Chavoux:
Chavoux wrote:Karl, I would say the best (not necessarily the correct) way to study grammar, is first of all to learn the language itself until you can express yourself comfortably in the language (and understand it as well). Then you are in the position to start deducing "laws of grammar" that describe how you (and native speakers of the language with whom you communicate) use the language.
Unfortunately, there’s no one with whom I can communicate Biblical Hebrew, as the last native speaker thereof died about 2500 years ago. Since then no one has learned Biblical Hebrew well enough to speak it fluently — we don’t even know its pronunciation, let alone speak it. With no native speakers to correct us, it’s very likely our attempts to speak Biblical Hebrew will result in uncorrected errors becoming hardened in our minds and in our understanding of Biblical Hebrew.
Chavoux wrote:In the case of biblical Hebrew, a good way would be to translate something from English (or Septuagint Greek) into biblical Hebrew and then compare that translation with the actual Hebrew as found in the text. That would give you a good indication of how close your grammatical rules are to the actual usage of the language. (You can also learn the rules from others who have already gone through this whole process).
I haven’t done that, and except for some simple areas where prose has been translated as prose, I wonder how close translating back would be.
There is a danger to this exercise — we can become more used to our own mistranslations than to how Biblical Hebrew is actually presented in Tanakh.
Chavoux wrote:The interesting thing to me, is that the whole perfective (past/completed) / imperfective (future / incomplete) paradigm seems to work pretty well for most of the Hebrew Bible. I just don't see the major disconnect that you and Rolph seem to claim. There are exceptions, but then there are exceptions in all languages. E.g. in Afrikaans we will normally tell a story that happened in the past using present tense in order to make it sound more dramatic. This does not mean that past tense does not exist in Afrikaans.
How many times have you read Tanakh through, cover to cover, in Hebrew? Even once?
Chavoux wrote:Remember that native speakers use a language and speak it as it feels natural to them without thinking about grammar and that grammar rules
When I first saw the “Jehoash Stone” forgery, my first reaction was, “This doesn’t feel right.” I couldn’t describe in linguistic terms why it felt odd, just that it did.
Chavoux wrote: only come afterwards to try and describe the way people actually use the language. Of course, it can also help us to learn a new language, since we can compare its grammar to that of languages we already know, but I do not think that starting with grammar is ever the best way to learn a new language. Only after a certain proficiency in the language exists, can one start to learn and apply grammar in order to figure out how to use new words in other contexts.
Shalom
Chavoux Luyt
Remember, what we study in class is mostly cherry-picked examples that seem to fit the presuppositions of the teachers. When I first read Tanakh through, I was shocked at how much the actual text varied from what I had been taught in class. Yet I soldiered on, trying to make the text fit according to the rules I had been taught. It was only after about five times reading Tanakh through (I was a slow learner), that I decided to ignore what I had been taught, and just let the text sort of ooze into me, as if by osmoses, by reading Tanakh over and over again. As a result, I think I know Biblical Hebrew better than anyone else on this list, yet I make no claim to knowing it as well as a native speaker.
There are certain mistakes I notice when people study Biblical Hebrew:
1) They start with the assumption that Biblical Hebrew verbal conjugations necessarily code for some sort of time measurement — tense, aspect or a combination of the two. I claim it’s wrong to start with that assumption. I find examples of Qatal used for past, present and future tenses, both perfective and imperfective aspect. The same with Yiqtol. Likewise with participles. In both prose and poetry. As a result, I came to the conclusion that Biblical Hebrew doesn’t conjugate for time.
2) They don’t read Tanakh. By that, I mean reading it through cover to cover, so that they become familiar with the whole text, not just what they cover for class or professional studies. I also mean reading the text through multiple times, not just once or twice, but 15, 20 times. Some of the rules expressed in discussions on this list were proven wrong with looking at passages that may not be so exciting nor interesting to read, but only by being familiar with all can accurate rules be made.
3) They assume that their teachers were accurate, that they have accurate answers to all the students’ questions. As a result, they become more familiar with scholarly expositions on the language than on the text itself. This is medieval thinking that the Reformation fought against. Of course, teachers will know more than rank beginners, but as students learn more, they should be ready to challenge their teachers. The Reformation expressed itself in theology as a return to the Bible (“Sola Scriptura”) and in science to making observations and experiments, and in both ready to say that the “experts” who went before could very well be mistaken.
4) Lastly, related to #1 above, what I seem to notice now is that some people seem to say that what they observe fits certain named rules, but then they redefine the rules to their own definitions. It is this reason that I started this thread, is this the right way to go about research? Doesn’t this practice lead to confusion rather than communication?
What is your answer to point #4?
Karl W. Randolph.