• What is the best way to learn biblical Hebrew?
• Where can I get help with exegesis of the Hebrew Bible?
• What resources are available for further study of biblical Hebrew?
Because biblical Hebrew is so difficult for students, I have written (with Jason DeRouchie) A Modern Grammar for Biblical Hebrew. You can also get A Modern Grammar for Biblical Hebrew Workbook. Reading the grammar and doing the exercises in the Workbook, you will get a handle on how the language works. But, as in all things, the more help you can find, the better. I hope this site will help you to get a good grasp on the language. My blogs will deal with learning strategies, grammatical and syntactical issues, prose and poetry, and the exegesis of the Hebrew Bible. Maybe you are unsure about the difference between ס and שׁ. Or maybe you can recite the full conjugation of הִשְׁתַּחֲוָה. Either way, I hope that you will find something here to help you along.
Here are a few important points about this site.
- This site is dedicated to biblical Hebrew and not to modern Hebrew, to politics, to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, or to theological discussion. Theology will occasionally be touched upon when dealing with the interpretation of the Hebrew of a text. But the Hebrew text and its meaning will always be front and center.
- When discussing Hebrew, I use Hebrew letters, not Roman letters. Transliteration is rarely used but if used, it will be done with a simplified system. Transliteration will not represent the Hebrew scientifically.
- An important consideration is that you need to be able to read the Hebrew letters. Unfortunately, it is still hard to display Hebrew on web pages with consistency across the multitude of browsers and platforms that readers will use. Therefore, text with Hebrew will usually be displayed in a format that is more like a photograph than like text. I have found that this gives the best results. But be aware that text will blur if you enlarge the display on your browser too much.