Hebrew

Textkit Community Open Board
21

I’m not sure how much Ecclesiastes could have been influenced by Greek models, since it was written by King Solomon who was born about 1000 BC.

22

Wikipedia actually suggests that it was more influenced by Persian models.

23

Wikipedia also states that the author was probably NOT King Solomon.

24

The entire Hebrew bible has a very small vocabulary (8500 words/stems or so I’ve heard), and the grammar is also somewhat simpler than what you might find in Classical Greek.
The narrative portions of the bible are similar in their language and as fitting for their content (laws, chronicles and so forth) are lucid and straightforward. When you get to the classical prophets and the poetry, things naturally become more complex and inclusive in vocabulary, grammar and structure, but as a new learner you should be able to tackle them with the same ease (when you begin reading systematically, I do recommend beginning with the narratives, if only as to acknowledge the contrast between their clarity and the immense beauty of Isaiah or Jeremiah). On the other hand, books like Job (from chapter 3) are mostly incomprehensible to me as a Modern Hebrew speaker without some help.
Now if anyone here wants to learn Modern Hebrew, I’d assume he won’t be doing it in order to have a soul to soul conversation with someone in the Jerusalem market, but to read the literature. And as the bible is by and far the greatest influence on the language of the writers, and is generally lurking in the shadow of any Hebrew text, I’d recommend starting from there first.

25

Hi,

[Thanks for your thoughts and welcome to bluetech.]

I found William R. Harper’s Elements of Hebrew in a book-shop and I bought it. So, I am going to study Biblical Hebrew. I think that this incoming week I wll be able finally to master the aleph-bet and then I’ll move to Harper’s book and some books I’ve bookmarked from Google Books.

I’d like to know a short list of Biblical vocabulary with phonetic transcription and English translation and Hebrew characters. No more than 30-50 words. It would be very useful to begin.

Regards and many thanks again for the commentaries,
Gonzalo

P.S.: I’ve found two interesting links. This one deals with vocabulary and this one with History of Hebrew language.

26

I wouldn’t be too worried about that, from what I hear Job is a notoriously difficult text to translate for Biblical scholars as well.

27

BTW, this book is also available at the Internet Archive:

http://www.archive.org/details/williamrharperse00harprich
[William R. Harper’s elements of Hebrew by an inductive method ([c1921])]

I note that you have at present the aim to learn the basic vocabulary of ~50 words. If however you wish to build on this later, then Harper can again help you. He compiled a comprehensive list of Hebrew words by their frequency of occurrence. Very useful:

http://www.archive.org/details/hebrewvocabulari00harpiala
[Hebrew vocabularies: lists of the most frequently occurring Hebrew words (1898, c1890)]

28

Many thanks. Your contributions have been excellent for me, I really thank you specially for the second link. I am not by no means studying “deep” Grammar, at this point I am trying to master the aleph-bet and I am also reading some sections of the Grammar.
Regards,
Gonzalo

29

Hi,

I am studying with Harper’s Method and manual of Hebrew and the book I bought. I highly recommend it. It let you read Hebrew from the first page explaining every thing. Besides, his Elements are also very useful. I get a bit troubled with the vowels (their sounds+transcriptions) but Evan’s videos help a lot. Do you know any other resource or other material?

Regards,
Gonzalo