Interesting find in Jerusalem

Archaeologists digging on the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem have found a 3000 year old handle bearing the name Menachem in ancient Hebrew script.

Check out the entire article, with a picture of the ancient writing, here.

Modern Hebrew

As part of my effort to become more proficient in production of biblical Hebrew, I have embarked on the study of modern Hebrew. I am using Rosetta Stone in this effort. This helps me to hear, see, and produce Hebrew, even if it is not biblical Hebrew.

I am very impressed with Rosetta Stone. Through the COHELET project, I have come to have some understanding of Second Language Acquisition (SLA) theory and methodology, and it is interesting to see how Rosetta Stone incorporates those theories into its approach.

Hopefully, this will help prepare me for my time in Israel!

A Worthy Cause

A former student of mine, Bryan McInnis, is planning his own trip to Israel next winter. Bryan has ambitious plans for using his experiences there to support and strengthen the local church.

Please check out his video description of his plans at jerusalemexperiement.com. And please consider supporting him in this venture!

Getting Ready...

My trip to Israel will begin in a little over a month (June 18). Some of you have asked what, exactly, I'll be doing. So, at the risk of boring some who know this well, here's the deal.

For the last couple of years, I have been involved in something known as the COHELET project. The COHELET project, as you can see from the link above, seeks to apply the insights from the study of Second Language Acquisition (SLA) and apply them to the study of biblical Hebrew. In short, it seeks to teach biblical Hebrew in the same way that a modern language (such as Spanish or German) would be taught. Rather then emphasizing memorization of paradigms and "decoding" of a text, the communicative approach of the COHELET project seeks to emphasize the communicative nature of the language. So, students produce in the language (biblical Hebrew), rather than simply study it as an artifact. The goal is to help students become the best readers and interpreters of the Old Testament that they can be. They can best achieve that through learning the comunicative function of the language, primarily through production.

The experience at Bethel over the last two years has been phenomenal. Students have made more progress in reading Hebrew more quickly (and with more enjoyment) than I would have thought possible. They are measurably more capable than their counterparts who were taught in the traditional approach to the language. Anecdotally, they seem to retain more and actually use Hebrew after they have completed their grammar courses.

My experience in the COHELET project has completely changed my approach to teaching Hebrew. I am convinced that it is the most effective way of helping people learn to really read Hebrew and be independent interpreters of the text.

Unfortunately, I was not taught this way myself. The learning curve for me has been incredibly steep as I have had to learn to produce in biblical Hebrew in order to teach this way. While the work I have done has been tremendously rewarding (I find myself improving as a reader of the text as a result of shifting from a "decoding" to a "reading" approach), I need to be better at this if I am going to be able to be effective in teaching this way.

So, I will spending 4 weeks at the Biblical Language Center just outside of Jerusalem. A COHELET project design team member, Randall Buth, conducts biblical Hebrew immersion courses at Kibbutz Tzuba. There, I will be a student in a course and have opportunities to observe how beginners are taught via this method. My prayer is that I will be more effective in reading, interpreting, and teaching the text of the Old Testament as a result.

I hope to be posting frequently from Israel and keep any interested readers up to date on how things progress there.

An Observation from Numbers 11

I was reading Numbers yesterday, and was struck by a particular passage. In chapter 11, the Israelites complained about not having any meat to eat, but only manna. (They even reminisce fondly about the good food they had in Egypt, noting that not only was it good, it was also free! Strange to contemplate the "benefits" of slavery in that way!) After they complained, Moses goes to God, who says he will provide them meat (they won't be happy about it, but that's another story for another time). Moses then wonders how this will be possible.

In response, God says ‏ היד יהוה תקצר ("Is the hand of Yahweh short?"). What struck me was the total assurance that comes from this question. God's hand is never too short to accomplish what he intends to do. He is, rather, all-powerful and sovereign, and able to do exactly what he intends to.

So, when I am uncertain about the future or anxious about something, I will remind myself of God's question to Moses ( ‏ היד יהוה תקצר). Lord willing, I'll be able to trust in the "long hand" of God!

"Gospel" and Culture

One of the things that has engaged me a great deal over the last couple of years, both personally and professionally, is the staggering degree of conformity to culture that I see in the evangelical church today.

I came across this article today at Evangelical Outpost, and found it to be provocative and thought-provoking. An excerpt:

One famous Evangelical pastor has recently made popular the phrase, “deeds, not creeds.” Evangelicals have their doctrine right, this pastor tells us, they just aren’t living it. Against such sentiments, Dr. Horton argues that many Evangelicals actually do not have their doctrine right, or at least they aren’t preaching it correctly. Evangelicals have confused the important categories of Law and Gospel, turning the Gospel message (which is supposed to be the good news of something that Christ has already done for us), into the Gospel program. If you’ll only live out the Gospel (by reading your Bible every day, joining a certain group at church, and learning how to be a Christ-like example to others), you’ll be healthy, wealthy and wise. The question to be answered is, “What would Jesus do?” rather than, “What has Jesus done?” But Horton says that this is a confusion of categories. The Gospel, by its very nature, is not something that you can do; rather it is something that has already been done. This confusion leads to bad preaching.

Read the whole thing!