Hello everyone. My name is Jack Love and I’ve been teaching Classical Hebrew, Biblical literature, and studies in ancient Hebrew and Aramaic literature since 1976.
I do have some academic credentials. I received a BA in History from the University of Wisconsin-Madison (1972), and an MA in Near East Studies from the University of California-Berkeley (1976). I’ve also studied for the doctorate at Hebrew University (Jerusalem) and the Hebrew Union College (Cincinnati). In 1978 I took a “temporary” detour from the doctoral degree to teach Hebrew at Lehrhaus Judaica in Berkeley, California.
My courses at Lehrhaus were popular beyond my imagination. For the basic course, I used a fabulous textbook developed by a modern master: Moshe Greenberg’s Introduction to Hebrew.
Professor Greenberg wrote this book with graduate students in mind. The Hebrew was a beautifully simplified version of four chapters in the Joseph saga taken from the book of Genesis. The English, however, is terse and difficult to understand unless you have a deep background in language and are comfortable with grammatical terminology. What that effectively meant was that my role as a teacher was something akin to being a translator of Professor Greenberg’s English.
After a couple of years of this I developed my own book. Professor Greenberg had relied on the outlines of Hebrew grammar that had been developed by his forerunners, specifically Gesenius and Kautzsch, and it seemed to me that this was a good path to follow. Therefore, my grammatical sections also followed the same time worn paths. The primary difference is that I assume nothing about my readers’ knowledge about grammar. Everything is explained as simply as I can figure a way to explain it.
In order to ensure that I did not trample on Greenberg’s territory, I selected the book of Ruth. And so I self-published Understanding Classical Hebrew: A Simplified Approach.
I tested the book on over 3,000 students who enrolled in my classes from 1980 to 1988. By the end of that period I was confident that the grammar was written in a way that most adult or college students could understand without coaching.
In 1988 I relocated to Ann Arbor, Michigan with my spouse and daughter. In 1991 a son came along. And with those family events, a need to earn a living that paid a bit more than I could receive as a Hebrew teacher. But I never left the love of the art of teaching Hebrew. For the last 23 years I have taught a wide variety of adult education courses at congregation Kehillat Israel in Lansing.
Hard to believe, but I’m retired now. I have the time to do a few things I’ve always wanted to do. One of those things is to continue to teach Hebrew. And since we now have this wonderful thing called the World Wide Web, I have an opportunity to reach many more people than I could have hoped to reach when I was tied to the geography of a single locale.
If I’ve managed to reach you I hope you’ll stick around and set a spell. If you have any questions about the topics I’ll be posting, please ask away. I can’t promise I’ll have all the answers. I can’t even promise you’ll like the answers I do have. But I can promise a full and fair treatment of your questions.
A friend of mine told me that she’d taken a class at Lehrhaus Judaica around 1990 which used a typescript of your book. She said it was a wonderful book, much better than anything she’d found anywhere else. I’m learning Biblical Hebrew now and I would love to be able to get hold of a copy of your book. (She would too, since her copy has fallen apart.). Is it available for purchase?
Dear Laura, thank you for the kind words. I am working on the 3rd edition of the book and I am willing to make it available at no charge provided that recipients agree to send their edits and suggestions back to me. If that is agreeable I will provide you with a link for downloading a copy. Best regards, Jack Love
Greetings, Jack!
I happened upon your link while attempting to find a download of Moshe Greenberg’s Introduction to Hebrew. I would like a download of your book as well.
Grace and Peace,
Louis
Jack, I lost my copy of your Hebrew lessons using the Book of Ruth.
How can I get a copy of your excellent presentation for beginning students?
Hi Jack,
I once had your Hebrew text from when you taught in Berkeley. I have gone on to use other texts but I would love to go back and read yours again as a refresher & as a reminder of my youth! Could you send me the pdf please.
Thank you,
Preston Grant
preston_grant@sbcglobal.net
Hi Jack!
I took your course every time it was offered, until you moved to Ann Arbor. I was there for Jonah, Ezekiel (plus intro to Aramaic), and much much more. And I enjoyed every minute of it. Among your students, I was usually the guy who knew the most Hebrew, but I needed reminders that Biblical Hebrew and Israeli Hebrew are not the same language!
How nice to hear from you after all these years! I don’t update this blog very often, but it’s certainly wonderful to hear from any of my students!
Dear Jack, I took your course in the early 90’s and still have the text. I’ve spent most of my retirement working on Greek
(now in Book 23 of the Iliad) and recently a member of the
Homer group (we’ve also done Virgil, Dante, some Occitan and other languages) asked if I’d like to study Hebrew with her. I showed her your book and she said it was far better than all the other ones she’d seen (one “simplified” one introduced the history of the matres lectionis in the 1st chapter). I can’t Xerox mine for her since it’s heavily annotated, and I wonder if you’d send us two copies, or downloads, or whatever. We’d be glad to pay for it, or the shipping, or to send you our comments.
We’d be very grateful.
Anne Winters
Hi Annie. If the email address on your account is correct (awinters) I’ll be happy to send you a PDF of the latest version of my textbook. Just corrected yet another typo today. There’s no charge for this, but obviously if you choose to print any part of it, that’s could cost you. I’m always delighted to hear from student of yore.
Thanks so much Jack. I learned so very much from your Lehrhaus course, but had to divorce, go back and do my doctorate, work full time, publish . . . Hebrew got lost, though I did take 1 local course in Skokie and learned to say hamburger in Hebrew. Yes the address on my account is right–awinters@ uic.edu. (I taught later at the University of Illinois at Chicago.)
If I print out one copy for the friend who’s studying with me, I’ll be glad to pay for it, just let me know how much.
Hi Anne! I replied via email.
I took a Hebrew course at Lehrhaus in Berkeley, sometime in the early 1990’s, and have used your book (Understanding Classical Hebrew: A Simplified Approach) for many years as a reference. It really is the best I’ve found for learning Hebrew.
Would it be possible to get a PDF copy of it? Mine has become a bit dog-eared over all these years. I’d be happy to pay and/or offer suggestions, as you mentioned. Todah Rabbah!
Hi Jacob. Check your email for your free update. 🙂
I’m constantly correcting typos and making improvements, so please let me know if you see something that needs correction or improvement.
— Jack Love
Jack,
My name is Tony Cooper. We were roommates at the University of Wisconsin-Madison during the summer of 1972. Our room mates were Steve Freedman and Sheley Falick ( I believe). We also worked with Vic Rodwin (a long time professor at NYU and also a researcher on major cities of the world) on the University of Wisconsin 1970 Symposium. It would be great to talk with you sometime.
Tony! How wonderful to hear from you! I’d love to get in touch–how about a Zoom session some time? Write me at my email address and we’ll figure something out: jackflove@loveleefamily.net