Biblical Hebrew Forum

[George F Somsel <gfsomsel AT juno.com>]

On Mon, 5 Sep 2005 01:31:27 +0100 "Read, James C"
<K0434995 AT kingston.ac.uk> writes:
> Iposted twice because I thought the first one hadn't gone through. 
> Sorry!
> 
> I'm all for studying alternative theories but enforcing students to 
> agree with them 
> is not a justifiable prerequisite.
> 
> The title of my course was MA Herbrew/Classical Greek. You can't get 
> much more linguistic 
> sounding than that. Here in GB Hebrew degrees are not that common 
> and only a few uni's offer 
> them. I searched  long and hard for a purely linguistic course and 
> this was the best I could 
> find.
> Anyway, I found the workaround. I shall be doing a Ph.D in 
> Artificial Intelligence and my 
> translation algorithms will give me the chance to put to good use 
> the hebrew/greek I learned at 
> St. Andrews without having to make any compromises.
> I think that studying the NT could only be valuable to any Jew as it 
> would give a valuable insight 
> into an important part in your nation's history. From a historical 
> point of view the NT gives a 
> wealth of information about Hebrew practices and beliefs of that 
> time. It also provides you with a 
> wide view of how certain hebrew terms were translated and understood 
> at that time, a valuable link 
> when tracing the evolution of meaning of many hebre terms e.g. 
> torah/nomos.
> If anybody knows of a purely linguistic hebrew degree, I would 
> dearly love to know of one. Distance 
> learning would be best. Even OU doesn't offer a purely linguistic 
> degree.
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Frankly, I can't understand why you feel that you would need to
compromise.  It may be that they would require you to study views which
are at variance with your own, but the only requirement generally is that
you understand them and be able to interact (support or oppose).  Are you
saying that it is a compromise for you to even understand another
person's position?  

george
gfsomsel
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