February

The course is designed to meet specific training needs of Translation Consultants and CIT. It focuses on strengthening both the skills in reading Hebrew Bible and in translation\consulting practice. During lessons the students will learn to analyze and recognize the grammar forms, particularities, and constructions of the Hebrew text. Simultaneously they will study the typical problems and underwater stones the translators and consultants usually meet in various translation projects. Special attention is paid to a number of difficult places of the Hebrew Old Testament and to the most reliable decisions for such cases accepted by majority of biblical scholars. The students also will become acquainted with the basic conceptions of the textology of the Hebrew Bible first of all in terms of the using of this knowledge in translation procedure. In the practical classes the students will act as translators into their mother tongue and as Translation Consultants in turn, discussing with each other the problems and difficulties that emerge both in translating and consulting. During the course some basic language tools and advantages of the Paratext program also will be explained for the students.

Once a week, the students will study a sub-module called “The Masoretic Text and its Features” (taught by Itai Kagan). In these lessons, the students will be introduced to the history of the Masoretic Text, its unique position vis-à-vis other textual traditions, and the various paratextual signs surrounding the text in both manuscripts and printed editions. The students will learn the system of the Tiberian cantillation marks (also known as accents) for the 21 “prose” books of the Hebrew Bible, with special focus on the syntactic information they contain and their effect on exegesis and translation.

Dates: February 1 – March 1               Credits: 3

Instructor: Luka Manevich, with assistance of Itai Kagan

March

In this course we will study the structure of meaning of Biblical Hebrew from a cognitive linguistic perspective. We will analyze the Hebrew texts of the Old Testament and look for the semantic structure behind the individual words. Rather than basing ourselves on existing dictionaries, which are strongly influenced by philology and etymology, we will let the Biblical text speak for itself wherever possible, and look for semantic patterns among the linguistic elements. We will study the difference between lexical meanings and contextual meanings and assign semantic domains to them. We will discover together how a study of Biblical Hebrew poetry helps us reconstruct the different cognitive frames and categories that must have existed in the minds of the speakers of the language. We will study Hebrew metaphors and discover how different semantic domains can be mapped onto one another. Finally, we will discover how the semantic structure of the language can be used to establish the meaning of words in cases where the context provides insufficient handles for doing that.

COURSE GOALS:
Students will learn how to do a structural semantic analysis of Hebrew key terms, using contemporary linguistic methods and rely less on traditional dictionaries that are often built on a defective lexical analysis. This new methodology should lead to better insights in the meaning of these terms and how they related to the worldview of the ancient Hebrew speakers. Students will also learn to work with new software that is currently being developed and helps facilitate research of the Hebrew Bible.

Dates: March 1 – March 3           Credits: 3

Instructor: Dr. Reinier de Blois

By Zoom in February and March, and Continued Live in Israel

Utilizing a variety of second language acquisition strategies, students learn to internalize the knowledge of Biblical Hebrew morphology (word structure), syntax (sentence structure), lexicon (vocabulary), and discourse (text structure). Methods and/or tools employed include: Total Physical Response (TPR), biblical and non-biblical stories, story-based dialogues, songs, games, substitution drills, reading and gradual discovery of grammar in BH texts. The course emphasizes learning Hebrew by regular exposure to, and use of, BH, and therefore encompasses listening, speaking, reading, and writing. The goal of the course is to improve the internalization of Hebrew and the reading fluency in Biblical Hebrew, especially narrative texts, with limited recourse to reference materials.

Dates: February 1 – March 31          Credits: 6

Instructor: linguist Eyal Nahum

April/May

This course will explore the Land of the Bible: its geography, history, cultural settings, archeology and the nature of the land. Special emphasis will be given to the annual seasons in the nature, especially the insights gained from it regarding the Biblical feasts.  Weekly lectures and field trips will illuminate the extra-textual information in the Bible, providing greater insights to understanding the context of the Biblical text.  The 15 fieldtrips throughout the land with Hebrew Bible in hand will elucidate the texts and enable to understand the text more clearly and translate it more accurately.

Dates: April – May, alongside the other courses.           Credits: 6

Instructors: Bob Carter, Dr. Halvor Ronning, Ronit Maoz, and other academic guides and visiting lecturers.

May

In this course, students will learn how to analyze the ways in which Biblical Hebrew narrative texts are structured. It's not just what is said – it’s how it is said that matters! We will concentrate on participant reference, the verb system, default and marked word order, as well as the effect of text structure on non-chronological arrangement and paragraph division. We will compare narrative with dialogue and other genres, such as found in prophetic texts. Longer stretches of narrative texts, like the Samson and Balaam narratives, will be among the texts studied during the course. Participants will learn more about how they can help teams to translate biblical texts while fully respecting what is expressed by the discourse features in the Hebrew text. We will analyze, then, how Biblical Hebrew texts, in particular narrative texts, are given structure by linguistic means (the verb system, participant reference, word order patterns) and how these features make a text coherent. But we will also look at texts from a literary perspective, exploring time, point of view and the buildup of plot in them. Translation consultants will especially benefit from the course. While we go through the modules we will reflect on how we might be able to (help translators to) express the functions of all these features in the target language when we translate.

COURSE GOALS:
Participants will be able to analyze a range of linguistic and literary features in Biblical Hebrew texts in terms of their contribution to the coherence of the text. They will be able to reflect on the implications for translating biblical texts into target languages which are different from Hebrew. They will be familiar with recent developments in Hebrew discourse studies. Translation consultants will be equipped to apply this knowledge in their work with translation teams.

Dates: May, alongside Living Biblical Hebrew         Credits: 3

Instructor: Dr. Lénart de Regt

June

This is a practical course. It aims to give students an increasing appreciation of how Hebrew poetry works and to help them develop their skills in unfolding the layers of meaning embedded in the artistry of many Biblical poems. We will study multiple poems – in context and in Hebrew! These poems have been selected because they are variously interpreted, and we will discuss which interpretation is most likely. We will ask whether poetic structures and devices point to significant meaning connections in the poem. We will explore the Biblical world of the poets and their original audiences as well as other kinds of context. Classes will demonstrate how to analyze and synthesize a wide variety of biblical poems and students will practice applying these principles and procedures to assigned Hebrew poems

Dates: June          Credits: 3

Instructors: Murray Salisbury

A. RESIDENT OPTION: The all-inclusive cost is $6000*

1. application fee for Hebrew University.
2. tuition for all six courses.
3. health insurance for students of Hebrew University.
4. room and board for three months.
5. all study trip fees – including travel, overnights and entrances to museums and archeological sites.

It does not include individual personal expenses and books. Advise for private pocket money: $100 per month.

*subsidies and scholarships are available, reviewed by a special committee