Talk:Hebrew language

See also Talk:Modern Hebrew language and Talk:Hebrew languages.

Hebrew grammar

"Hebrew grammar is mostly analytical, lacking inflectional mechanisms for dative constructs, and having no systematic ablative, accusative or dative constructs"

This is slightly misleading, as hebrew has a very concrete accusative construct - the nota accusativi "et". Also, while hebrew 'lost' it's noun-case inflections, it retains many other mechanisms or constructs for differentiating the case of an object.

I place my comment here since the refered 'talk' pages talk little of linguistic aspects of the language.

You are right. I think I've fixed it. - Mustafaa 01:47, 4 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Yes, Very well written!

Online translator

Does anyone know of a good online translator page that can render Hebrew websites in English? There are some good articles on our Hebrew counterpart which potentially contain a lot of useful information for the English language versions. Timrollpickering 14:06, 5 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Wouldn't that be nice. - Gilgamesh 07:01, 21 Dec 2004 (UTC)

If you can identify a page or two you think bear translating, I'll try to do it for you in my spare time.Mlevie 16:54, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Torah and Bible

Line 2: "... the original Bible, the Torah ...". While I know that the Hebrew Bible is sometimes referred to as "Torah", this name is more typically used to mean Pentateuch, i.e. the five Mosaic books. A less confusing Hebrew name, in this particular sentence, would be Tanakh.

Size

This page is 40 kb long! I see that the former articles for sections such as Hebrew grammar and Hebrew phonology were merged here. Is there some reason why this was done? It is kind of inconvenient for people with old browsers who can't upgrade. Wikiacc 01:35, 25 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I am that I am

The second paragraph of I am that I am makes some assertions about the subtleties of interpreting אהיה אשר אהיה. I'm pretty sure it isn't accurate. Perhaps someone watching this page could give that text a quick fixup? Thanks, Dbenbenn 04:11, 28 Dec 2004 (UTC)

I have to say that I couldn't help snorting at the idea of "I be that I be," but I don't dare correct it. In all honesty we may never really understand what that sentence meant, but since the name of God (let's write it "Yahweh") is derived from the same root as the verb "to be," I have heard it suggested that the sentence means simply "I am Yahweh," which at least makes something approaching grammatical sense.Mlevie 21:53, 6 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Romanisation

I know that at least one person, Arthur Koestler proposed romanising Hebrew. Although I think this was probably only ever a minority opinion, can it get some kind of mention? It is a curious footnote if nothing else.

I suggest a sub-article, for now I can provide the following links (if there's any trace from Koestler's suggestion that's indeed interesting). Some contemporary Israeli scholars are promoting Romanisation (Prf. Haar-Sagor for example)

 [1] (http://www.stav.org.il/karmeli/) - (interesting presentation of the state of written hebrew)
[2] (http://www.cs.technion.ac.il/users/ornan/ornan1.html) - (iso standart) 
[3] (http://riters.com/hebrewLatinisation/index.cgi/LatHebrewFrontPage) - (a wiki discussing various sugguestions)

Ar?

A fricative like the "ar" in "heart"? There's no fricative there. A better explanation is required. Chamaeleon 14:48, 12 Jan 2005 (UTC)

imperative

"Generally speaking, the imperative of most verbs in Modern Hebrew is expressed by using the 2nd person future form."

this is inaccurate, omission of the first syllable, is also very common (contrast with biblical hebrew - ommiting the first syllable, and reapplying "bgd-kft"). Imperative in modern hebrew is a currently an unstable phenomenon, and the subject of research, but by no means is being 'replaced' by '2nd person future' (which does exist)

example: b.d.k. 'infinitive' livdok (to check) imperatives in common use: (male) vdok! (rm 1st) tivdok! (2nd f.) bdok! (classic-hebrew form) (female) vdeki! (rm 1st) tivdeki! (2nd f.) bdeki! (classical male + i) bidki (classical). all forms are very common, the 'rm 1st' form is unique to modern hebrew, and is an example for a case in which modern hebrew does not obey 'bgd-kft'.

