Expert: J.M.J. West - 1/16/2009

Question
When the apostle Paul wrote the new testament did he have such a thorough knowledge of the Greek language so that he actually penned his letters with no problem in that language?

Answer
Insofar as I am aware, St. Paul was relatively fluent in Greek.  He was still human, and though the spirit prevented him from writing theological error, it did not prevent him from run-of-the-mill grammatical mistakes or improper word choice.  That said, I'm not aware of any glaring mistakes in the Pauline Epistles either (note, Paul wrote a lot of letters, but he did not write 'the new testament', for the New Testament had multiple authors).

Jesus and the apostles spoke Aramaic in their day to day life (Jesus' words in Aramaic are preserved in a number of the Gospels).  But all of the NT documents were penned in Greek, which  was the "lingua franca" of the day, and which gives us good assurance that the NT authors were quite fluent - in those days most people spoke two or three languages.

There are times where Paul will forget to write something, then go back and re-insert what he meant to say (like when he lists off those he baptized, and then remembers one more (1 Corinthians 1:16))

If you have a more particular question in mind, feel free to ask it.  

Pax Christi,

-J.M.J. West