This paper addresses the significant methodological potential for New Testament exegesis by establishing a systematic framework for applying register analysis to New Testament texts. Register analysis examines how language varies according to situational context, providing insights into the functional relationship between linguistic features and their social settings. Unlike approaches focused on dialectal variation (language according to user) or idiolectal peculiarities, register analysis centers on language according to use, thus offering a linguistically principled understanding of how New Testament texts encode and construct their contexts of situation.
There are, however, several challenges to using register analysis in New Testament studies, ranging from differing perspectives on register to a general resistance among many biblical scholars to use or legitimately engage linguistic approaches to study the New Testament. To navigate these challenges, this paper uses Douglas Biber and Susan Conrad’s standard linguistic textbook Register, Genre, and Style to delineate six essential principles of register analysis and demonstrate their application to New Testament exegesis. The first principle establishes the primacy of situational characteristics over linguistic features, illustrated through analysis of Luke’s preface (1:1–4) and its misinterpretation when linguistic features are prioritized over situational variables. The second principle emphasizes the importance of analyzing patterns and distributions of linguistic features rather than isolated occurrences, exemplified through comparative studies of feature distribution in New Testament texts. The third principle is the necessity of applying situational and linguistic analysis cyclically, while recognizing that for ancient texts, access to contexts of situation comes primarily through the texts themselves. The fourth principle addresses the functional basis of register variation, demonstrated through an examination of imperative forms in Matthew’s Garden of Gethsemane narrative (26:36-45), where linguistic variation reflects register shifts within the same setting. The fifth principle involves the identification of registers at different levels of specificity, which enables the distinction between written and spoken registers within biblical texts despite their textual preservation. The sixth principle is the requirement for representative text samples, acknowledging the challenges posed by limited corpora of biblical Greek while highlighting corpus linguistic methods as viable approaches.
The paper engages with significant contributions to register analysis in New Testament studies, including Stanley Porter’s application of Systemic Functional Linguistics to New Testament Greek, David Lamb’s sociolinguistic study of Johannine writings, Matthew Brook O’Donnell’s effort to compile a register-balanced corpus of Koine Greek, and Ji Hoe Kim’s work on lexical density in the Gospels.
This research makes a threefold contribution: it establishes a clear theoretical foundation for register analysis in New Testament studies, demonstrates practical applications of this methodology through examples from New Testament texts, and offers new perspectives on perennial interpretive challenges. The paper concludes by addressing the limitations of register analysis for New Testament Greek while proposing strategies to maximize its potential for advancing our understanding of how New Testament texts function within their sociolinguistic contexts.