The Third International Summer School on Hebrew Studies and Semitic Philology

July 27, 2018

The Third International Summer School on Hebrew Studies and Semitic Philology, which is the continuation of the International Certificate Academic Program for Hebrew and Biblical Studies, will take place at the National University of Ostroh Academy from July 16 to August 5.

This year 16 lecturers from Ukraine, Germany, Jerusalem, Turkey, Russia, and the U.S. will teach 53 students from Ukraine, Belarus, Poland, Italy, and Russia. The participants of the school – students, lecturers, translators, researchers, and scholars – are going to learn different languages: Biblical Hebrew, Akkadian, Aramaic, Arabic, Syriac, Mandaean, Kurdish, Sabaen, etc.

"The aim of our project is to introduce specialists in different fields, who deal with history, philosophy, and philology, to the ancient language learning so that they will be able to work with the text independently. Learning such specific things as languages, which are required for reading the archaic texts, should be accessible to everyone," says Dmytro Tsolin, Director of the Center of Jewish Studies at the National University of Ostroh Academy, Associate Professor, PhD in Philology (Dr. hab).

The schedule of the summer school comprises two parts: core language courses and additional lecture courses. The former encompasses the courses that will continue for three weeks, and the latter encompasses the short courses on the different problems of Semitic philology.

There are both those who learn a difficult language for the first time and those who have the basic knowledge of Hebrew studies and Semitic philology among the participants of the school.

"This year I have come to the summer school for the third time. I would like to continue learning ancient languages. I teach Polish at an Italian university, and learning Biblical Hebrew is my hobby because I have always wanted to read the Bible in the original," says Emiliano Ranokki, the participant of the school.

Oleksandr Ivaniuta, who studies philosophy in Kyiv, has come to the Summer School on Hebrew Studies and Semitic Philology for the first time. Regarding the language learning, he says,

"I have come here for the first time to learn Arabic, which is very different from the Indo-European language family. If a person faces this for the first time, it is very hard to learn such a language, but it is possible. We mostly work on our own. It usually takes 8–10 hours to process the complicated material and prepare for the next class. In the future, I am going to translate the texts by the late Arab Aristotelianists into Ukrainian."