The following "Elements of Syriac Grammar" are intended for the assistance of those students who are desirous of extending their studies to the Syriac (Aramaic) language. This is easily accomplished in consequence of the close affinity which exists between Syriac and Hebrew. The Syriac (Aramaic) language supplies one source of valuable information for the criticism of the Hebrew Bible.

By an examination of a Hebrew word as it is used in this language, essential service has been rendered in elucidating many difficult and important passages of Holy Writ, and it has been the constant practice of commentators to have recourse to Syriac whenever the text of the Old Testament fails to establish satisfactorily the significance of a word. In such case, every person allows that a reference to Syriac is one of the legitimate means to be employed in determining the sense of a passage, and although this language is inferior to Arabic in the extent and variety of its literature; it is nevertheless superior as regards its much more intimate connection with the original language of the Bible.

But the great claim as it appears to me, which the Syriac has on the attention of that class of persons for whose use this book is intended, consists of the Syriac New Testament. The high antiquity of this version and its use in the early Syriac Church stamp an importance on it which can be assigned to no other, and if these circumstances be added another, that the Syriac language is so nearly the same as that spoken in Palestine in the first age of Christianity, that by many persons it has been termed the vernacular language of our Lord, it must be allowed that the Syriac New Testament possesses a value inferior only to that which belongs to the original.

From these remarks it will obviously appear desirable that the Bible scholar should acquire a knowledge of the Syriac language. In the execution of this book, I have consulted the Grammars, which have been published in Germany during the last fifty or sixty years, as well as others of a more ancient date. I have endeavored to be simple in the arrangement, to account for the vowel changes and the various inflexions of words, by the operations of a very few principles, and to exhibit in a concise form the general structure of the language. How far I have succeeded in these matters I leave for others to decide.