Stanley E. Porter and Matthew Brook O’Donnell 4 the conjunctions are adversative/discontinuous, inferential/summative, additional, additional positive or negative3. There are numerous other treatments of the Greek conjunctions (to say nothing of treatments of conjunctions in other languages, especially modern ones), many of those on Greek not as nuanced as these. These treatments, however, recognize several important features of use of the conjunctions in Greek. One is that they function on different levels, that is, they may be used to link together elements at various discourse levels, from words to word groups to clauses to paragraphs. Another is that they may be related by a cline of meaning, in which two different conjunctions may indicate various semantic features to varying degrees. The attempt is to find some kind of semantic explanation of their use. A third observa- tion is that there may be differing sets of criteria that can differentiate conjunction use. However, even though these common elements are found in these analyses of the conjunction, the application of these categories has not proved productive. For example, one of the treatments mentioned above attempts an analysis of John 3:16. He states: ‘γάρ is a coordinate conjunction linking this sentence to the previous idea in John 3:14… ὥστε is a subordinate conjunction… ἵνα is a subordinate conjunction…” The discussion is restricted to coordination and subordination at the sentence level (we do not comment on the fact that the grammarian misinterprets this verse as stating: “For God so loved the world, with the result that…, in order that whoever believes”)4. The grammarian fails to note the use of οὕτως at the beginning of the first clause, or differentiate how the two subordinating conjunctions differ. We would also suggest that in this in- stance γάρ links two paragraphs (John 3:1-15 and 16ff.), and that οὕτως is a clausal conjunction cataphorically linking the primary and secondary clauses of this complex: “God loved the world in this way: he purposefully gave his only son…” In any case, it is clear that a more sophisticated analysis of conjunctions is needed in Greek. In this paper, we attempt to offer such an analysis that considers the multi-variable nature of the use of the conjunctions. 2. Methodological Issues in the Study of the Greek Conjunctions The study of the Greek conjunctions has been hindered methodologi- cally. For example, the standard study by Denniston provides simply a C.L. Westfall, A Discourse Analysis of the Letter to the Hebrews: The Relationship 3 between Form and Meaning (Library of New Testament Studies 297; London 2005) 82. Wallace, Greek Grammar, 668. 4