Ezrae Via Linguarum Classicarum

[Ezra]

Goals

Before I go to the main part of this post, I would like to talk about goals I pursue by learning Hebrew. I started my journey in classical languages in 2017. Having a lot of free time (I was out of a job back then) and having experienced a certain kind of a revelation, I decided to devote myself to studying of classical languages. My definition for a classical language to be learned is to be able to read unadapted literature I am interested in, and in case of Hebrew it means primarily Tanakh, mediaeval commentaries as well as philosophical and mystical works.

Method

I've written in another post that unlike in case of Latin and Ancient Greek, there are little learning materials for Biblical Hebrew. There are plenty of grammar textbook and grammars but next to nothing graded readers. A learner is expected to read a textbook and start translating. As my goal is to be able to read normally and not grammarly-translatively, I decided to go another route.

First, I studied Assimil's course for Modern Hebrew. It took me about eight months.

Second, I used an Anki deck for Biblical Hebrew to learn 1200 most common words.

Third, I read a book on Biblical Hebrew ("A New Grammar of Biblical Hebrew" by Frederic Putnam). At the end of the book he recommends a pre-reading technique, when one writes a grammatical form for every word in a sentence and then translates the said sentence. While it might seem a good idea to someone who do not mind to read Tanach only for a couple of decades or so, I decided right away that such approach is not for me. Instead, I employed a method I've read about in books about polyglots, that is: the parallel text method.

I started to read the Tanakh one chapter a day. First, I would read a verse, than I'd check its translation. In the beginning I had to check every verse but closer to the end of Torah my reading speed increased considerably and I memorized a lot of words, though I still have to use a dictionary quite often. Luckily, the language of Torah is quite simple for the most part (though poetical pieces were impenetrable).

Hard and easy

Overall, I can not say that Hebrew is hard for me. Unlike Japanese katakana, with which I still have problems until today and which proved to be impossible to learn using Anki, Hebrew script did not pose significant difficulties. Though there are some similar characters like ד‬ and ר‬ or ג and נ, I've already was trained by Japanese characters to discern small differences. Grammar as well, while being quite different to European languages, do not seem to be impossible to understand and actually simpler than Latin, for example. I'd say that in a certain way Semitic system of roots, binyanim and mishkalim is actually a very logical one. Still, there are certainly a lot of things that are unusual at first, and verb tenses show the mentality quite different from our own.

The main problem is a vocabulary. Biblical lexicon has nothing in common with European languages, so words are not easy to memorize. I do not use Anki now and rely mostly on words' repetition in the text.

Comparing to Latin, Hebrew is progressing significantly slower, though I am satisfied with the pace.

What is next

Some time ago I reached an important milestone: I finished reading the Torah. Obviously, next step is to continue reading the Tanakh (there are still 1100+ pages to read). I will continue using English translation as a way to check my understanding of difficult passages and as a quick dictionary if I am overwhelmed with a lot of unknown words. After the Tanakh I would like to try reading bilingual Hebrew-Latin editions of famous mediaeval Jewish works like Kuzari.

[Ezra]

Another important milestone has been passed. I have finished «Familia Romana»! The next step is to move on Latin readers, plenty of which I've downloaded from archive.org and other places.

In other news

I've become a student. Again. So I will have to juggle my available time again. It is going fine for now: as I am totally unable to study such fancy topics like Algebra and Calculus after work, I study them in the morning, having as a result an hour or two in the evening. And, obviously, I have plenty of time at weekends (though the main bulk is going to be devoted to A&C as well). I hope I will be able to secure 45-50 hours / month for languages, but we will see how it goes.

[Ezra]

Latin (34 ¼ h)

Latin is the leader of November! And a lot has happened. I have finished «Familia Romana» and started to read dozen(s) of readers I've downloaded from archive.org and other places. At first, the plan was to read all of them in progression from easier to harder ones, but I've ran out of steam pretty fast. After reading of «Cornelia» (psychedelic stories about American (?) girl, who, it seems, was driven to madness by Latin learning in school), «Julia» and half of «Carolus and Maria», I decided that I am done with readers and ready to advance to some real Latin. My choice was classic : «Commentarii de Bello Gallico» by Julius Caesar. This particular edition is from the series «Biblioteca Classica Latina» and features extensive notes in Latin as well.

Hebrew (18 h)

My Hebrew journey continues. I've finished reading the book of Joshua and continue to read Paul Jouon «Grammaire de l'Hebrew Biblique». And my Latin studies also proved their usefulness in this department: Paul Jouon frequently illustrates Hebrew grammar points with examples in Latin.

Italian (13 h)

In terms of effort involved, Italian progresses fastest of all. I've read 25 chapters of «L'italiano secondo il metodo natura», which took me 37 hours in total, and I already can read Wikipedia and get through non-fiction books. I wonder, when I will be able to read Japanese Wikipedia this fast? Speaking of Japanese...

