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Re: Biblical Hebrew or Modern Hebrew?

From:Isaac A. Penzev <isaacp@...>
Date:Monday, September 27, 2004, 20:11
Katav Steg Belski:


> On Sep 27, 2004, at 8:20 PM, David H wrote: > > Hello. I have been wondering which of these languages would be better > > to > > learn first. > > I hope to obtain a good (if not fluent) knowledge of Modern Hebrew some > > day, and I would also like to be able to read the Tanakh in its > > original > > Hebrew. But which would be better to learn first, would learning > > Biblical > > Hebrew make it easier to learn Modern Hebrew since a lot of the grammar > > and vocabulary are the same, or the other way round? > > Thanks > > > I'm not sure, sorry. I learned both of them concurrently, so i don't > know which is better to learn first. But whichever you choose, make > sure you start out reading with vowels, and then learn how to read > without them. Because once you know how to read with them, you can > easily learn how to read without - but if you first learn without > vowels, reading vowelled texts can completely mess you up. > It also depends which is more of an immediate goal - do you want to > visit Israel, or read the Tanakh?
I learnt some Modern Hebrew first, and it was a mistake. To switch from BHe to MnHe is much easier. But anyway, all I can say is "I agree 100% with Steg", esp. about vowels. And finally, it depends on your immediate goal. -- Yitzik who teaches BHe to some rather lazy guys in a certain institution