How Biblical Languages Work: A Student's Guide to Learning Hebrew and Greek

by Peter J. Silzer, Thomas J. Finley

A practical and easy to understand guide to learning both Hebrew and Greek. Ideal for Biblical language scholars. This book provides the first practical beginner's guide to the main components of biblical Hebrew and Greek. It will bring the reader through various organizational structures in Hebrew and Greek using insights gained from years of linguistic and biblical experience. The authors intend this book to be used as a tool to supplement traditional courses in Hebrew and Greek, and to show that these languages are organized in much the same way as other languages. The last chapter includes tips to help each reader learn in his own way. Written by two extremely well-qualified linguists. Uses helpful learning methods by moving from known (English) to unknown (biblical languages). Ideal companion to first-year grammars. Provides a key for getting the most out of both Hebrew and Greek

Genres: Biblical Studies, Language, Reference, Linguistics

258 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2004

Reviews

[Preston Scott · Rating 4 out of 5]

With this work, Silzer and Finley give an introduction and roadmap to beginning Greek and/or Hebrew students for learning the languages. While the book might be beneficial in some respects to a new student (it provides a lot of conceptual framework for understanding how language functions/works in general), I fear that it might slightly overwhelm rather than motivate because of its avalanche of information. Nevertheless, the last chapter, with its practical tips for studying and learning the languages, might prove helpful for a beginner student after all.

Rating: 3.5 stars

[Katie · Rating 3 out of 5]

As the description above advises, this book is for the student enrolled in Biblical language courses; it is not an introduction for the very beginner. The information is useful, but supplemental, such as grammar charts and overviews of sentence structures.

[Jon R. Jordan · Rating 5 out of 5]

An incredibly helpful overview of languages in general and the intricacies of Hebrew and Greek in particular. I highly recommend this for anyone currently learning Hebrew or Greek, or those who are just more interested in the inner workings of language in general.

[Craig · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read for seminary -- Hebrew class.

[Sean McGowan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very helpful.

[Ryan Spencer · Rating 4 out of 5]

A practical guide for a beginning student of biblical languages. Finley explains the basics very well and the charts he provides serve as incredible resources I know I will return to over the years.

[Nathaniel Beaty · Rating 5 out of 5]

“How Biblical Languages Work” is a book that is designed for a person who is interested in, about to begin, or just beginning to study the Biblical languages (Hebrew and Greek). You do not need to know any language other than English to read it. I would also note that while it is designed for those who will go on to be students of Hebrew and Greek, it would be a great help to any lay person who wants to understand their English Bible better. It isn’t necessarily for beginners, but it can be used by them if they are determined enough.

The book starts out by defining language as “systems of conventionalized symbols used by groups of people to communicate and to express their identity.” From here it breaks down all these aspects of language and how they work together. In fact, though it is not really a long book, it went way more in depth than I expected. It talks about syllables, morphemes, compound words, sentence makeup, semantics, dialects, and why translation is not an exact art. Also discussed in the book is why studying the original languages might be important to you and a few helpful study tips. The only downside is that there are parts that are very technical and may require lots of concentration to read with understanding.

Overall, I’d say this book is excellent. Outside of the Bible, there are very few books that say nothing I disagree with. You can add this book to the list of those that I totally agree with. It is factual, concise, and in-depth. Furthermore, it has exercises that are good to do and extremely enlightening at the end of each chapter. This will be a great resource for many years to come.

My Rating: 9.5/ 10 Stars.

[Leigh Kimmel · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've always been fascinated with languages and with language in general, so I'm easily captivated by books on language and linguistics.

This volume is written from a Christian perspective, and specifically for the use of preachers, missionaries, and other ministers of the Gospel in understanding the Bible at a deeper level than just reading and comparing translations.

It begins with a general discussion of the phenomenon of language, starting with how speech sounds are made, and moving through morphemes, syntax and semantics. Then it moves into the specifics of how Biblical Hebrew and Koine Greek differ from English in these various specifics.

It's particularly interesting to see how metaphor and other figurative speech is often very culture-bound and difficult to translate -- something that we spent a great deal of time discussing in a course on literary translation I took in my senior year of college at the University of Illinois. Too literalistic, and the translation can be meaningless to anyone but experts. Too free, and one can betray the original, even lose the meaning altogether. This is an especially sensitive matter with sacred texts, since infelicities of translation raise the question of whether one is losing doctrinally vital elements of Scripture and thus leading believers astray.

[Tyler Brown · Rating 3 out of 5]

Neat idea: take a linguistics textbook and throw out everything that doesn't pertain to English, Greek or Hebrew. In my opinion, linguistics is best approached in workbook form than in a book form, which made much of it unhelpful. The text also uses SBL instead Greek or Hebrew type. A MAJOR shortcoming since most of the users of a book like this are learning the languages a need more practice with the language itself.

[Mike Morris · Rating 4 out of 5]

surprisingly technical, far beyond the high school level. bounces back and forth between Greek and Hebrew, which kept me a bit confused, and referenced the old High German language and numerous other forms. should be retitled "A Doctoral Student's Guide".

[Samuel Rivera · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was an introduction to the main topics in linguistics, with the Biblical languages as examples. It does fulfill its purpose well but I felt it boring since I had already read an intro to linguistics book and learned the languages.

[Nolan Fox · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good

[Levi Friesen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Probably a really helpful book; slightly more technical than I could grasp.

[Bfleegs · Rating 4 out of 5]

A good, overarching, broad brush introduction to the basics of linguistics as applied to Greek and Hebrew.

[Timothy Miller · Rating 2 out of 5]

After reading this, I've come to the conclusion I'm not meant to be a linguist when I grow up.

[Bill · Rating 1 out of 5]

Get the physical book; avoid the ebook

This ebook is a scan, and not a good one at that. Table of contents doesn't work. I like the physical book, but this ebook is unusable.

[Chris · Rating 2 out of 5]

By title, one would expect this book to be targeting students who are commencing studies of Biblical languages, and it is - to an extent. The book covers basic concepts of linguistics, and really encourages the reader to think abstractly about common features of languages. However, there are some sections early in the book (particularly in the sections that address letters, sounds, and how words change) that could easily overwhelm a beginning student. I found myself ignoring detail because I was really trying to approach languages from a higher, more abstract level.

[Peter Stonecipher · Rating 3 out of 5]

There is definitely helpful information here for the student who is new to the biblical languages. Sometimes the authors get too deep into linguistic discussions that are probably too obscure for Greek and Hebrew students.