The omission of the first syllable may be common but it is not grammatical. For livdok, grammatical imperatives are "bdok/bidki/bidku" (classical and still in use in formal situations) and "tivdok/tivdeki/tivdeku" (same as the future tense). Dropping the first syllable of the future ("vdok/vdeki/vdeku") is not grammatical, as initial v (written bet) is not allowed. People may use "ain't" all the time in English, but it ain't correct. A reverse example: some speakers may say "pilosofiya" instead of "filosofiya" because they know that initial f (written pe) is not allowed in Hebrew words (since this is a foreign borrowing it's an exception.) I've corrected the article to reflect this.69.3.148.220 20:29, 7 Mar 2005 (UTC)

In Modern Hebrew, the use of the normal infinitive as a general imperative, no doubt under the influence of European languages (eg. German)recreates a major use of the infinitive absolute in Biblical Hebrew well described by Haiim Rabin (A Textbook of Israeli Hebrew p. 315)as "...used in commands that are addressed to nobody in particular, but are valid for everybody; its use is in such cases comparable to that of the imperative. significantly, an example will be found in the Decalogue."

Geographic distribution

"Hebrew is spoken primarily in Israel by its close to six million Jews as well as by the two million Arabs who live there. However, outside of Israel, Sephardic Jews, mainly in France (with over half a million Jews), and expatriate Israelis, mainly in the United States, (about half a million people), tend to use it as a home language. Usually, most Ashkenazi Jews not born in Israel, (about eight million people), find it difficult to learn and use Hebrew in colloquial speech."

There is an appparent contradiction in the last sentence. My guess is that it should read "do not use", but someone who knows more than I do should correct it.

I assume your proposed correction "do not use" is intended to suggest that "learn and use Hebrew in colloquial speech." should be altered to say "learn and do not use blahblahblah". I don't think such a rewording is necessary, since the compound verb here is "learn and use". Many Ashkenazim know Hebrew, but find it incredibly difficult to use as a colloquial language. That is to say, they can read it, and understand what they're reading. They can pray in Hebrew and understand the words they're saying. But if you say something to them in Hebrew, they look at you like you're addressing them in an extinct dialect of some previously unknown click-language from the highlands of Papua New Guinea... TShilo12 07:37, 17 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I think this paragraph's first sentence is the only one that makes any sense, and I'm in favor of removing the rest of it. I'm Sephardic (I live in the US) and I speak Hebrew although my family speaks no Hebrew at home. Sephardic Jews are not centered in France. I know many Ashkenazim, particularly the more religious sort, who spend lots of time in Israel and speak Hebrew. Perhaps TShilo doesn't know them, and there may be no survey that says how many there are, but that doesn't mean they don't exist. Non-Israeli Ashkenazim do not "find it difficult" to learn and use Hebrew, any more than Italian-Americans "find it difficult" to learn and use Italian. In fact, I find that sentence offensive. Hebrew is no more difficult for them than, say, Japanese. It's just that most non-Israeli Jews are not descended from Israeli Jews, nor do they have any Israeli relatives, and therefore for them Hebrew is a language they learn for their bar mitzvah and after that they don't see the point.Mlevie 21:46, 6 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Hey. Don't blame me. I didn't write it! My comment about Ashkenazim was in fact that they do know Hebrew, unlike what the article says. My experience with many Ashkenazim, "particularly the more religious sort", however, is that their ability to use Hebrew conversationally breaks down rapidly after a few sentences, especially when faced with someone who speaks MIH or a sefardi or mizrachi (etc.) flavor of Hebrew. This inability is far more pronounced in people who have never been to Israel, or more accurately, have never been outside of a "black-hat" yeshiva in Israel. Personally, I think the whole paragraph is utterly bogus. Large sectors of the Jewish population in Israel obstinately refuse to learn Hebrew, whether it's that portion of the immigrants from the former Soviet Union whom that describes, who prefer to speak Russian, or those charedim who consider MIH to be a desecration of the <shudder>"loshen kodesh"</shudder>. There are also significant numbers of so-called "Anglos" in Israel, who prefer to learn as little Hebrew as possible, opting instead to use English. As for the claim that the "two million" (Good lord! What does that author know that the Israeli census missed?!) Arab citizens all speak Hebrew, that's just plain laughable, and should be summarily deleted without comment. TShilo12 09:36, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Incidentally, my remark about click-languages comes from personal experience: Most ashkenazim are not aware that `ayin has a pronunciation, and often look shocked when they hear it pronounced. Similarly, most ashkenazim regard the pronunciation of cheth differently from khaf as an alien concept, and some don't appear to be able to tell sometimes that you're even saying a cheth...and if they manage to catch the difference between a kaf and a quf, watch their eyes go wide... TShilo12 10:06, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Well, honestly I can go to an Ashenazic synagogue and not understand a word, I can barely believe it's the same language, but that's a diaspora for you. Still, the pronounciations you mention (non-silent 'ayin, chet and kuf as in Arabic) are non-standard and people are entitled to look a little askance at them, just as Parisian French speakers struggle to understand the Quebecois or Germans from Munich squint at Schweizerdeutsch. As for Israeli Arabs, would it not be fair to say that the million or so who live inside the Green Line and went to Israeli schools probably know Hebrew fairly well? In fact, most of them probably speak it better than the Anglo and Russian 'olim you mention.Mlevie 04:25, 29 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Aspect in Modern Hebrew

