Thankfully, you, don’t have to understand Hebrew or be a scholar in order to read your Bible. But somebody does have to do this work. Someone has to sweat through the original languages and work with a team of others to bring the original into your native tongue.
What this means is that it isn’t necessary, but you are receiving your information second-hand. That is certainly okay. And it’s probably arrogant to think that if I give a little bit of time to learning the original languages, I’ll be able to read them just as effectively as those who have given their lives to understanding the various nuances. There are ways in which we should rely upon second-hand information. Though he is talking to specifically to pastors, I think these words of John Piper are correct:
“Another result when pastors do not study the Bible in Greek and Hebrew is that they, and their churches with them, tend to become second-handers. The harder it is for us to get at the original meaning of the Bible, the more we will revert to the secondary literature. For one thing, it is easier to read. It also gives us a superficial glow that we are “keeping up” on things. And it provides us with ideas and insights which we can’t dig out of the original for ourselves” (Piper, Brothers We Are Not Professionals, 83).
If Piper is correct, and I think he mostly is, then what this likely means is that many folks are getting third-hand information. Again, that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. But it could be. Misinformation could easily be spread this way. It’d be helpful to at least learn enough to know what you don’t know.
My goal today is to share with you six Hebrew words that might be helpful for you to know. But my goal is to merely whet your appetite and encourage you to consider studying the original languages for yourself. These are in no particular order.
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