www.alphadictionary.com

Paul Ogden and I are having a conversation about old and modern languages in the blog that might be of interest to Agorans at http://www.alphadictionary.com/blog/?p=78 and the following (which I will post later today).

Can any one lect be the same as another? No, not entirely. Is Old English the same language as Modern English? Lack of comprehension of one from the other suggests not, yet the former is surely the ancestor of the latter. The matter is more complex, however, in the case of Hebrew. Classical and Modern Hebrew are further removed in time from one another than the former two Englishes, but both have a significant element of planning in their construction. In Classical Hebrew, the work of the mediaeval Masoretes is the lens through which we understand much of the texts of the Tanakh. With Modern Hebrew, it was the work of Eliezer Ben-Yehuda and others that prepared the language for mass use in the modern Israel. Phonetically, grammatically and lexically, the two Hebrews are quite different, and comprehensibility is low. In spite of this, Modern Hebrew is built upon the foundation of Classical Hebrew, and, because of its planned nature, is more clearly an adaption of the older language than Modern English is to Old English.

!מה שהוא אמר

Or "what he said!".

I would say that the comprehensibility is very good for the Modern Hebrew speaker reading or hearing the Classical Hebrew of the Bible. On the other hand, if Moses were to suddenly show up today, he would need some help understanding Modern Hebrew. Modern Hebrew has (for the most part) retained the vocabulary of Classical Hebrew; and added new vocabulary to boot.

Also the use of tenses is different, but the change came about much earlier than with Eliezer Ben Yehuda. In the Torah (the first five books) past tense is indicated by using future tense, preceded by "and". E.g. "and he will" actually means "and he did". By the time the Book of Esther was set down, the use of tenses was much as it is today. I.e. the past tense has its own discrete conjugation, and no longer depends on the "and".

Garzo, it's wonderful to have you back! Please don't stay away for so long again.

... Garzo, it's wonderful to have you back! Please don't stay away for so long again.

To quote Perry:

!מה שהוא אמר

Or "what he said!".

Or in other words, Parson, please don't be so parsimonious with your time here!

I would say that the comprehensibility is very good for the Modern Hebrew speaker reading or hearing the Classical Hebrew of the Bible.

My university Bible Hebrew (BH) teacher (who also taught the modern Hebrew language of Palestine) was rather pessimistic on today's speakers' of modern Hebrew regarding their understanding the old language.

Also the use of tenses is different

Big big big problem.

contemporary Palestinians have as much difficulty in interpreting the Bible Hebrew aspect as Europeans.

The often named "perfect" may mean something that happened some time ago, in that BH כתב ktb might like our (Germanic) be thought of like a past tense, meaning the simple past (he wrote) or the present perfect (he has written), or with verbs signifying perception etc. the general present tense, or with verbs signifying the mental state of the subject, perhaps translated by the English present of the verb 'to be' plus an adjective, to mention just a few possibilities. In poetry, this "perfect" is often used to denote habitual activity, like 'he writes'. And don't think that the "imperfect" is any easier.

Garzo, it's wonderful to have you back! Please don't stay away for so long again.

I've been too busy on too many projects, but do I agree!

My university Bible Hebrew (BH) teacher (who also taught the modern Hebrew language of Palestine) was rather pessimistic on today's speakers' of modern Hebrew regarding their understanding the old language.

Is that a political statement, or just a slip?

My university Bible Hebrew (BH) teacher (who also taught the modern Hebrew language of Palestine) was rather pessimistic on today's speakers' of modern Hebrew regarding their understanding the old language.

Is that a political statement, or just a slip?

Probably.