Hebrew

History of the Hebraic language

Proto-Hebrew

The Letters of Amarna, or of Such-Amarna, are an Egyptian diplomatic correspondence of before our era, that is to say approximately seven centuries before the written setting of the first book of the Bible (at least according to the critical modern biblist, which fixes the first drafting of the Deutéronome under the reign of Josias, at the end of before our era, but undoubtedly on the basis of older tradition).

Certain letters come from Canaan, future the promised land of the Hebrew . They are written in Akkadien, the language of diplomacy of the time. But they include/understand many words and expressions of the west-Semitic languages spoken in Canaan. One finds linguistic parallels there striking with Hebrew of the Old Testament, which indicates that the dialectal proto-Hebrew shapes were spoken in Canaan before the installation about the Hebrew themselves (the letters do not mention Hebrew, except perhaps in the form of the Apirou , population badly identified whose name has a possible relationship with “Hebrew”).

But beyond these linguistic indices, the form of this or these proto-Hebrew (X) remains vague. One can however notice that the old dialects Phénicien S (current Lebanon) known are very similar to old Hebrew, so much so that one can speak about geographical forms of the same language, which thus seems to be spoken (with regional alternatives) about the Phénicie (current Lebanon) to Canaan (current Israel). Biblical Hebrew thus comes, of one (see several) these dialectal geographical alternatives.

One millenium later, the phenician of the colonists Carthaginian still strongly resembled Hebrew, in spite of a geographical and historical divergence already old.

Biblical Hebrew

Hebrew is the language of the Hebraic Bible (He dir=rtl texte= '' תנ " ך '' trans= '' tanakh ''), of the Mishnah and the majority of the Books apocryphal books (He dir=rtl texte= '' ספריםחיצוניים '' trans= '' sefarim hitsoniyim '') and of the Handwritten of Qumran (He dir=rtl texte= '' ספריםגנוזות '' trans= '' sefarim guenouzot '') discovered in the caves of the desert of Judaea between 1947 and 1956.

In the Bible, in particular in the first book, the Genesis (He dir=rtl texte= '' בראשית '' trans= '' Bereshit ''), in the chapter 14, verse 13: one finds He dir=rtl texte= '' אברםהעברי '' trans= '' Avram ha' ivri ''), it is about Abram before he becomes Abraham (He dir=rtl texte= '' אברהם '' trans= '' avraham ''), but the text does not mention any de la the spoken language by this one and its descendants. Of aucuns think that the Hebrew term would come from the expression He dir=rtl texte= '' מעברלנהר '' trans= '' me' ever la-nahar '' (on other side of the river) which indicates the origin of Abraham.

The text of the Hebraic Bible of use in the printed editions or the rollers of the Torah to the Synagog is called text massoretic (He dir=rtl texte= '' מסורת '' trans= '' massoret '' meaning transmission ). Its drafting is the fruit of a work of several centuries, since the time of the kings ({{- S mini|VIII|E}} century before the Christian era) until that of the Maccabées (delivers of Daniel, 167 before the Christian era), of which it is difficult to establish the various stages.

Biblical Hebrew is a religious language, undoubtedly slightly different from the spoken language by the population. One finds there indeed primarily terms being able to be used in a religious context. One thus noticed a certain poverty of the biblical language: the Bible does not comprise more: 8000 words, of which: 2000 would be hapax (terms appearing only once), and these words are built on only 500 Hebraic roots. Thus, for example, biblical Hebrew knows only few colors: the white, the black, red, blue (still that Tekhelet was interpreted like a dark nuance (by Rachi) or light blue (by Maïmonide), and that current Bible of French rabbinate translates it by “azure”). A popular vocabulary more diversified, now disappeared, has to exist beside the formal and specialized language of the Bible.

Mishnaïque Hebrew

This shape of Hebrew corresponds to one period of the history of the Hebraic language () which corresponds about to the period of the Talmud (), and this one is thus a testimony. It is called also Hebrew rabbinical or language of the Wise ones.

It was a living language used in the everyday life as much as in the literature as attest it documents epigraphic and manuscripts found by the archeologists in Israel, and joined together in an Israeli data bank. It started to be studied linguistically by Abraham Geiger in 1845.

Mishnaïque Hebrew contains certain innovations compared to Hebrew of the Bible, to which it is posterior several centuries. These innovations relate in particular to the fields of syntax and the vocabulary. In this last field, one notes loans with the culturally dominant languages politically and/or of the time: Greek Araméen, , Latin and Persan.

Hebrew with the Middle Ages

As from the 10th century, it is apart from Palestine, in the middle of the various Jewish communities of the diaspora (He dir=rtl texte= '' גלות '' trans= '' galout '') that Hebrew survives, until its formidable ground rebirth of Israel (He dir=rtl texte= '' ארץישראל '' trans= '' erets Israel '') at the 20th century.