Japanese (12 hours)

The end of my Danganronpa voyage is near. I've finished fifth chapter, and there is only one left to go. I am not sure what I will be doing after that. In the face of time scarcity challenges and general uselessness (for me) of Japanese, I thought about dropping it altogether, but, for now, decided against it. There is Danganronpa 2. I could continue by playing this one as well, but I am tired of this crazy blackwhite bear Monokuma and his plans to take over the world by making high-schoolers to kill each other. On the other hand, I've bought «Chrono Trigger» on Steam sale! Ah, «Chrono Trigger» and this version supports Japanese — a temptation too strong to be easily shaken off.

I also would like to do some proper study, so I have an idea to go through «A Dictionary of Basic Japanese» and write 5-10-20 sentences for every grammar point. In any case, this will, probably, have to wait until January.

French

It should be noted that Paul Jouon's grammar is written in French, so while I count reading it as "Hebrew", I actually exercise my French. I also played «Stellaris» for several hours in this language.

[Ezra]

December was a difficult month and not a very productive one. Still, I was able to devote a decent chunk of time to language learning.

Latin (20 ½ h)

I am reading Caesar's «De Bello Gallico» with commentaries in Latin as well, which are quite interesting and helpful. There are some (quite a few, actually) things I was not able to understand, so as soon as I am done with the first book of «De Bello Gallico» I will, probably, re-read it with parallel Loeb's translation.

Hebrew (15 h)

Judges is the Tanakh's book that is currently being read. A very interesting one and reminds me of the «Judge Dredd» movie. "One man is Judge, Jury, AND Executioner" or "One man is the law" are very fitting to this book and capture main plots of this book quite exact. I also started to read about verb system in Paul Jouon' grammar.

Japanese (12 h)

As I am nearing the end of Danganronpa, I devote more time to this game in hope to finish it as fast as possible. I was not able to finish it in December as I hoped but this is fine.

Italian (2 ¼ h)

Well, It seems Italian was mostly neglected this month. I've read 25 lessons out of 50 in «L'italiano secondo il metodo natura»; next step is to read other 25!

In the next post I will recapitulate the year 2018 and tell about my plans for 2019.

[avalon]

Ezra, I was a Latin teacher for nearly 20 years. I'd be happy to help you out occasionally with De Bello Gallico. Just post when you get stuck

[Ezra]

Summary for Year 2018

Let's start with language learning statistics for the past year. Stats might be little lower as my statistics for 2017 and beginning of 2018 was lost, but not too much off, as I started to collect it anew in February.

Latin (302 ½ h) — this project was started in February/March of 2018 and it took me about 280 hours to get an ability to read Caesar's «De Bello Gallico» (slowly and not without difficulties). I consider it was quite fast and had I not already happen to know two Romance language, I think it would take me 1.5-2 times longer.

Hebrew (184 ½ h) — past year I was mostly reading Tanach and made through to the Book of Judges using a parallel text method. I read first in Hebrew and then, if I have any difficulty with a verse, I look into translation. Sometimes I use a dictionary, though I mostly prefer the translation to save time.

Japanese (270 h) — whoah! I was sure I was neglecting Japanese for the most part, but it actually took the second place! Most of this time was spent on playing Danganronpa, and while at first this game was very hard (my game alter-ego was just standing all the time, having no clue on what's going on, desperately trying to understand what other characters were saying), it has become easier with time, though I still have to look unknown words, as well as already forgotten, pretty often.

Italian (39 ½ h) — I've started Italian in August as I need a reading ability in it to use the best textbook for Ancient Greek «Athenaze» and some other materials in Italian for learning Ancient Greek. It is also a very important and useful language for Classical and Renaissance studies.

All-in-all, the year was quite productive in classical languages' department, and I am happy with progress made.

Plans for Year 2019

Latin — my first goal is «De Bello Gallico». After that there are number of options: some mediaeval historical chronicles, written in more or less simple Latin, «Legenda Aurea», and also bilingual texts. For example, I found on archive.org a bilingual italian-Latin edition of «Historia de duobus amantibus» (The Tale of Two Lovers) written by Pope Pius II as well as Hebrew-Latin edition of «Kuzari».

Hebrew — I would like to read entire Tanach in 2019 and it seems doable. I will also continue to read Paul Jouon' grammar.

Japanese — the plan is to finish Danganronpa in January. After that I think to devote about ten hours a month to «Dictionary of Basic Japanese» and get though it during 2019. But before I able to conclude how realistic this goal is, I have to gather some stats for a month to measure my speed.

Italian — it took me about 40 hours to get through 25 lessons of «L'italiano secondo il metodo natura». I need to make a dash and finish other 25.

