A number of people have expressed their interest in the Aramaic classes that are offered over at Aramaic Designs, but that the price (in this economy) has been prohibitive.
Because of this a new class is in development that should be ready in the next couple of months that will be on the topic of the Aramaic Lord’s Prayer. The basic information at this time is as follows:
ARC010: The Aramaic Lord’s Prayer
Duration: 8 weeks (~2 months)
Enrollment: Rolling (you can enroll at any time)
Price: $50Current Syllabus: (subject to change, but probably close to this)
- What’s So Special About The Lord’s Prayer?
– Context & History
– The Prayer in Greek- A (Brief) History of Aramaic & the Language of Jesus
– An Introduction to Aramaic & its Alphabet
– The Aramaic of Jesus- The Syriac Peshitta Lord’s Prayer
– An Introduction to the Peshitta
– The Peshitta Lord’s Prayer- Other Syriac Lord’s Prayer Traditions
– The Other Syriac Traditions and Their Relation to Each Other
– Old Syriac, Harklean, etc.- Scholarly Reconstructions of the Lord’s Prayer
– Reconstructing the Words of Jesus
– The Jesus Seminar
– Individual Scholarly Reconstructions (Jeremias’, Fitzmeyer, Chilton, Brock, etc.)- Modern Aramaic Traditions of the Lord’s Prayer
– The Plight of Neo-Aramaic
– Neo-Aramaic Examples (Neo-Assyrian, Ma`loula, etc.)- Odd Translations of the Lord’s Prayer
– An “Aramaic” Imagination
– Notable Odd Translations (Ouseley, Lamsa/Errico, Douglas-Klotz, etc.)- Conclusions, Thoughts & Final Paper
– Aramaic and Prayer
– Greater Historical Context
– Final essay on any topic covered in the class, or other topic subject to professor approval (~500-1000 words).
All who are interested or wish to have more information, please email in to Information@AramaicDesigns.com.
Peace,
-Steve
Steve – how is the course conducted? If people are living around the world in different time zones, will that work?
The course is conducted entirely through modified Moodle courseware, so students can access the material (be it the audio lectures, quizzes, tests, vocabulary building exercises, etc.) at any time they need to, regardless of their time zone.
Interaction between students is via live chats (for immediate communication) as well as email and forums, and every week there will be virtual office hours where the professor is logged on to the live chat specifically for going over any pressing questions and to help the students one-on-one.
Of course if there are any scheduling problems or whenever a student needs further help, something can be figured out with the professor.
The goal of these courses is to make learning different dialects and quirks of the Aramaic language as reliable and accessible to as many people as possible, so as the audience grows and new situations crop up, I plan on modifying the courses to better fit the needs of the students.
It’s going to be a heck of a lot of fun. 🙂
Peace,
-Steve