In the daily life the Jews spoke the language about the country in which they lived, reserving the Hebraic language with the pertaining to worship field. It is indeed in this language that the Jews of the Diaspora requested three times per day, that they read the Torah and the comments studied some; it is also in Hebrew that the wise ones (He dir=rtl texte= '' חכמים '' trans= '' hakhamim '') of the various countries corresponded. Let us note that the Hebraic production in pertaining to worship, cultural and professional fields show the dynamics of the Hebraic language over the historical long life.

Rebirth of the language

Hebrew knew at the 20th century an astonishing rebirth under the impulse of Eliézer Ben Yehoudah (1858 - 1922).

The work of Ben Yehoudah finds his origin during the time known as of the Haskalah (He dir=rtl texte= '' השכלה '').

The Haskalah

The Haskalah is a philosophical movement influenced by the Century of the lights French, initiated at the end of the 18th century in Germany by Moses Mendelssohn (1729-1786), and which intends to better integrate the Jews in their environment not-Jew, by the practice of a “modern” education, the implication in the debates philosophical or scientific and integration with the economic channels of the time.

Part of the movement also stuck to a rebirth of the use of the Hebraic language. This one had become exclusively a religious language used for the worship. The partisans of the Haskalah , the maskilim (He dir=rtl texte= '' משכילים ''), at least those interested by this question, wished to develop a laic use of the language, and to spread the use in the Jewish populations of it.

In 1793, the first periodical in Hebraic language is published by Maskilim of the Prussian city of Koenigsberg: He dir=rtl texte= '' המאסף '' trans= '' hameasef '' ( the collector ). A big part of the newspaper is devoted to the translations, philology, the literary creation of modern type and the current events.

Since 1853, Avraham Mapou, the father of the Hebrew novel, publishes a biblical Romance which will be a great success near the readers: Love of Sion .

Shalom Abramovitch, more known under the name of Mendele Moich Sforim (Mendele the salesman of books), invented after a turning via the Yiddish a new Hebraic prose, mixes of biblical and rabbinical Hebrew.

The Haskalah develops gradually in the Austro-Hungarian Empire then in the Russian Empire where it runs up against the hostility of mediums plus traditionalists, less exposed to the assimilation as in Germany.

It is in Central and Eastern Europe that develops the Hebraic press: several newspapers are born with Vienna, in Galicie (He dir=rtl texte= '' חלוץ '' trans= '' halouts '', He dir=rtl texte= '' השחר '' trans= '' hashahar '') or in the Russian Empire (He dir=rtl texte= '' המגיד '' trans= '' hamagid '', He dir=rtl texte= '' המליץ '' trans= '' hamelits ''). The latter played a key function in the diffusion of the ideas “modernisatrices”, literary works and the laic use of Hebrew specific to the Maskilim .

The latter were very early confronted with relative poverty (: 8000 words and 500 roots) of the Hebraic language, to evoke the modern world in particular. The problem has two origins: on the one hand, Hebrew is a language dating from antiquity, on the other hand it is about a formal language specialized in the religious field.
Certain authors, like Mendele Moich Sforim, thus began a work of lexical creation, inventing new words on the basis of Hebraic root.

The Maskilim thus managed to make hatch the literary use of the Hebraic language, partially modernized.

Ben Yehouda

It is into 1858 that was born in a Lithuanian village Eliézer Perlman. From its Master to the Yeshiva (talmudic school), he learned the Hebraic Grammaire and lute in hiding-place, like other students, the novel of Avraham Mapou, the Love of Sion . He continued studies of medicine to Paris where he on the occasion to speak Hebrew, and conceived the project to make revive the use of this language. In 1878, he wrote an article in ha-shahar where he invites the Juifs to speak Hebrew.

Sympathizer of the first group Zionist, the Lovers of Sion, Eliezer Perlman chooses in 1881 the patronym of Eliézer Ben Yehoudah and left to settle in the town of Jerusalem, in Othoman Palestine . Married the same year, it decided to be addressed to his wife Deborah only in Hebrew. It prohibits that one communicates with his son, Ben Tsion (who will bear later the name of Itamar Ben Avi), in another language. The Maskilim had developed a literary language, but it is on the initiative of Ben Yehouda that the revival of spoken Hebrew was initiated.

In 1894, Eliézer Ben Yehoudah undertakes the drafting of a dictionary joining together all the Hebrew terms usable in modern Hebrew. With this intention, it was based on religious Hebrew (biblical or mishnaïque), like on the lexical work of creation of the first Maskilim . This work remaining insufficient, Eliézer Ben Yehoudah will be in the beginning many neologisms like restaurant (He dir=rtl texte= '' מסעדה '' trans= '' mis' adah ''), newspaper (He dir=rtl texte= '' עיתון '' trans= '' iton '') or watch (He dir=rtl texte= '' שעון '' trans= '' sha' one ''). It is also at the base of the use of the pronunciation séfarade (which it considered being more faithful to the ancient pronunciation) of religious Hebrew as pronunciation of modern Hebrew bases.

