Twenty Questions with Brian Webster

Brian Webster’s new Hebrew grammar is making lots of noise. We saw Brian present the CD-ROM portion of his grammar at SBL a few years ago. Unfortunately, he was only teasing us as the book and CD had not yet been released by Cambridge UP. But its out now and folks seem to be loving it. Brian agreed to answer twenty of our questions, so without further ado, here you go.

1. Where are you from? Where did you grow up?
I grew up in the southwest part of Columbus, Ohio.

2. Why biblical studies? Does confession/faith have anything to do with it?
Faith is an essential part. I consider the Bible to be God’s word. It is essential to who I am and I want most to serve the larger faith community through my scholarship.

3. Why biblical Hebrew?
My focus on Hebrew was partly an issue of timing. If I had had Professor Hoch before Professor Roland, I might have gone the New Testament route.

I had taken three years of Greek and was studying both Hebrew and the history and culture of Israel with Leon Roland. He had done archaeology in Israel and really got my interest. The next Fall I applied to Hebrew Union College, because it was one of two places with his highest recommendation. In the Spring, however, I wrote a paper on the structure of the book of Hebrews, which my New Testament professor, Carl Hoch, said could be the core of my dissertation, if I went the New Testament route. I was on track to go to Hebrew Union and had enjoyed Ugaritic and Aramaic. Maybe if I had worked more with Dr. Hoch first I would have ended up in New Testament, and knowing a dissertation topic from the beginning might have meant finishing earlier.

4. Can you tell us about your education? Where and under whom?
I did an Ancient Languages major with a Religion minor at Cornerstone University in Grand Rapids, MI. I started Seminary during my last year of college, and took classes at Grand Rapids Theological Seminary and Calvin Theological Seminary. At Calvin I was fortunate enough to study the Psalms with John Stek, who edited for the NIV and was superb at what he called the architectonics, or stanzaic structure of the Psalms. At Hebrew Union I studied mostly with Alan Cooper, Samuel Greengus, Stephen Kaufman and David Weisberg, but also with Herbert Brichto, Isaac Jerusalmi, and Matitiahu Tsevat. Dr. Jerusalmi was the most influential in marking the way I approach Hebrew morphology and Dr. Kaufman on the way I view syntax. I benefited from Drs. Greengus and Weisberg in Akkadian, Sumerian, and history and culture of the ancient near east. A combination of Drs. Stek, Cooper, and Kaufman influence my ongoing work in the Psalms and the verb in Hebrew poetry.

5. What are you currently teaching and/or researching?
I mainly teach Hebrew Grammar, Hebrew exegesis, Hebrew Reading, and Akkadian.
My research focuses on poetry, the Psalms, and the verb system. My SBL paper last Fall in the Hebrew and Linguistics section was on “Stative Verbs in the Psalter” (given jointly with Jill Zwyghuizen). My next paper will be on the perfect verb in Proverbs, arguing against the common supposition that many perfect verbs in the Proverbs are general presents. I’m also researching the Psalms for my forthcoming commentary.

6. Do you do Greek as well?
Yes, I taught Greek for 9 years when I taught undergrad at Cornerstone. Greek is fun too. I use colors when I teach the languages. I used to call Greek an 8 color language, while Hebrew is a four color language–based on the pedagogy I developed for each. I hope to write a first year Greek Grammar as well.

7. What’s your biggest struggle with first year Hebrew students?
When they don’t do homework. I have cures for many struggles with Hebrew. But when students simply have not studied, there’s little I can do.

8. You’ve written an introductory Hebrew grammar and its already getting much praise. Congrats. How did the book come about?
It’s a case of providence and thanks to my department chair, Bob Chisholm. I was working on some of the basic ideas that are in the project. (In fact I had tried unsuccessfully to pitch the interactive CD concept for a Greek Grammar a couple years earlier.) But my department chair had a conversation with someone from Cambridge Press, during which he was asked if he knew anyone interested in writing a Hebrew grammar. Bob referred them to me. And obviously they liked my pitch. The first sample of the moving graphics that I showed them was pretty sketchy compared to the final product, but it was apparently enough (along with a recommendation from Bill Arnold from Asbury, who hadn’t seen the sample but believed in the concept).