Can someone expand on Aspect in Modern Hebrew compared to Biblical Hebrew, and the usual Semitic aspect system? The Semitic languages page could also use some explaination of the Semitic Aspect system.

Diphthongs

"Ancient Hebrew did not have diphthongs. Although diphthongs do exist in modern spoken Hebrew, grammar rules discourage their use. Thus, the root Y-Kh-L, 2nd person singular, future should have been conjugated tuykhal, however the correct form is tukhal."

Firstly, this is simply incorrect. Biblical Judian Hebrew, had most probably had Diphthongs, this is actually the strongest Shiboleth between Biblical Hebrew and other Canaanite dialects. Second - could someone explain the "tuyhkal" example? what does it mean 'should have been' (wasn't, isn't, doesn't have any will of it's own does it?). This should either be clarified or removed.

It's "tukhal" because it's supposed to be, not because of some made up nonsense about diphthongs. Whoever wrote that rubbish needs to study a little bit before pontificating esoterically. The root Y.K.L is a result of an innovation of classical Hebrew by which initial W was replaced by Y. This is why whereever the root, for example, Y.L.D is preceded by any consonant, including yud, the Y from the root seems to disappear. It doesn't disappear, it's just realized in its original form, hence words, using the example of Y.L.D, like noladeti and toldot. If you look at Arabic, it has preserved the original initial vav (ok, so wā, in Arabic)...whence the Arabic word "walid". As for what "tukhal" means, I don't actually know, but "tokhal" is "you will eat" TShilo12 17:22, 25 Feb 2005 (UTC)

I gather it's agreed then that this sentence be removed? I'm well aware of the W->Y shifts in Hebrew and Aramiac, but I don't see their relevance to either Diphthongs nor to the form imaginary form tuykhal. Oyd11 23:21, 1 Mar 2005 (UTC)

If it were up for a vote, I'd vote "yes". Remove the sentence altogether. The entire thing is garbage, from the first word to the last. Someone who knows more about the HYPOTHETICAL status of diphthongs in Biblical Hebrew can then write something that makes sense to take its place. TShilo12 04:36, 3 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Hebrew avoids dipthongs in the sense that a syllable must contain a consonant and a vowel and therefore dipthongs are impossible. This doesn't really have anything to do with "tukhal" per se, which by the way means "you will be able to" and should have been (meaning, I guess, were it a regular verb) conjugated "tikhol" not "tuykhal." Even today I think dipthongs are only found at the end of a word, as in the non-Biblical past participle (taluy "dependent," or samuy "hidden.") Correct me if I'm wrong. Mlevie 21:33, 6 Mar 2005 (UTC)

