Etymology
The modern English word "Hebrew" is derived fromHistory
Hebrew belongs to the Canaanite group of languages. Canaanite languages are a branch of theOldest Hebrew inscriptions
Classical Hebrew
Biblical Hebrew
In its widest sense, Biblical Hebrew refers to the spoken language of ancient Israel flourishing between and . It comprises several evolving and overlapping dialects. The phases of Classical Hebrew are often named after important literary works associated with them. * Archaic Biblical Hebrew, also called Old Hebrew or Paleo-Hebrew, from the 10th to the 6th century BCE, corresponding to the Monarchic Period until theEarly post-Biblical Hebrew
*Displacement by Aramaic
Mishnah and Talmud
The term "Mishnaic Hebrew" generally refers to the Hebrew dialects found in theMedieval Hebrew
Revival
Modern Hebrew
Current status
Phonology
Consonants
Notes: # Proto-Semitic was still pronounced as in Biblical Hebrew, but no letter was available in the Phoenician alphabet, so the letter had two pronunciations, representing both and . Later on, however, merged with , but the old spelling was largely retained, and the two pronunciations of were distinguished graphically inGrammar
Hebrew grammar is partly analytic language, analytic, expressing such forms as dative case, dative, ablative case, ablative and accusative case, accusative using prepositional particles rather than grammatical cases. However, inflection plays a decisive role in the formation of verbs and nouns. For example, nouns have a construct state, called "''smikhut''", to denote the relationship of "belonging to": this is the converse of the genitive case of more inflected languages. Words in ''smikhut'' are often combined with hyphens. In modern speech, the use of the construct is sometimes interchangeable with the preposition "''shel''", meaning "of". There are many cases, however, where older declined forms are retained (especially in idiomatic expressions and the like), and "person"-enclitics are widely used to "decline" prepositions.Morphology
Like all Semitic languages, the Hebrew language exhibits a pattern of stems consisting typically of "triliteral", or 3-consonant Triliteral, consonantal roots, from which nouns, adjectives, and verbs are formed in various ways: e.g. by inserting vowels, doubling consonants, lengthening vowels and/or adding prefixes, suffixes or infixes. 4-consonant roots also exist and became more frequent in the modern language due to a process of coining verbs from nouns that are themselves constructed from 3-consonant verbs. Some triliteral roots lose one of their consonants in most forms and are called "Nakhim" (Resting). Hebrew uses a number of Prefixes in Hebrew, one-letter prefixes that are added to words for various purposes. These are called inseparable prepositions or "Letters of Use" (). Such items include: the definite article (grammar), article ''ha-'' () (= "the"); prepositions ''be-'' () (= "in"), ''le-'' () (= "to"; a shortened version of the preposition ''el''), ''mi-'' () (= "from"; a shortened version of the preposition ''min''); Grammatical conjunction, conjunctions ''ve-'' () (= "and"), ''she-'' () (= "that"; a shortened version of the Biblical conjunction ''asher''), ''ke-'' () (= "as", "like"; a shortened version of the conjunction ''kmo''). The vowel accompanying each of these letters may differ from those listed above, depending on the first letter or vowel following it. The rules governing these changes are hardly observed in colloquial speech as most speakers tend to employ the regular form. However, they may be heard in more formal circumstances. For example, if a preposition is put before a word that begins with a moving Shva, then the preposition takes the vowel (and the initial consonant may be weakened): colloquial ''be-kfar'' (= "in a village") corresponds to the more formal ''bi-khfar''. The definite article may be inserted between a preposition or a conjunction and the word it refers to, creating composite words like ''mé-ha-kfar'' (= "from the village"). The latter also demonstrates the change in the vowel of ''mi-''. With ''be'', ''le'' and ''ke'', the definite article is assimilated into the prefix, which then becomes ''ba'', ''la'' or ''ka''. Thus *''be-ha-matos'' becomes ''ba-matos'' (= "in the plane"). This does not happen to ''mé'' (the form of "min" or "mi-" used before the letter "he"), therefore ''mé-ha-matos'' is a valid form, which means "from the airplane". :''* indicates that the given example is grammatically standard language, non-standard''.Syntax
Like most other languages, the vocabulary of the Hebrew language is divided into verbs, nouns, adjectives and so on, and its sentence structure can be analyzed by terms like object, subject and so on. * Though earlyWriting system
Liturgical use in Judaism
Hebrew has always been used as the language of prayer and study, and the following pronunciation systems are found. Ashkenazi Hebrew, originating in Central and Eastern Europe, is still widely used in Ashkenazi Jewish religious services and studies in Israel and abroad, particularly in the Haredi and other Orthodox Judaism, Orthodox communities. It was influenced by Yiddish pronunciation. Sephardi Hebrew is the traditional pronunciation of the Spanish and Portuguese Jews and Sephardi Jews in the countries of the former Ottoman Empire, with the exception of Yemenite Hebrew. This pronunciation, in the form used by the Jerusalem Sephardic community, is the basis of the Modern Hebrew phonology, Hebrew phonology of Israeli native speakers. It was influenced by Judaeo-Spanish, Ladino pronunciation. Mizrahi Hebrew, Mizrahi (Oriental) Hebrew is actually a collection of dialects spoken liturgically by Jews in various parts of the Arab and Islamic world. It was derived from the old Arabic language, and in some cases influenced by Sephardi Hebrew. Yemenite Hebrew or ''Temanit'' differs from other Mizrahi dialects by having a radically different vowel system, and distinguishing between different diacritically marked consonants that are pronounced identically in other dialects (for example gimel and "ghimel".) These pronunciations are still used in synagogue ritual and religious study in Israel and elsewhere, mostly by people who are not native speakers of Hebrew. However, some traditionalist Israelis use liturgical pronunciations in prayer. Many synagogues in the diaspora, even though Ashkenazi by rite and by ethnic composition, have adopted the "Sephardic" pronunciation in deference to Israeli Hebrew. However, in many British and American schools and synagogues, this pronunciation retains several elements of its Ashkenazi substrate, especially the distinction between Niqqud, tsere and Niqqud, segol.See also
* List of Hebrew dictionaries * List of Hebrew words of Persian origin * Hebraism * Hebraization of English * Hebrew abbreviations * Hebrew literature * Hebrew numerals * Jewish languages * List of English words of Hebrew origin * Romanization of Hebrew * Study of the Hebrew languageNotes
References
Sources
* * * * * *External links