A Reference Grammar of Modern Hebrew (review)

Hebrew Studies 47 (2006) 457 Reviews the careful work of a colleague, who—while being trained in Europe—is making a contribution to biblical studies in Asia. I hope that more of this academic interaction will be forthcoming in the future and that mainstream publishers will provide opportunities for scholars from Asia, Africa, South, or Central America to present their original contributions to the larger academic community. Gerald A. Klingbeil Adventist International Institute of Advanced Studies Theological Seminary Silang, Cavite, Philippines gklingbeil@aiias.edu A REFERENCE GRAMMAR OF MODERN HEBREW. By Edna Amir Coffin and Shmuel Bolozky. Pp. xiv + 447. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005. Cloth, $90.00. Paper, $39.99. A Reference Grammar of Modern Hebrew is designed “to teach about the language and to give readers a reference tool for looking up specific details of the language” (preface). This descriptive grammar is organized according to universal structural categories. The discussion focuses on a combination of normative language and common use, with occasional notes pertaining to the classical language embedded in the account of contemporary language use. Both authors are veteran teachers, and the book is largely based on their experience in teaching Hebrew to English speaking students and on research work in Hebrew linguistics. The authors are thus well positioned to produce a work that addresses the long-felt need in the field for a reference work of this scope. The detailed discussion, rich with examples, takes the user from individual words to noun and verb phrases, noun and verb systems, and finally to an essential chapter on language in context, in which sample discourse is applied as a contextual framework for topics introduced in the earlier chapters. Five appendices, including verb, noun, and particle charts and basic rules of punctuation and plene writing, and an index of grammatical topics complement the grammatical discussion. Hebrew grammatical terminology, included in the book with the aim of facilitating “students’ use of Hebrew language textbooks” (back cover), can be particularly useful for instructors, many of whom practice or are trained in the United States and are more likely to be familiar with the English terminology. The visual presentation is clean and precise, pointing to the meticulous preparation of the manuscript and to the serious attention given to formatting . The production of such a complex bi-directional document involving Hebrew Studies 47 (2006) 458 Reviews vocalized Hebrew in a camera-ready format is a formidable task, and rare slips like the font size switch in twnrytm on page 9, or the underlined space in example 3 of section 13.4.4 and elsewhere, are negligible. The contrast between the color and brightness of the paper and the print is optimal, making the reading of the very dense manuscript easy as can be under the circumstances—any attempt to use a larger font face in Hebrew or to spread out the text would have resulted in a book that is at least double in size and prohibitively expensive. The intended audience, according to the authors, includes non-native speakers who study the language, native speakers who seek a comprehensive coverage of Hebrew grammar, instructors of Hebrew, students and scholars of Biblical Hebrew seeking to understand the contemporary language, students of linguistics, and the general public interested in Hebrew language and culture. Writing with such a varied audience in mind is a luxury that authors of reference works can rarely afford. Combined with a lack of careful editing for consistency and clarity, this approach detracts from the value of a work that would have otherwise been unequivocally praiseworthy. The lack of clarity in the discussion, resulting from catering to a broadly-defined audience, can be illustrated with the indirect object, the definition of which is indirectly noted in section 3.7: “There are verbs that have to be complemented by objects, and when these objects are not direct, they have obligatory prepositions, which link them with their objects” (p. 51). Getting past the ambiguous “they,” the user is left to deduce that an indirect object is a prepositional object, a term that is relatively more intuitive for a non-linguist and could have been used instead. For a linguist, this broad use of “indirect...