OK, thanks, I had a brain fart with tukhal. As for the presence of diphthongs, I doubt that the fact that they are only found at the end of words in the way modern Jews speak Biblical Hebrew can be used as evidence that this has always been the case. (I'm not thinking of -uy, I'm thinking of -ay...) My assumption is based on the fact that the Tiberian mesortim used -y and -w in their vowel-sound representations. My guess is that what we pronounce as akhshav was then pronounced akhshåu, and my guess is that the yud in `oyev was diphthongized in forms like `oyveini (oh no! two diphthongs in the same word, and neither at the end!)... Anyways, I think this whole discussion is (1) moot, since the offending section has been deleted (Thanks Mlevie) and (2) demonstrative of the fact that this constitutes too much of a delving into the hypothetical, about which there exists no consensus, and certainly insufficient documentation to warrant certain-sounding mention of possibilities as though they were established fact. Shabat shalom lekulam TShilo12 16:36, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Use of the name "Ladino"

Someone put in that Judezmo is "wrongly called Ladino". This may be the opinion of a large number of Judezmo-speakers, but from a linguist's or historian's standpoint, there is certainly nothing whatsoever wrong with referring to it as such. Therefore, I have changed "wrongly" to "also", although this is, IMHO, slightly inaccurate, since it is far more often referred to as "Ladino" in English than as "Judezmo"...and this is the ENGLISH Wikipedia. Regardless, any personal rants about the "wrongness" of calling it Ladino should be substantiated and included on the Ladino page, and discussed on the talk page there, not on the Hebrew page. TShilo12 13:24, 21 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Perhaps, as a compromise, you could mention that most linguistics classify Judezmo as a form of Ladino, while mentiontioning that some Judezmo speakers object to this?--Josiah 23:57, Feb 25, 2005 (UTC)

It's the other way around. The few linguists who distinguish these two terms, notably Prof. Haim-Vidal Sephiha, insist that "Ladino" should refer only to the ultra-Hebrew-influenced "translationese" in which Bible translations were written, and call the language itself Judeo-Spanish or Judezmo. I think most linguists see this as excessively pedantic, though. - Mustafaa 00:12, 26 Feb 2005 (UTC)

That is not particularly pedantic, actually: "Ladino" as a name for "translationese" covers not only Judaeo-Spanish (= Djudío-spanyol, Djudezmo, Jaquetía, Spanyol, etc.), but also Castilian and other Iberian language forms. In most of the history of "Ladino", it has been understood to be the idiom of literal translations from Hebrew/Aramaic into an Iberian (though usually not Portuguese) written language. The tendency to call the everyday language of Balkan and Ottoman Sephardim and some mainly coastal North-African Sephardim "Ladino" is almost entirely 20th Century invention, with this usage becoming significant only in the second half of the Century... -- Olve 23:58, 1 Mar 2005 (UTC)

two main features?

<Q>Modern Hebrew has a rich jargon, which is a direct result of the flourishing youth culture. The two main features of this jargon are the Arabic borrowings (for example, "sababa", "excellent", or "kus-emmek", an expression of strong dissatisfaction which is extremely obscene both in Arabic and in Modern Hebrew), and the obfuscated idioms.</Q>

Firstly, as already discussed in the past, wouldn't it be preferable to replace 'kus-emmek' with some of the many other borrowings from Arabic? (See the old discussion, giving the comparasion "English has many words derived from Anglo-Saxon, such as fuck, cunt and whore.")

Second - what's the other 'main feature'? and what makes these features more central to others?

what are the obfuscated idioms? Is this perhaps one of them?