At the end of fifteen years the first volume of the Thésaurus of the old and modern Hebraic language was published. The sixth and the seventh volumes were published right before its death, in 1922. It is only into 1959 that the complete series of sixteen volumes was completed.

Oppositions and adhesions

Vulgar” and daily practice the “of the “crowned language” (He dir=rtl texte= '' לשוןהקודש '' trans= '' Lĕshôn ha-Qôdesh '') will cause the very firm hostility of the most religious Jews. During the 20th century, the majority of the Haredim (ultra-orthodoxe) will adopt however gradually the daily practice of this “modernized” language, while preserving religious Hebrew for the worship.

Certain current groups haredim , as the Edah Haredit continue to refuse the laic use of Hebrew, holding it for a crowned use. The current Israeli members of the Edah thus always use the Yiddish like spoken language.

Contrary, the movement Zionist quickly defends the use of modernized Hebrew of the Maskilim , more particularly in the version of Ben Yehouda.

So in Der Judenstaat , Theodore Herzl does not believe in Hebrew like uniform language of the Jewish State, the organizations Zionists which appear between the end of the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century join there very quickly. Hebrew becomes thus one of the official languages of the Palestine agent (1922-1948), then of Israel after 1948.

Synthesis

Ben Yehouda is not the only creator of modern Hebrew. The Maskilim which preceded it in it took part. The speakers of Hebrew who succeeded to him continued to create words, process specific to any living language. But by the width of its work of creation and census of the terms, it seems a founder impossible to circumvent.

Writing

Basic consonant alphabet

Vowel system

In the beginning, the Hebraic language, like besides the other Semitic languages using the alphabet, does not note the vocalic sounds.

Three vowel systems developed: Babylonian, Palestinian and that known as of Tibériade. It is only at the 7th century that the wise ones (He dir=rtl texte= '' חז " ל '' trans= '' hazal '') of the Judaïsme joined together with Tibériade was appropriate of a system of vowels based on features and points which one calls vowel system, which is named in Hebrew " torat hanikoud " (rules of punctuation). One also inherits this period the signs of Cantillation (He dir=rtl texte= '' טעמים '' trans= '' te' amim '' - the word He dir=rtl texte= '' טעם '' trans= '' your' amndt '' means Hebrew taste), the Torah being sung since his origins. It is it still nowadays in the Jewish worship thanks to these signs of cantillation .

Grammar

In Hebrew any word can be analyzed into two Morphème S: the Design and the root.

The nominal or verbal designs constitute skeletons in which the roots are cast. They are of number limited and associated with specific directions or uses.

The root of each word is released naturally for the hébraïsant Locuteur which distinguishes the addition from a Consonne Préfixale or Suffixale. A root is generally Trilitère but Hebrew knows also roots Quadrilitère S even Quinquilitère S.

Thus one can produce a Adjectif, a Conjugaison, a Forme passivates, a Indicatif, etc starting from any root, even if the word is of foreign origin: let us take the word " Telephone " (He dir=rtl texte= '' טלפון '') deciding of course " téléfone" , the verb " téléphoner" according to the Hebraic Grammar, " is said; letalepène" (He dir=rtl texte= '' לטלפן '') (some pronounce " letalefène" by assimilation.

The family members Kimhi who lived about the middle of the Moyen-âge spent many years to count and include/understand the designs (He dir=rtl texte= '' משקל '') and posed the bases of the first Hebraic Grammaire.

The Academy of the Hebraic language

The language is officially governed by He dir=rtl texte= '' האקדמיהללשוןהעברית '' trans= '' HaAkademia LaLashon Haivrit '' (Académie of the Hebraic language).

See too

Linguistic

Dictionary of the languages

Languages by family

Afro-Asian Languages

Semitic Languages

Hebraic Grammar
Hebrew alphabet
Yiddish (or yidich)
Yévanique (judéo-Greek)
Judeo-Spanish Judéo-Arabic
Judéo-Persan
Ladino
Shuadit (or Judéo-of Provence)

Swadesh List of Hebrew
Eliezer Ben-Yehuda
Positions of the Hebrew characters on the keyboard AZERTY: : image: clavierhe.png for Windows XP

External bonds

Dictionary Hebrew-French/free French-Hebrew in line
the National center of the Hebrew מרכזבןיהודה, to find a '' oulpan '' in Paris or in the Paris region
the National institute of the Languages and Eastern Civilizations (Langues' O)
Site of study of Hebrew in line
Jewish Names of Hebrew, Arab and German origin
Hebraic Typography on the territory of German language
Hebraic Language and Hebrew keyboard

Hebrew biblical

the Hebrew Bible, translated verse by English and French verse
the Hebrew Torah, translated verse by verse into French (Cahen, Darby, Segond), into Latin, Greek and English
Rachel, European Network of the libraries judaïca and hébraïca, in partnership with the BNF

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