Customer Reviews

Webster's New World Hebrew Dictionary : Hebrew/English-English/Hebrew (Transliterated)

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

I found this dictionary to be of no use in my learning Hebrew. I was attracted to this dictionary because the format and fontsize suggested that my eyes would not suffer the fate of the old Persian miniature painters while using it. However, its primary (and critical) failing is that if you are trying to translate a Hebrew word whose pronunciation is unknown to you, you are really out of luck. You have to guess at several different transliterations; this can be a very lengthy chore, sometimes without reward. If your only need is to translate from English to Hebrew, this is indeed a very nice dictionary. But if you need to translate words in Hebrew to English, get another dictionary.

This dictionary disintegrates almost from day one. Because of its thickness, the pages soon separate from the spine, necessitating the use of rubber bands to hold it together.

The time when this dictionary is most helpful is when you HEAR a Hebrew word, don't know what it means, and have no idea how to spell it. That's when I turn to the Hebrew-English section, that is based on the way the word sounds, and I look up the word. Once I know the meaning and the correct Hebrew spelling, then I turn to my Rav-Milim all-Hebrew dictionary to reaffirm the pronunciation and to learn how to use the word properly in a sentence.

Other than its propensity to fall apart, another major problem with this dictionary is that it lacks the standard vowel markings (nikudot) that any student of the Hebrew language needs to know. It also sometimes fails to explain some of the subtle nuances of usage that can keep you from using the word incorrectly. In my opinion, a person who uses Webster's New World Hebrew Dictionary exclusively is like a person who never progresses beyond counting on his fingers.

So, upon further reflection, if I could change my original rating for this dictionary, I would rate it 4 stars because it CAN be useful in certain situations. However, I would never recommend it to a person who intends to rely on just one dictionary. It is best used in conjunction with one or two other good dictionaries that contain vowel markings, thorough definitions, PLUS sample sentences in which the word is used.

I agree with Alexis. The good point (why it has two rather than one star) is that the font is large. A plus for someone like me who misplaces his glasses.

WNWHD features the main word entry in transliteration, not actual Hebrew script. But although transliterations are just fine there are two big problems. First, transliterations can be non-standard and confusing---they should have used an symbol for symbol of every consonant and vowel-point as most of us use in biblical Hebrew. But worse than this, and second, is that when reading Hebrew you will be seeing either consonants (as in most modern Hebrew publications) or vocalized (i.e., with vowel-point/niqqudim) and that's what you'll want to look up in a dictionary. You want to be assured by seeing the direct correspondence between the word you are reading and the one you look up. For some beginners, this means do all the funny symbols look exactly the same in both??

But in this dictionary you have to know how the word sounds, then compare to their transliteration, and only then do you see the actual Hebrew characters. This seems unnecessary and convoluted.

After some practice you can "get the thing to work." But the approach may be revolutionary to some, but bass ackwards to me. ;-)

I found this dictionary nearly useless. The Hebrew words are transliterated, so if you want to look up a Hebrew word you have to guess how it might be spelled with English letters -- a very time-consuming chore. When I used it to translate from English to Hebrew, my Israeli instructor just laughed at the words they gave.

Having shopped just about every bookstore on the West Coast and purchased several other Hebrew/ English dictionaries, and several on learning Hebrew, I can -- contrary to some reviewers -- recommend this book strongly.

Nothing else comes close in the ease of use, clear print, grammer, and pronunciation guides. There is no other book I have seen which comes close to being as useful, a fact the other reviewers fail to note.

Perhaps that's a sad statement on the lack of popularity of learning Hebrew for adult readers, but it's true. I do agree, however, that you need other books to learn Hebrew. A dictionary is not the best choice for that.

Despite the other negative reviews, in my opinion this is a very good dictionary, and have no trouble in recommending it as your first choice amongst Hebrew/ English dictionaries.

Everyone has noticed the problem: Romanized transliteration is confusing. Someone else made the excellent recommendation: learn the alef-bet (and the pointing system) and use a real dictionary.

Now that I am more familiar with written Hebrew, this dictionary has become more utile. It provides excellent instructions on pronunciation of Hebrew words. It is also handy for identifying a word that I have only heard spoken: I can just look up the transliterated word to find the meaning and the correct alef-bet spelling.

This dictionary has given me what I haven't found elsewhere: the stressed syllable, the actual pronunciation of the schwa, lots of inflectional details.

Unfortunately typos, omissions and errors in the alphabetical order abound. The funny translitteration makes can make it difficult to find words encountered in written text.

I give a high rating because the good stuff to me by far outweighs the negatives.

For those of us still getting used to spelling in Hebrew, this is a great help because the words are transliterated.

I presumed, that I would be able to find thousands verbs that start from lee... (infinitive), but found just no more then 50-60. I was unable to find such words, like "leerdof", "leez'of", "leez'om", and hundred others. I was able to find "leerdof" only from another part of book, when I was looking for tranlsation of english word "follow".

I believe this book is very unusefull for anyone.

OK, so you see an (unpointed) word in a newspaper and you want to look it up in this dictionary. You have to know how it is pronounced to find it quickly. Otherwise you slog through different sections. "Let's see, is that first syllable 'lo', or 'lee', or 'la'... Never mind. Buy a pointed dictionary and skip this one unless you already know the language