9. What introductory text did you use before?
I’ve used at least Kelly, Seow, and Pratico and Van Pelt. I found that if the Grammar was organized around the stems, and I would pause from the book part way through the year to focus on the conjugations, students would say they wish the book did it that way. Also if the Grammar was organized around the conjugations, and I would pause from the book part way through the year to focus on the stems, students would say they wish the book did it that way. This only proved that it is valuable for students to have the occasion to look at the paradigms from more than one direction. With all of them I thought that they made too many rules about changes in forms.

10. Who is the audience of your grammar (any more specific than simply first year Hebrew students?) and what goals, if any, do you set out for those who take up your grammar?
Certainly the first year Hebrew student is the primary audience, but I hope that it is helpful for the those trying to learn on their own and in a variety of class settings and those wanting to review. The goals are to learn basic Hebrew forms and their meaning, to learn enough (or more than enough) vocabulary to use A Reader’s Hebrew Bible (Zondervan, 2008) profitably, gain a useful perspective on how to use syntax books, and glimpse how the Hebrew bible is great literature.

11. What tools do your second year students use? Any plans on new second year material in a similar vein as your grammar?
They use syntax books like:
Arnold and Choi, A Guide to Biblical Hebrew Syntax.(Cambridge, 2003), Chisholm, From Exegesis to Exposition: A Practical Guide to Using Biblical Hebrew, (Baker, 1998) and William’s Hebrew Syntax. (Toronto Press, 2007) revised by Beckman, Brotzman, Ellis R. Old Testament Textual Criticism: A Practical Introduction, (Baker, 1994).

I have no contract for second year material. There are a couple of chapters in the Grammar that focus on seeing the drama in Hebrew narratives, based on things like the nature of the clause structure and turning that into the “camera language” of modern movies as a way of describing the stories. It’s sort of a way to use discourse analysis to inform public presentation of the stories. It also pays attention to pausal forms to influence the public reading of scripture. I’m developing that material further in another class and hope that the approach will someday be useful for second year courses and for preachers.

12. Reviewers have said that your grammar employs both inductive and deductive learning. How would you characterize the pedagogical style of your book? Is there anything you’re reacting against or a pedagogical hole you feel needs filling?
With other texts, I was frustrated that obvious similarities in the language were not emphasized. For example, when a Grammar presents the pronoun in the order of 1st, 2nd, then 3rd persons, but the verb in the order of 3rd, 2nd, 1st persons, it prevents the students from comparing the independent pronoun to the endings of the perfect conjugation. There were several things like that could be capitalized on, but weren’t.

Also I was heavily influenced by the approach of Dr. Jerusalmi at HUC. He taught basic syllable principles that governed how words were formed. Everyone in the class would have these “ah-ha” moments as things we had formerly studied by rote suddenly seemed to fit into simple patterns. So the grammar adopts his approach and covers syllable principles in chapter 2, which are used as a foundation throughout. Part of why he could simplify things so much for us came from taking hold of the fact that the Masoretes did not consider vocal shewa to be a syllable. Modern linguists might debate that, but if vocal shewa is not treated as a syllable, that little tweak can make a tremendous amount of vowel length changes seem very simple. Grammatical historians might point out that certain kinds of vowel reduction are quite late in Biblical Hebrew, and that Jerusalmi’s approach works because it enables the student to focus to ignore certain late vowel reductions and focus on a linguistic level that has a lot of uniformity. But in any case, there are far, far fewer principles to learn for the forms to make sense. That doesn’t mean that every student finds it to be as easy as pie, but it is easier to have fewer rules.

I’ve also been very conscious to make as much use as possible of comparisons within the language and make sure the students have as many pieces as possible already in place when they come to new material. Then by incorporating the moving graphics that computers are capable of, I can help the students visualize it better than ever.

So, for example, the pronoun and the verb give the persons in the same order. The students have learned the independent pronoun before covering the perfect verb. And in TekScroll, the relevant part of the pronoun (for first and second persons) or the noun (for third persons) moves out of the pronoun and over to the verb stem to make the form. Then the practice translations incorporate a number of verses where the pronoun occurs with the verb form. When we read them aloud it helps to further reinforce that the new thing we are learning isn’t totally new, we already know part of it.

