- Proto-Hebrew: The language developed from a common Canaanite ancestor, with the earliest written records appearing around the 10th century BCE.
- Biblical Hebrew: This period, spanning from roughly 1,000 BCE to 3rd century BCE, is when the Hebrew Bible was written. Spoken Hebrew was common, though there may have been differences between the spoken and written forms.
- Decline in spoken use: The Babylonian exile in 587 BCE marked a turning point, as Aramaic became more prevalent. Hebrew continued to be used for religious purposes, but it largely disappeared as a vernacular language.
- Mishnaic Hebrew: This form was developed around 200 CE and is the language of the Mishna. It was a literary language used for religious study, and while it shows some linguistic changes from Biblical Hebrew, it was not a commonly spoken language.
- The original Hebrew alphabet was similar to other Canaanite scripts.
- After the Babylonian exile, the Jews adopted Aramaic square script (Ashuri script) for their holy texts.
- Ancient Hebrew lacked written vowels. A system for indicating vowel sounds was developed by Jewish scholars around the 8th century CE, which became the basis for the written Hebrew we know today.
Hebrew is a Northwest Semitic language within the Afro-Asiatic language family. A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages, it was natively spoken by the Israelites and remained in regular use as a first language until after 200 CE and as the liturgical language of Judaism (since the Second Temple period) and Samaritanism. The language was revived as a spoken language in the 19th century, and is the only successful large-scale example of linguistic revival. It is the only Canaanite language, as well as one of only two Northwest Semitic languages, with the other being Aramaic, still spoken today.
The earliest examples of written Paleo-Hebrew date to the 10th century BCE. Nearly all of the Hebrew Bible is written in Biblical Hebrew, with much of its present form in the dialect that scholars believe flourished around the 6th century BCE, during the time of the Babylonian captivity. For this reason, Hebrew has been referred to by Jews as Lashon Hakodesh (לְשׁוֹן הַקֹּדֶש, lit. 'the holy tongue' or 'the tongue [of] holiness') since ancient times. The language was not referred to by the name Hebrew in the Bible, but as Yehudit (transl. 'Judean') or Səpaṯ Kəna'an (transl. "the language of Canaan"). Mishnah Gittin 9:8 refers to the language as Ivrit, meaning Hebrew; however, Mishnah Megillah refers to the language as Ashurit, meaning Assyrian, which is derived from the name of the alphabet used, in contrast to Ivrit, meaning the Paleo-Hebrew alphabet.
Hebrew ceased to be a regular spoken language sometime between 200 and 400 CE, as it declined in the aftermath of the unsuccessful Bar Kokhba revolt, which was carried out against the Roman Empire by the Jews of Judaea. Aramaic and, to a lesser extent, Greek were already in use as international languages, especially among societal elites and immigrants. Hebrew survived into the medieval period as the language of Jewish liturgy, rabbinic literature, intra-Jewish commerce, and Jewish poetic literature. The first dated book printed in Hebrew was published by Abraham Garton in Reggio (Calabria, Italy) in 1475. With the rise of Zionism in the 19th century, the Hebrew language experienced a full-scale revival as a spoken and literary language. The creation of a modern version of the ancient language was led by Eliezer Ben-Yehuda. Modern Hebrew (Ivrit) became the main language of the Yishuv in Palestine, and subsequently the official language of the State of Israel.
Estimates of worldwide usage include five million speakers in 1998, and over nine million people in 2013. After Israel, the United States has the largest Hebrew-speaking population, with approximately 220,000 fluent speakers (see Israeli Americans and Jewish Americans). Pre-revival forms of Hebrew are used for prayer or study in Jewish and Samaritan communities around the world today; the latter group utilizes the Samaritan dialect as their liturgical tongue. As a non-first language, it is studied mostly by non-Israeli Jews and students in Israel, by archaeologists and linguists specializing in the Middle East and its civilizations, and by theologians in Christian seminaries.
Etymology
The modern English word Hebrew is derived from Old French Ebrau via Latin, from the Ancient Greek hebraîos (Ἑβραῖος) and Aramaic 'ibrāy, all ultimately derived from Biblical Hebrew Ivri (עברי), one of several names for the Israelite (Jewish and Samaritan) people – or the Hebrews. It is traditionally understood to be an adjective based on the name of Abraham's ancestor, Eber, mentioned in Genesis 10:21. The name is believed to be based on the Semitic root ʕ-b-r (ע־ב־ר), meaning 'beyond', 'other side', 'across'; interpretations of the term Hebrew generally render its meaning as roughly "from the other side [of the river/desert]"—i.e., an exonym for the inhabitants of the land of Israel and Judah, perhaps from the perspective of Mesopotamia, Phoenicia or Transjordan (with the river referred to being perhaps the Euphrates, Jordan or Litani; or maybe the northern Arabian Desert between Babylonia and Canaan). Compare the word Habiru or cognate Assyrian ebru, of identical meaning.
One of the earliest references to the language's name as Ivrit is found in the prologue to the Book of Sirach, from the 2nd century BCE. The Hebrew Bible does not use the term Hebrew in reference to the language of the Hebrew people; its later historiography, in the Book of Kings, it is referred to as Yehudit (יְהוּדִית, lit. 'Judahite').
 |
| amazon link |
In the midst of modern day Middle East politics, very few give any consideration to the miracle of Israel’s “rebirth” as a nation. But even among those who do acknowledge this phenomena, an even lesser number can recite the major players in Israel’s rebirth and there is one of those players whose role has been for the most part relegated to obscurity: Eliezer Ben Yehuda.
