The Biblical Language Center, at Qibbutz Tzuba, just west of Jerusalem is offering its second annual, immersion Greek SXOLH this summer 2008. Two teachers in class teach in Koiné Greek, 90%+ of the time. Outside languages (e.g. English, Hebrew) are restricted to 10% within the classroom. From the beginning students start to play in the [...]
In a discussion on another blog, www.AncientHebrewPoetry.typepad.com , John Hobbins asked me about tense and aspect in Arabic, with an implicit question on its relevance to biblical Hebrew tense-aspect, "Does [Östen] Dahl represent a consensus point of view when he interprets the classical Arabic verbal system as at root aspectual? Or is there a continuing [...]
[Excerpts from an email exchange between Randall Buth and others on whether a "dead" language, Greek in the discussion below, can ever be taught as a "live" language.]> I think that what is happening is that there is a clear distinction between> learning, reading and speaking a language that is NOT DEAD and learning, reading> [...]
This is a translation question from a student for Dr. Buth:Dear Dr. Buth,Last night i was reading Psalm 16 and struggled with some difficultverses. I would like to seek your opinion on verse two: אָמַרְתְּ לַיהוָהאֲדֹנָי אָתָּה טוֹבָתִי, בַּל-עָלֶיךָA straightforward reading seems strange and doesn't make sense: my welfare is not upon you.BDB interprets this [...]