The reason I consider it both inductive and deductive is that while it has the lists of forms (deductive) it includes immediate practice. They don’t really learn the perfect forms by memorizing the list, per se (though they can if they want, and I do make them write the paradigm on quizzes – right next to the pronouns and noun forms). Primarily they learn the perfect forms by saying, “hey look, you pretty much know these already, let’s practice.”
Another pedagogical “hole” was filled by having bunches and bunches of practice and exercises, all carefully coordinated with the vocabulary that students are already supposed to have studied. I find it counter productive for students to have to learn a new list of vocabulary words in order to start do exercises. I want to go right to exercises in class and work on real Biblical text as much as possible.

The CD changes a lot. I teach from the CD and use the book for reference. The CD helps the students know what they have to focus on. There are things to know and things to know about. The book tries to be very complete for a first year grammar, and indicates that some things are “for reference,” something to know about, that you can refer back to. TekScroll really emphasizes the core of what we need to get reading the latest Bible passages for practice.

13. Weak and irregular verbs are always a struggle to make clear to beginners. How do you approach the task?
The tags that we use are “ID Badge” and “Aliases.” The strong verb has a pattern sometimes called a stem distinctive, principal part, or other terminology. We call it the ID badge. The weak verbs usually modify this as a combination of weak consonant behaviors and syllable principles. The students are to learn the ID badges solid. The changes in weak verbs are explained as repetition of basic phonological principles. And a “cheat sheet,” the Alias Profiles, serves as a point of reference. It takes the relevant vowels from the weak verbs and coordinates them with the ID badge that was modified into that form by the weak consonants and syllable principles. Currently I let the students use the Alias Profiles on exams, though I may also ask them to explain why a certain ID badge changes into a particular Alias. Again TekScroll helps us out by moving the ID badge into a weak root and making changes. For example, a first guttural root will receive the ID badge for a Niphal imperfect, the guttural will make the dagesh bounce out and it lands next to the hireq under the prefix, thus lengthening it to a tsere. When the students practice parsing in TekScroll they can click for certain hints, one of which shows the relevant pattern to help them recognize the stem. It’s another way to make students focus on the right part of the verb to figure out  its identity.

14. How do you do vocabulary with your first year students?
The CD that comes with the textbook includes a program called TekScroll which has a vocabulary component among other resources. The vocabulary section is basically a flashcard interface that includes audio. The program allows students to review randomly and to kick out the words they get right and keep in the words they get wrong. I sometimes also divide the students into small groups to think up hints to share with the rest of class. Also the practice translations in TekScroll as well as in the Workbook (also on the CD) only use vocabulary from previous chapters. So after we cover grammar, we can immediately start translating as in class practice. The practice translations in TekScroll use the most recent vocabulary a minimum of three times each.

15. Your grammar comes with a CD-ROM that seems to be just as popular if not more popular than your actual text. What’s on the CD? How did you make it? How do you envision its use?
The CD includes the program TekScroll, the workbook, the answer key to the workbook, paradigms (in color PDFs) and paradigm tools, and various vocabulary tools. I’ve tried to overemphasize the CD to Cambridge Press by saying you are not selling a book which happens to come with a CD, you are selling a CD which happens to have a book with it. We’re thinking outside the book on this project.

Having the workbook on the CD saves the students money as does having printable vocabulary cards. I was happy to see that Cambridge priced it very competitively as compared to other grammar texts. But beyond that students do not have to buy another workbook or vocabulary cards. Everything is included in one package. On the other hand I don’t like language textbooks that have the (few) exercises printed right in the main textbook. I want them to have their handwriting right next to the printed exercise to make easy to point things out.