Now for other languages which I would like to start.

Ancient Greek — this is the third language I need in order to complete my Trifecta of Absolutely Necessary Classical Languages. My intention is to start learning it somewhere in summer 2019, as I will have exams in May and can not start new time-heavy projects like this until that time.

German — I feel I need a reading ability in German: not only the second-best textbook on Ancient Greek written in this language, in addition there are numerous books on Classics and Classical languages (in expanded meaning — not only Latin and Ancient Greek, but Arabic, Persian, Sanskrit, Hebrew, Aramaic etc.) My preliminary estimation is that it might require 150-200 hours, and I am not sure I am able to allocate this time for now. Maybe in summer or, more probable, in autumn 2019.

A lot depends, of course, how other, non-language related things will play out. I moved into another apartment to live alone for a time being, and while there should be less distractions, I will have to think about things I would prefer to delegate to someone else . So, we will see how this year will turn out.

[Ezra]

I finished Danganronpa! Almost two years of black-white bearish craziness are over! It took me more than 400 hours versus 40 hours in English. I am not sure was it wise investment of my time, but overall I am glad I have done it. Japanese takes a back seat until June, though I will try to devote 5-10 hours a month for "A Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar". Latin and Hebrew will continue to be a focus of my studies for a while.

[Ezra]

Ok, it is already a month as I am living alone in my freshly renovated apartments. It seems, my moving out did not help too much to optimize my time-management. If anything, it seems I spent January less efficient than I hoped. On the other side, living alone (not with parents, friends, a woman) gives some benefits and much more flexibility in setting the way you spend your time.

Well, now let's move to month's statistics.

Latin (17 h)

I had almost finished a first book of «De Bello Gallico», when I suddenly decided to change my approach . I remembered that during studying French I used the parallel-text method. Before moving to reading unadapted text using only a dictionary when needed, I read two novels with parallel english translation. It worked quite well, so I've decided to do this for Latin too. So currently I am reading «De Bello Gallico» and Seneca's Epistolae using Loeb edition.

Hebrew (22 ½ h)

I am nearing the end of Samuel I. A very interesting book, just as the previous ones. From time to time I check other books, and, it seems, vocabulary is one of my main problems. But I still has about thousand pages to read in Tanakh, so it still has time to improve before I move to reading without using parallel translation.

Japanese (21 h)

Uff, I have finished Danganronpa. Finally! And at least until June I am done with black-white bears.

Italian (5 h)

Continuing with «L'italiano secondo il metodo natura».

Wanderlust

I spent some time thinking about other fascinating classical languages that I would like to learn after Ancient Greek (oh, this is not going to be easy). Classical Arabic is tempting, and it opens a path to Persian. Classical Chinese is scaringly magnificient, but requires learning Mandarin as well. And there is always Sanskrit.. So many extremely hard classical languages, so little time..

[Ezra]

Latin (15h)

I am reading «Epistulae morales ad Lucilium» using parallel-text method. I also found an interesting book which I able to read without parallel text (and there is no such thing for this book). It is Erasmus' «Colloquia familiaria», which contains quite a lot of fictional conversations in Latin and was written specifically for Latin-learners. There are also a number of others colloquias on Vivavarium Novum.

Hebrew (9h)

I continued to II Samuel. Hebrew is becoming easier, and it seems to positively affect my understanding of its modern variety.

Italian (4h)

Not much but enough to keep my Italian from falling back. Continuing with the same textbook.

Japanese (40 min)

Well, Japanese is surely neglected Let's wait for June to come...

[Ezra]

Well, I've spent 32 hours this month playing XCOM . The only thing I can say in my defense is that I played it in Italian . There are couple of things I noted.

First, it seems that learning several languages at the same time -- an eternal debate topic among language learners -- has an advantage in that even if one does not actively learn one of the languages in the learning list, it still slowly improves in the background. I certainly neglected my Italian since January -- buy somehow when I started to play XCOM it did not give me noticeable difficulties. I also was not diligent with my Latin this month as well, still when I picked up Erasmus' Colloquia to continue reading, it was easier than the last time I was reading it.

Second, it seems that my Itailian is up to the job it was supposed to be learned for: I looked at Athenaze's preface and it does not seem to present any difficulties in Italian department. No, the Greek project is not to be started in April or May (those months will, probably, even less language-learning-centric than March) -- September is more likely. But I've got an idea for summer project: what if learn enough German to read Zuntz' Greek textbook (which is the second best)? I have "German for Reading" and a couple of ninetenth century books in vein of natural method. Might be worth a shot .

P.S. By the way, I like XCOM much more in Italian than in original English. The latter is somewhat bland, while Italian voice add more to the intense environment of the game.