The political entity that was once “Israel” was not simply a nation; it was a people. And this people had, among their various ethnic and community ties, a language that had been essentially dead for the previous 2,000 years. Eliezer Ben Yehuda, at great cost to himself and almost single-handedly, resurrected and established again the language of Hebrew to the Jewish people. Author Robert St. John has deftly and expertly interwove the personal story of this humble man with his great accomplishment. . .that literally cost him his life.
For historians and patriots alike, this is a must read.
This book is a jewel. It has been out of print for over 20 years and it's almost impossible to find an unused copy. I bought a 1957 edition at Amazon which was in amazingly well preserved. Regarding the book, the author exposed the Hebrew language with a historical perspective and linquistic framework in a scholarly manner which does not bore. Highly recommendable. - AnonThis classic work on the history of Hebrew is rich with fascinating information about the development of the Hebrew alphabet, the ways in which Hebrew borrowed from neighbouring languages and its remarkable period of dormancy as a spoken language and subsequent revival. Surely one of the definitive works on the history of a language ever written. Trivia fans may note that its author, William Chomsky, was the father of the distinguished linguist and controversial political activist Noam Chomsky. - Anon
Excellent review of linguistics, history and development of Hebrew from an expert in the field. Some of the material is very technical for the casual reader. An excellent starting place to study the history and development of Hebrew. Obviously a lot has changed in the world since 1969, but it remains a solid piece of scholarship. - Anon
* * * * *
The Linguistic History of Hebrew:The Canaanite Dialect that became the Language of the Bible
What Mesopotamian texts influenced the Hebrew Bible? Dr. Joshua Bowen from@DigitalHammurabi joins us to compare ancient Near Eastern literature - including the Atrahasis, the Code of Hammurabi, and other Mesopotamian myths - with the biblical text. We explore textual dependence, shared motifs, internal tensions, and what these parallels reveal about the Bible’s development.Check out Digital Hammurabi: / @digitalhammurabiDr. Bowen explores:- How to think about textual dependence- What kinds of Mesopotamian texts influenced the Bible- What questions you should ask about the Bible's use of other textsResources & Links- ETCSL (The Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature) https://etcsl.orinst.ox.ac.uk/- ORACC (Open Richly Annotated Cuneiform Corpus) https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/- "Learn to Read Ancient Hebrew: An Introduction for Complete Beginners" by Joshua Bowen https://tinyurl.com/4wesyc72- "Before the Muses: An Anthology of Akkadian Literature" by Benjamin Foster (for Akkadian literature): https://tinyurl.com/5ejcen64- "The Harps that Once...: Sumerian Poetry in Translation Paperback" by Thorkild Jacobsen https://www.amazon.com/Harps-that-Onc...- "The Literature of Ancient Sumer" https://www.amazon.com/Literature-Anc...- "Myths from Mesopotamia: Creation, the Flood, Gilgamesh, and Others" by Stephanie Dalley https://www.amazon.com/Myths-Mesopota...
- Part I - Foundations: The Birth of the Sacred
- Essay 1 - Animism and the Living Cosmos
- Essay 2 - From Tribe to Totem
- Part II - The Age of Gods
- Essay 3 - The Mesopotamian Fertile Crescent
- Essay 4 - Egypt, Indus, and Minoa Sacred Cultures
- Essay 5 - From Polytheism to Henotheism
- Part III - Axial Awakenings
- Essay 6 - Ancient Israel, Persia, and Monotheism
- Essay 7 - India's Axial Age
- Essay 8 - Greece and the Birth of Reason
- Part IV - The Sacred Made Universal
- Essay 9 - The Age of Universal Religions
- Essay 10 - Modernity and the Eclipse of the Sacred
- Essay 11 - The Rebirth of the Sacred
- Part V - Conclusion of Series
- Part VI - Supplementary Materials
- 1 - The Ancient History of Mesopotamia
- 2 - The History of Language in Ancient Mesopotamia
- 3 - The Ancient History of the Hebrew Language
- 4 - How the Ancient Near East Gave Shape to Israel's God:
- Why the ANE is Essential for Israel's Received Theology (I-II)
- Affecting Cultic Syncretism Across the Ancient Near East (III-V)
- Cultural Identity Formation & the Rejection of Syncretism (VI-IX)
- 5 - The History & Compilation of the Hebrew Bible:
- From Oral Memory to Proto-Canon (I-II)
- Exile, Redaction, and the Birth of Scripture (III)
- Second Temple Scribalization to Canonization (IV-V)
- 6 - The Unhelpful Oxymorons of "Biblical Authority" & "Inerrancy"
- 7 - The Evolution of Inerrancy: From Ancient Plurality to Modern Certainty
- 8 - A Historical-Theological Study of "Son of Man" vs "Son of God"
- 9 - The Song of Gilgamesh & Other Ancient Flood Stories
- 10 - Isaiah as a Living Textual Tradition: Manuscripts, Variants & Transmission
- 11 - From Scroll to Scripture: Bible Versions, Variants & their Histories
No comments:
Post a Comment