origen, and dozens of others.

Why Would You Want It?

That’s the million dollar question—actually, the $400 question. Allow me to take a stab at some reasons that you should consider placing your pre-order.

Greek Studies

Comparative Grammar

The Greek New Testament is a fairly small corpus of literature. There are hundreds of words, forms, and grammatical structures that occur only once in the whole GNT making it difficult to adequately evaluate them. Being able to compare NT usage—vocabulary, morphology, and syntax—to other Greek writings like the LXX, OT Pseudepigrapha, Josephus, Philo, the Apostolic Fathers, etc. is incredibly valuable. But even these bodies of literature don’t address all of the questions grammarians and exegetes have. Significantly broadening the corpus of Greek texts that can be compared to the Greek NT is a major boon to biblical Greek studies.

Textual Criticism

In many cases the writings of the church fathers shed light on which readings of the biblical texts are earlier and more likely to be original. If you’ve looked at a Greek New Testament apparatus, you’ll see references to the fathers on nearly every page. Being able to look up these references will allow textual critics to get one step closer to the sources—and even make advancements in the field of textual criticism.

Church History

Reading the Original

Have you ever been reading somewhere in Schaff’s ECF and wanted to see the underlying Greek behind the English? I know I have. Have you ever wished you could follow references to the Father’s in footnotes in commentaries and other academic literature? With our digital edition of Patrologia Graeca, this kind of study will finally be easily accessible.

Many people don’t realize that Philip Schaff’s 38-volume Early Church Fathers represents only a fraction of the writings of the church fathers. If you want to read some of the church fathers, reading them in Greek or Latin is the only option. Serious students of the history of the formative years of the church cannot afford to ignore this massive collection of writings.

History of Interpretation

Since Scripture references will be tagged, you’ll be able to evaluate all of the places where a certain passage of Scripture is discussed—a crucial part of in-depth study on difficult passages. Want to find out how the fathers handled baptism for the dead in 1 Cor 15:29? No problem. Add your Patrologia Graeca collection to your Passage Guide, use the Reference Browser, or run a search like bible = "1 Cor 15:29".

Convinced yet? Read more or place your order at the Pre-Pub page.