Hebrew

Hebrew (Ivrit)Hebrew

The earliest Hebrew script was derived from a Phoenician
script. The modern Hebrew script was developed from a script known as
Proto-Hebrew/Early Aramaic. The earliest known
writing in Hebrew dates from the 11th century BC.

Hebrew is a member of the Canaanite group of Semitic languages. It
was the language of the early Jews, but from 586 BC it started to be
replaced by Aramaic. By 70 AD use of Hebrew as an everyday language
had largely ceased, but it continued to be used for literary and
religious functions, as well as a lingua franca among Jews from
different countries.

During the mid-19th century the first efforts were made to revive
Hebrew as a everyday language. One man who played a major role in
these efforts was Eliezer Ben Yehuda (1858-1922), who was the first
to make exclusive use of Hebrew in his home, and encouraged the use
of Hebrew among others, as well as its use in schools.

Today Hebrew is spoken by some 5 million people in Israel, where it
is an official language along with Arabic. and a further 2 to 3
million people speak the language in Argentina, Australia, Brazil,
Canada, France, Germany, Palestinian West Bank and Gaza, Panama,
the UK and USA.

Notable features

  • Type of writing system: abjad
  • Direction of writing: right to left in horizontal lines.
  • Number of letters: 22 consonants, plus final letters and diacritics
  • Used to write: Hebrew, Judeo-Arabic,
    Ladino, Yiddish and
    many other Jewish languages.
  • Some letters (kaf, mem, nun, fe and tzadi) have a final form (sofit),
    which is used when they appear at the end of a word.
  • There are no separate numerals in Hebrew, instead standard western
    numerals (1, 2, 3, etc) are used.
  • Long vowels can be indicated by the letters alef, vav,
    and yod. Short vowels are not usually marked, except in the
    Bible, poetry and books for children and foreign learners.

The Hebrew script

Modern Israeli pronunciation

Hebrew script (Modern Israeli pronunciation)

Notes

  • het is officially pronounced [ħ], but many people pronounce it [x]
  • ʻayin is officially pronounced [ʕ], but many people pronounce it [ʔ]
  • Post category:Languages
  • Reading time:3 mins read