Writing Biblical Hebrew

Since most verbs in Hebrew apply equally to humans and animals doing the action (including הלך, שׁתה, אכל), you might assume that the verb שׁכב 'to lie down,' would be the same. While working on the video that teaches שׁכב, I found some stock footage of a cow lying down and a horse lying down and happily included them in my video draft. Thankfully, one of my checkers pointed out that this verb doesn't seem to apply to animals, so I removed those clips before releasing the final draft. For animals lying down, you should use the verb רבץ. This is sometimes translated 'lie down' and sometimes 'crouch,' depending on the context. The evidence:  וְהִנֵּה־שָׁ֞ם שְׁלֹשָׁ֤ה עֶדְרֵי־צֹאן֙ רֹבְצִ֣ים עָלֶ֔יהָ (Gen. 29:2) ...and behold three flocks of sheep lying beside it... כִּֽי־תִרְאֶ֞ה חֲמוֹר שֹׂנַאֲךָ֗ רֹבֵץ֙ תַּ֣חַת מַשָּׂאוֹ  (Ex.23:5) If you see the donkey of one who hates you lying down under its burden... וַתֵּ֤רֶא הָֽאָתוֹן֙ אֶת־מַלְאַ֣ךְ יְהוָ֔ה וַתִּרְבַ

I'm embarrassed about this mistake, to be honest... always check The mistake I made:  In AwB lesson 60 when I taught the verb נָשַׁק 'to kiss,' I included a number of examples, all using אֶת־ for the object, such as: הַיֶּלֶד נָשַׁק אֶת־ אָחִיו - the boy kissed his brother הָאִשָּׁה נָשְׁקָה אֶת־ בְּנָהּ  - the woman kissed her son אַבְרָם נָשַׁק אֹתִ י  - Avram kissed me What I should have done:  הַיֶּלֶד נָשַׁק  לְ אָחִיו  - the boy kissed his brother הָאִשָּׁה נָשְׁקָה  לִ בְנָהּ  - the woman kissed her son אַבְרָם נָשַׁק  לִ י  - Avram kissed me The object of the verb נָשַׁק takes the lamed preposition, not אֶת־. The evidence: וַיִּשַּׁ֥ק יַעֲקֹ֖ב לְ רָחֵ֑ל  - Jacob kissed Rachel (Gen.29:11) וַיִּשַּׁ֥ק לָ הֶ֖ם - and he kissed them (Gen.48:10) וַתִּשַּׁ֤ק עָרְפָּה֙ לַ חֲמֹותָ֔הּ - Orpah kissed her mother-in-law (Rut.1:14) אֶשְּׁקָה־נָּא֙ לְ אָבִ֣י וּ לְ אִמִּ֔י - Let me kiss my father and my mother (1 Ki.19:20) And there are many more examples; the lamed preposition

If I had it to do over again, I would not teach לְיַד as the basic preposition 'next to, beside' in AwB lesson 6. Here's why: לְיַד occurs only 6 times in the text with a prepositional function. Of these 6, only 3 refer to a physical spatial location (1 Sam.19:3, Ps.140:6, Prov.8:3), while the other 3 refer to serving "alongside" someone in the context of assisting someone with duties (1 Chron.18:17, 23:28, Neh.11:24). From this tiny number of occurrences, it's clear that this word won't be very helpful for students who want to read the biblical text. (Moreover, the meaning of it is pretty easy to understand in context once a student is familiar with the word יָד. My use of לְיַד may have been due to unconscious influence from Modern Hebrew.) If I could do it over, I would instead teach the word אֵ֫צֶל, which also means 'beside,' and occurs over 65 times in the text. It's still not a very common word, but students will see it much more often in