Try your German conversation skills. Please try to keep it simple.
Use the “Comment” section below, bitte.
Neue Thema
Meine Vorväter kommen wohl aus Alte Schwente (Klicken Sie bitte für Photos) in West-Preussen. Aber es gibt heute wirklich keine West-Preussen und keine Alte Schwente. Die kleine Stadt heißt jetzt Swiete, eine polnische stadt. Woraus kommen Ihre Vorväter?
This page has the following sub pages.
Theological German/Theologisches Deutsch 
Okay, ich werde probieren, etwas einfach zu schreiben. Bitte, entschuldig mein schlechtes Grammatik. Mein Mann hat heute ein interessante Frage gelesen: Warum finden die Unglaubiger die Kirche unattraktiv? Was koennen wir tun, ein besser Wilkommen zum Unglaubiger darzustellen (= to present)? Wie koennen wir es machen, ohne vergleichen (= compromising) die Warheit von die Gute Nachricht?
Eine gute Frage! Vielen dank.
Ich denke, daß das ganz Kirchekultur für die Unglaubiger sehr fremdling ist. Wir brauchen sie hilfen, das Kultur zu verstehen, aber ich nie mehr ohne Wortbuch schrieben kann, und mein Wortbuch ist nicht hier. 😦
Sollen wir die Unglaubiger die “Kirchekultur” lehren, oder sollen wir die Kirchekulture veraendern? Das ist die Frage von die “Emerging Worship” (erscheinende Anbetung?) Gruppe, z.b. Donald Miller und Rob Bell. Personlich, ich finde viel Gute in die “Emerging Worship” Ideen, aber es ist auch wichtig dass wir vergessen nicht woher wir kommen. Tradition hat noch einen Rolle in unser Anbetung, aber zu viel Tradition verzweifelt die Unglaubiger.
Judy Redman has a good tip on how to type the German characters, such as Umlaut, in a comment (click here).
I am a beginner at German and a friend introduced me to your website. I hope to do PhD work in next year, and need to get going on my German. I am currently taking an online course with Goethe, but it doesn’t deal with theology and is a bit difficult to comfortably begin. I am looking for a textbook and or any other good materials for beginners; can anyone suggest good resources for my German introduction?
Blessings,
Dan
Welcome Dan,
My few suggestions are on the “Reference” page (click at the tab at the top of this page.) Goethe may be a bit difficult for beginners, but he will deal with some philosophical and theological issues.
Anyone else have any tips for Dan?
Also, I recommend working through the Moltmann interview posts that were recently posted here, and then listening to the audio–or doing it simultaneously.
Perhaps Dan is talking about a course with the Goethe Institute, rather than just about reading Goethe?
I can’t help with a textbook since I learned German first at school a long time ago, but any reasonable German course should give you the necessary grammar and it’s then a matter of learning the theological vocabulary, obviously ideally along with the more everyday words. I find that my Concise Oxford Duden dictionary has most of the words I need to know for my theological reading.
The thing that trips me up at times, though, is frantically looking through my dictionary for a noun, not being able to find it and then discovering that it’s actually the name of a person or place, not just an ordinary noun. Now, when I can’t find the word in the dictionary, I try googling it and I often find that there is information about a person or place that makes sense in the context.
Well Dan, was Judy right? Did you mean the Goethe Institute? That makes more sense–I didn’t pay close enough attention to the pronoun “with.”
I have recently bought several grammars for review from a used book store. Some are pre-reunification, so the cultural notes and maps are a bit dated–but the basic grammar is the same.
Since I’ve studied several languages, I don’t need a lot of explanation about (e.g.) what the genitive case does, what is a participle or gerund, etc., so the little Schaum’s Easy Outlines is quite helpful for me. I’m sure there are other books like that. I also have a couple of older books from the “Teach Yourself . . .” series; one is a German course, the other is a reference grammar; and I do find the explanations in there to be very clear.
I attend a weekly Stammtisch (“standing table” or conversation group) at a local coffee shop, and find that helpful. My smiling and nodding skills are coming along nicely.
Dan:
If you become a scholar, you will be reading German the rest of you life! So, you might as well really learn it.
I recommend the “Rosetta Stone” program. It is a bit costly, but works better than any other method. You will learn to speak as well read and write. Saving that, you ought to take a German class at the university or a junior college. You could also buy a copy of the German program that PBS produced for use by high schools and colleges. I think it is called “Guten Tag!”, but I am not sure.
Barry Lillie
Bakersfield, CA
Thanks Barry,
I second the motion. You won’t learn the specialized vocabulary of theology from a regular course, but I think the feel for the language, the grammatical usage, conversation and writing are important. You can keep coming back here, or use Helmut Ziefle’s book, for vocabulary.
As I look at all the responses above written in German I would to suggest, as a teacher of theological German, that you work harder to remember the gender of nouns so that your grammar will reflect these and read more naturally. This is the test of really understanding and comprehending what is going on in German literature, documents or even Scripture. Having lived in Germany and Austria for 11 years, it was important for me to live and work in the German language on a daily basis. Then I returned to the USA and got another degree in German. But that’s my story…to understand the cultural context is urgent, to learn theological German from a test-passing standpoint alone, I think, would be missing out on a tremendous life experience.
Meine Eltern–und, ja, ich auch–kamen von Ungarn nach den Vereinigten Staaten. Auf dem Wege, aber, verweilten wir fuer mehrere Jahre in Deutschland, zuerst in Tirschenreuth, in Bayern, spaeter in Baden Baden. Meine Familie, aber, auf Seite meines Vaters, stammten von der Gegend die heutzutage Baden-Wuerttemberg ist, sind dann im 16., 17. Jahrhundert nach Ungarn “ausgewandert.” Damals und bis ungefaehr 1850 nannten sich unsere Vorfahren “Doerner,” als sich aber Ungarn von der Oestereichischen Monarchie trennte, wurde der Name veraendert um die Familie zu magyarizieren, sozusagen. Meine Frau kam von Deutschen Siedler in Polen (Lodz). Meine aelteste Tochter wurde in Deutschlang geboren waehrend ich dort in der Amerikanischer Armee beschaeftigt war; sie lebt in Amerika; unsere zweite Tochter, die in Kansas City zur Welt kam, lebt heutzutage in Paris und ist dort eine Hebamme. Ich bezeihnete unser Herkommen als ein grosses Durcheinander. Als wir diese Sache einmal unserer juengstein einmal zu erklaeren versuchten, sage die Kleine: “How lucky that we all met in Kansas City.”
Get it? Good.
Arsen Darnay,
Interessant! Auch Meine tochter in Kansas City geboren war. Sie wohnt aber jetzt in New York.
Mark
I learned Deutsch thirty year ago, in my senior high school of a small town in East Jave, Indonesia. I feel like starting it all over again….. Wish me luck, peace !
Hi, I’m translating a systematic theology by Marquardt and am often confronted by phrases and especially word plays that I struggle to translate. Is there a forum where I can post the phrases and get feedback? Thanks!
I haven’t had much luck getting this site to be interactive. Quite a few people read it, but not to many make comments. I haven’t been too active the last couple years in creating new posts–I hope to get back at it this summer. I would be glad if people would use this page as such a forum.