Introducing Biblical Hebrew

Rating:
Summary: I've read all the reviewsl.......
Review: and I've done seaches for books by the Jewish Publication Society, and I have to agree with Amazon, PUBLISHERS, LET US SEE INSIDE THE BOOK. NOT ALLOWING THIS MAKES ME THINK IT ISN'T WORTH HAVING.

Rating:
Summary: A student's perspective: Don't use this book!
Review: I am a second-year, first-time-with-Hebrew MDiv student with an A average overall, and one seminary instructor chose this book to teach us Hebrew, rather than the book our seminary traditionally usually uses. Here is why I think that a Hebrew first-timer and MDiv-er shouldn't buy this book -- and why, as a committed student who wants to master the material in it, I would ask profs to use different textbooks to teach other students like myself.

1. Most U.S. M.Div. people need to learn to translate from Hebrew into English, not the other way around. Far too many of Ross's exercises (in fact, the majority of them for the first 30 or so chapters) are about translating from English to Hebrew -- something we do not need facility in to do good jobs as pastors/preachers/exegetes. Better to see lots of Hebrew and translate it into English -- the skill to be mastered, after all.

2. Each of the first 40 or so chapter/lessons has a maximum of 10 phrases for the student to translate from Hebrew to English. This is insufficient to acquire mastery of any of the concepts, grammar, or vocabulary covered in any one of the chapters, especially without an answer key available, let alone to continually reinforce and build upon one's mastery of previous vocab/grammar. Also, one does not get to see what specific forms of verbs, constructs, etc. actually look like "in vivo" often enough to facilitate future translation.

3. In each chapter, the author introduces vocabulary that he does not then use in translation exercises until tens of chapters later. As the old saying goes, "Use it or lose it."

In short, I would never recommend this book as a textbook or study aid to students new to Hebrew. I have found it helpful to reference and use the abundant exercises and explanations in Kelley's "An Introduction to Biblical Hebrew," as well as the "Basics of Biblical Hebrew" book and workbook to gain mastery of the material.

Rating:
Summary: quick review
Review: The book is clearly written and seems to contain all of the information necessary for a first-year grammar. My only complaint is that, to the best of my knowledge, there is no answer key for the book. So if you are planning on self-study, this would not be a good choice.