The main thing, however, is TekScroll. I used Macromedia Flash to create TekScroll. Flash enables the moving graphics and a use of color which would be very costly for print media. TekScroll, which runs on both Macs and PCs, contributes four main things: grammar illustrations, practice parsing, practice reading/translation, and a vocabulary program. Most of these I have mentioned in answering the other questions. The grammar illustrations highlight the most important elements of the chapter and use color and moving graphics to emphasize various elements. The practice parsings provide immediate feedback including directive hints as well as answers. The practice readings drill recent vocabulary and relevant grammar. (Since we predominantly use Bible verses, sometimes the practice readings are lopsided toward vocabulary review, whereas the translation exercises in the workbook will get more of the ones that drill on the grammar concepts.) Also, at chapter 17, we add parsing items to the practice readings, so that students are parsing from context. Finally the vocabulary program allows students to select vocabulary in lists by chapter, by frequency in the Bible, and by part of speech (verbs, nominals, and other) and then to review them randomly, with or without audio pronunciation of the words. It also let’s them decide whether to keep words in their virtual stack and can compile all the ones the missed (i.e. decided at some point to keep in rather than leave out) into a new list to review. It does not, however, write any files to your computer to use again in a new session. Maybe we can add that feature later.

As I’ve said elsewhere, I teach from the grammar illustrations in TekScroll, then use it in class to have students practice parsing and translation. I also frequently divide them into groups and have them work with TekScroll in class, sort of like a lab. They do collaborative learning and I circulate around them room to answer questions or give pointers.
There are also vocabulary flash cards that can be printed out (two sizes) and a list of the vocabulary by frequency. The vocabulary program includes words used 50 or more times in the Bible. Since not all programs require that much vocabulary, we wanted to make it flexible. So there’s also a reference sheet that includes that the words from the grammar chapters that occur from 50 to 100 times (two sides of one page). If a professor wants to only assign words used 100 or more times, or 75, or 63 or more times, the students can select them easily in TekScroll and then use the reference sheet while doing homework for the vocabulary they were not assigned to learn.

The paradigms are in color on the CD which makes it easy to emphasize affixes and ID badges (stem distinctives), at least for those not color blind. There’s also a handy one page strong verb reference sheet and forms for students to practice writing paradigms.

16. How much technology do you use in your day-to-day work? What place do you think technology should occupy with biblical language students, particularly first year students? Any Bible software preference?
I’m definitely a fan of Accordance. It enables complex searches with an easy interface and doesn’t require learning codes. I use it a lot to assemble data and check out various constructions that would bear on interpretive issues. Regardless of the program, you have to know something about syntax and word studies in order to maximize their benefit.
For a minimalist approach, see Lee Fields’ Hebrew for the Rest of Us. He tries to teach students what certain grammatical forms can mean and allow the computers to do the parsing. This can help students follow the discussions in commentaries and is all that many pastors may actually do. For that goal it’s a great text.

Still I prefer students to have some reading speed and to be sensitive to the storytelling in Hebrew, not just to exegete. I also think the to really be able to evaluate the discussions in commentaries or differences in modern translations, one needs to be reading Hebrew texts and be able to design good searches based on identifying the elements that need to be considered. Generally, that’s beyond the scope of a first year grammar.

17. Does your grammar have any particular linguistic bent to it? Do you?
I suppose I gravitate toward discourse analysis and a little bit toward role and reference grammar, but these do not have a great effect on learning forms. The phonological principles from Dr. Jerusalmi influence the grammar pedagogy. One area that is emphasized more than in many other grammars is the category of stative verbs. Aktionsart must be considered along with form and syntax to ascertain the nuance of the verb.

18. Any publications in the pipeline?
I’ve just finished a short book on the Psalms for Zondervan, The Essential Psalms Companion, due out the end of this year or the beginning of next. I have 69 articles in the forthcoming Baker Illustrated Bible Dictionary. And I am starting a four volume commentary on the Psalms for the Zondervan series, Hearing the Message of Scripture.

19. Are you reading anything at SBL this year in New Orleans?
Not this year at SBL. I’ve read at the last two and hope to have a paper (or article?) on the use of the perfect verb in Proverbs for next year. The folks at ETS have invited me to come serve on a panel about Hebrew grammars this year, which is right before SBL in New Orleans.

20. What do you do when you’re not working?
When I’m not teaching or writing, I spend time with my family. We homeschool, and though my wife takes the greatest share, I handle some of the subjects. My wife and I enjoy walks, I jog, the kids love the neighborhood pool. I just started coaching my daughter’s soccer team (I played varsity soccer throughout high school and college). My wife and I are the youth group leaders at our small church in Rowlett, Texas.

Much thanks to Brian for his time. Check out his grammar.