“It would appear that God’s intention was to only relate to Greek speakers, and the rest of the world would be totally dependent on them to know God. That is a very difficult concept to accept. :)”
Well, FK, there are a couple of ways to look at that. First is that that is exactly what God intended, or so it seems, given that the NT was written in Greek. The second is close to the first. What God intended was that people who are serious about Christianity would develop a language of theology and perhaps of worship which EXACTLY expressed what the Greek said. I pick #2.
This, of course, is precisly what the Slavs and to some extent Arabs did. The West, for reasons having to do with the Latin Western Empire and the predominence of Frankish thought in the post Empire period, chose otherwise. By the time the Reformers came along, the horse had long since left the barn.
It is interesting that the German Luther developed for his translation of the Bible was a sort of theological language, though not one designed to convey exactly what the Greek original said.
All of our pastors need to learn Greek in order to be ordained.
Well, FK, there are a couple of ways to look at that. First is that that is exactly what God intended, or so it seems, given that the NT was written in Greek. The second is close to the first. What God intended was that people who are serious about Christianity would develop a language of theology and perhaps of worship which EXACTLY expressed what the Greek said. I pick #2.
So throughout the ages, the only ones who were serious about Christianity were the ones who knew Greek (or a related language as you describe) in conformity with the Orthodox faith? That is quite a statement! :) Of course that would mean that several Saints were "not serious about Christianity", including Saint Augustine. That's a pretty odd result. :) This would appear to also leave all Roman Catholics out in the cold, since you would not recognize Latin as a language of theology that expresses EXACTLY what the Greek does.
In addition, isn't it probably true that Jesus spoke (and presumably taught in) at least three languages? With Hebrew being the original language of revelation, I don't see any Divine exclusivity with the Greek. Careful translation is a must of course, but God knew how many of His children were going to grow up knowing the original Greek, i.e. not many as a total number. God either sufficiently accounted for that, or it was not His intention to reveal His word to all of His children. By your standards, it would clearly be true that the vast majority of believers do not have reasonable access to His word.