Introducing Dewayne Dulaney (talmid56)

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talmid56
Posts: 295
Joined: Tue Oct 01, 2013 9:02 am
Location: Carlisle, Arkansas, USA

Introducing Dewayne Dulaney (talmid56)

Post by talmid56 »

When B-Hebrew changed to the web forum format, members from the former list were requested to re-introduce themselves. I am finally getting around to doing that now.

I am an American, born in 1956 and raised in north Louisiana, in Monroe and West Monroe, towns on the Ouachita River. My parents were Christians, members of the White's Ferry Road Church of Christ. From an early age I learned to love the accounts of the great men and women of the Hebrew Bible such as Noah, Abraham and Sarah, Moses, Ruth, David, Esther, and others. As I learned to read, both the Tanakh and the New Testament became my favorite books, and are still my favorite books today. I became a Christian also at age 7.

I became interested in learning languages while in junior high (middle school). Originally I was going to start with Latin in high school. Unfortunately the school dropped Latin from the curriculum the year before I started. Fortunately, I was able to get one of the Latin textbooks and start studying on my own. I also enrolled in French classes when I started high school. I took two years of French, then Spanish for the remaining two years.

About the time I started learning French and Latin, I found out that the church I attended was offering at night some of the same classes available at the preaching school it sponsored. One of these courses was Koine Greek, so I and my father both signed up for it. I enjoyed the course, but I struggled with the grammar-translation approach used. Meanwhile, the French course I was taking for credit required a lot of homework, and I eventually had to drop the Greek course to keep up with my French studies. However, I would return to Greek in later years. Meanwhile I decided to keep some contact with Greek so I bought an interlinear Greek New Testament that had 2 parallel English translations, the KJV and NIV. (The textbook we used for Greek did not introduce any actual NT readings until the last 2-3 chapters, so I was not ready to read Greek yet.)

When I went to college I planned to train to teach Spanish and French on the college level. I went to Lubbock Christian College (now University) in Texas and majored in Spanish with minors in French and History. I also took 2 years of German, which I found more difficult than French and Spanish, but enjoyed very much. The experience with German did help my Latin studies and later Greek studies because of the similar grammatical case system. The college also offered Greek and Hebrew, but I was unable to work them into my schedule.

I graduated with my B.A. in 1978 and then went on to graduate studies in Romance Philology at Louisiana State University. The workload of both my courses for the degree and the demands of being a teaching assistant proved to be more than I could handle at the time, so I dropped out about halfway through the program. While in graduate school I continued my Latin studies and began to read the Vulgate New Testament regularly.

By this time I had attained near-native fluency in Spanish and had visited Mexico five times. I was also able to serve as a Spanish-English interpreter. For the next several years I tutored individuals in Spanish.

After a while I moved to Dallas, Texas and became a member of the Preston Road Church of Christ there, which hosted a school of preaching. I decided to enter the preaching ministry and as part of the curriculum I was able to take Greek again. Although the approach was still grammar-translation, I did well in the course (only 1 year was offered) and continued my Greek studies on my own after graduation. I then was a pulpit preacher for 3 years full-time and about 10 years part-time. I also worked part time as an ESL substitute teacher and tutor for college-age and older adults. I also got to teach a French course at a continuing education center.

Although the Preston Rd. School of Preaching didn't offer Hebrew when I attended, I had become interested in it through my Old Testament courses, so I started teaching myself some. I bought a beginning grammar and pocket lexicon, a Hebrew interlinear, and then later in school bought the Koehler-Baumgartner lexicon (2nd ed.) and the Gesenius-Kautsch-Cowley advanced grammar.

Five years after I graduated from preaching school, I returned to the Dallas area and learned that an extension course in Biblical Hebrew was now available from that same school. I took the course (also grammar-translation) from Dr. Michael S. Moore, who later taught at Fuller Seminary. Besides me there were 3 other preachers taking the course, and we wanted more Hebrew. At the time only one course was offered, so Dr. Moore offered to do some reading work with us and so we took 3 more courses with him. While it was more translating than reading, I enjoyed them very much and benefited from them greatly. We covered passages from Genesis, 1-2 Samuel, Ruth, Jeremiah, and selected Psalms. I took these courses from 1988 to 1990.

This got me started on regular reading from the Bible in Hebrew, which I continue today. I have read all the way through the Tanakh twice now. These readings have all been a blessing in my devotions, and have been very useful when preparing sermons and Bible classes.

I still preach occasionally, and have taught a number of adult Bible classes over the years from the books of the Old Testament, including Genesis, Job, Proverbs, Minor Prophets, Ezekiel, Daniel, and a course on the non-writing prophets such as Elijah and Elisha from Kings and Chronicles.

