GRAMMATICAL CONCEPTS 101 FOR BIBLICAL HEBREW: LEARNING BIBLICAL HEBREW GRAMMATICAL CONCEPTS THROUGH ENGLISH GRAMMAR [Paperback]

This is an extremely valuable work that goes in depth into issues of grammar, syntax, semantics, linguistics, and discourse analysis of Biblical Hebrew. The approach is comparative; the author compares a variety of concepts, illustrating how each separate issue of grammar, syntax, etc., is treated in the English language, and then illustrating the treatment of the same issue in Biblical Hebrew. Illustrative phrases, clauses, and sentences all use names from the TaNaKh (Hebrew Bible), and almost all of the Hebrew examples are actually taken straight out of the TaNaKh. I had been reviewing English grammar and also had been studying linguistics in order better to clarify concepts that I was covering in my course in Biblical Hebrew, but I found that Dr. Long's excellent text included everything that I had either already studied or intended to study from the grammatical standpoint. I expect to continue studying linguistics elsewhere; the coverage of that particular subject in this book is inadequate for my needs. This latter point is stated as a matter of fact, and is not intended as a criticism of the work, which is excellent in what the author chose to cover in detail.

Why did I rate this book as only a four (would have been four-and-a-half, if that rating were supported by Amazon.com)? The book has two faults, one highly significant and the other merely marginal. The significant fault is that the book includes a great many forward references. The substantive text begins on page three (page one is a section header, and page 2 is blank). As early as page four (the second page of text), there is a forward reference to page 36. Thus, I had to leave one finger holding my place in page four while paging forward to page 36 to read the section beginning there. On page five (the third page of text), there are TWO forward references, one to page 127 and the other to page 123. Sprinkled liberally throughout the book are other forward references. Thus, I found myself going back and forth many times, which makes the book a frustrating read. I wonder whether the author might have taken a little more trouble organizing his material so that forward references would be greatly reduced in number or perhaps eliminated entirely. I don't mind backward references. Often, I will remember what I have already read, so that a backward reference might not require that I actually detour to re-read it. The other fault that I find with this book is that in, I think, two places the author declines to cover a subject altogether, referring the reader to his/her regular text on Biblical Hebrew. This I consider to be a minor defect.

Overall, I have found this book to be a very valuable work, and I am grateful to Dr. Long for giving me, in a short but very clearly written exposition, several new insights into the intricacies of Biblical Hebrew. I feel that this book would probably overwhelm a beginning class in Biblical Hebrew, but it is certainly appropriate to an intermediate course (third and fourth semesters); with a very bright class, perhaps it could be used in the second semester. Certainly, this is a "must read" for everyone who teaches a course in Biblical Hebrew!
A Practical Grammar for Classical Hebrew
An Introduction to Biblical Hebrew

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