About 6 years ago, I decided to retrofit my Hebrew, Greek, and Latin studies with some communicative approaches and materials. I started getting audio files of the Hebrew Bible texts I was reading and began listening to them. This has really helped my reading comprehension. I had already been in the habit of reading the Hebrew out loud, but listening added an extra dimension that proved tremendously helpful.

I also added reading and listening to the New Testament in Hebrew to my study. I first read some of the NT in Hebrew from Delitzsch's translation, then from the Israel Bible Society version. I have since listened to the entire NT in Hebrew from the Bible Society version.

Later I joined B-Hebrew and began trying to compose some Hebrew emails to some of the members. Although I was not at all skilled at this, I enjoyed it and learned a lot. I hope to try this again soon.

Currently I am reading and listening to the Tanakh in Hebrew 2-3 days a week (Genesis and Jonah). I am also planning to memorize selected Psalms. I am also reading the OT texts in the Septuagint and in the Vulgate. For the past year I've also been reading the NT in Greek and Latin.

I continue to benefit from B-Hebrew and hope to contribute more as time goes on.

If any members would like to email me to practice writing in BH or do the same with a PM here on B-Hebrew, I would be delighted. I am still more skilled at reading than composition, but the practice would be welcome.

May God bless you all, and may we all learn and profit from our Hebrew studies. I certainly have, and continue to do so.
Dewayne Dulaney
דואיין דוליני

Blog: https://letancientvoicesspeak.wordpress.com/

כִּ֤י שֶׁ֨מֶשׁ׀ וּמָגֵן֮ יְהוָ֪ה אֱלֹ֫הִ֥ים חֵ֣ן וְ֭כָבוֹד יִתֵּ֣ן יְהוָ֑ה לֹ֥א יִמְנַע־ט֝֗וֹב לַֽהֹלְכִ֥ים בְּתָמִֽים׃
--(E 84:11) 84:12 תהלים
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Galena
Posts: 144
Joined: Fri Jul 24, 2015 8:55 am
Location: Ireland

Re: Introducing Dewayne Dulaney (talmid56)

Post by Galena »

Quite an introduction, hallo from Ireland by the way. So many professionals here - so intimidating you know. Look forward to your posts.
Chris Watts
Chris Watts
talmid56
Posts: 295
Joined: Tue Oct 01, 2013 9:02 am
Location: Carlisle, Arkansas, USA

Re: Introducing Dewayne Dulaney (talmid56)

Post by talmid56 »

Thank you, Chris. Looking forward to your posts as well. As it happens, I am of Irish descent on my father's side. Would enjoy discussing Irish geneology and family in a PM sometime.

Hope you enjoy B-Hebrew.

Dewayne Dulaney
Dewayne Dulaney
דואיין דוליני

Blog: https://letancientvoicesspeak.wordpress.com/

כִּ֤י שֶׁ֨מֶשׁ׀ וּמָגֵן֮ יְהוָ֪ה אֱלֹ֫הִ֥ים חֵ֣ן וְ֭כָבוֹד יִתֵּ֣ן יְהוָ֑ה לֹ֥א יִמְנַע־ט֝֗וֹב לַֽהֹלְכִ֥ים בְּתָמִֽים׃
--(E 84:11) 84:12 תהלים
talmid56
Posts: 295
Joined: Tue Oct 01, 2013 9:02 am
Location: Carlisle, Arkansas, USA

Re: Introducing Dewayne Dulaney (talmid56)

Post by talmid56 »

I failed to mention earlier (probably because my brain was tired) that I became certified to teach Spanish on the K-12 levels in Arkansas and taught it for 5 1/2 years during the period from 2002 to 2010. I also taught high school and middle school English for 1 1/2 years, and Exploratory Latin for 2 1/2 years. Unfortunately, most of the students had no desire to learn, and I got little support from parents and administrators. However, I hope that I was able to be a good adult influence. When I taught Latin I did use some communicative approaches, and that was a good experience for me, and I hope for the students, as well.

Dewayne Dulaney
Dewayne Dulaney
דואיין דוליני

Blog: https://letancientvoicesspeak.wordpress.com/

כִּ֤י שֶׁ֨מֶשׁ׀ וּמָגֵן֮ יְהוָ֪ה אֱלֹ֫הִ֥ים חֵ֣ן וְ֭כָבוֹד יִתֵּ֣ן יְהוָ֑ה לֹ֥א יִמְנַע־ט֝֗וֹב לַֽהֹלְכִ֥ים בְּתָמִֽים׃
--(E 84:11) 84:12 תהלים
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