Oyd11 23:44, 1 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Inconsistent translitarations

The article's translitaration of hebrew includes 'h' for xet (hataf), 'x' for xet (nax), xazaq, 'y' inside SAMPA quotes where apparently 'j' is ment, 'c' for cadik: industrializacia, 'ts' for cadik shem etsem, mixed SAMPA, IPA, and apparently ad-hoc translitarations. Now, I'm just saying we should decide on a consistant standart, at least for the article. Was there such a discussion in the more general scope in WP? Oyd11 23:44, 1 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Transliteration scheme for Hebrew from Nynorsk Wikipedia

The following is a quick (and, as far as the comments go, not entirely complete) translation of the transcription convention for Hebrew from the Nynorsk Wikipedia. It follows mainly the Qimḥian analysis of the Masoretic system. Could this be something to build on for the English Wikipedia too...? -- Olve 00:32, 2 Mar 2005 (UTC)

The Hebrew alphabet

Consonants

Hebrew	Transcr.	Hebrew	Transcr.	Comments
א	’. -			When a א has no vowel sign (including ševá) under it, it is not transcribed.
ב	ḇ	בּ	b, bb
ג	ğ	גּ	g, gg
ד	d	דּ	d, dd
ה	h, -	הּ	h	When this consonant is last in the word, it is only transcribed when it has a vowel sign or a mappíq (point, similar to dagéš).
ו	v, u, ū, o, ō	וּ	vv
ו	z	זּ	zz
ח	ḥ
ט	ṭ	טּ	ṭṭ
י	j, ī, i, ē, e	יּ	jj	We do not write īj, ēj, ej, but ī, ē, e.
כ ך	kh	כּ ךּ	k, kk
ל	l	לּ	ll
מ ם	m	מּ	mm
נ ן	n	נּ	nn
ס	s	סּ	ss
ע	‘
פ ף	f	פּ ףּ	p, pp
צ ץ	ṣ	צּ	ṣṣ
ק	q	קּ	qq
ר	r
שׁ	š	שּׁ	šš
שׂ	s	שּׂ	ss
ת	t	תּ	t, tt

Vowels

Hebrew	Transcr.	Hebrew	Transcr.	Hebrew	Transcr.	Hebrew	Transcr.
אִ אִי	ī	אִ אִי	i
אֵ אֵי	ē	אֶ אֶי	e	אֱ	ĕ
אָ	ā	אַ	a	אֲ	ă	אְ	ə (audible) or non-transcribed (silent)
אֹ, אוֹ	ō	אָ	o	אֳ	ŏ
אוּ, אֻ	ū	אוּ, אֻ	u

Thank you, however, the problem here seems to be of the "The good things about standards is that there are so many different ones to choose from" sort. I possibly suggest the 'academic semitic translitaration' for a phonemic translitaration, and either IPA or SAMPA for phonic. While this is abit akward, as the two are confusingly different, it's mostly alright, as most linguists are familiar with IPA, and most Semitic linguists are familiar with the 'semitic translitaration' (I forgot who it's named after).

An example: Most modern hebrew speakers do not differentiate the pronounciation of ʾ and ʿ, thus the words 'ʾbd' and 'ʿbd' are both pronounce /avad/.

Now, is this what 'we' want?

Oyd11 01:15, 3 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Minor edits regarding the definite article

The article at one time stated "Hebrew has only a definite article, ha-..." which an anonymous user changed to "Hebrew has only one definite article, ha-..."

Both statements are accurate. The point that is being made in the article, however, is not that Hebrew has only one definite article, but that Hebrew has a definite article, ha-, but not an indefinite article.

I changed the word "one" to "the", so it now reads "Hebrew has only the definite article, ha-...", and would have clarified that there is no indefinite article, but perhaps that work is better left to a Hebrew grammarian, who could insert such a paragraph, or brief mention, directly preceding the apparently confusing mention of the definite article.

In the meantime, hopefully my alteration will prevent further "helpful" edits that end up changing the whole gyst of the text.

TShilo12 09:02, 18 Mar 2005 (UTC)

I think the sentence is somewhat awkward - especially the "only" part. Why not simply write: "Hebrew has a definite article, ha-, but no indefinite article" or something similar. Moreover - I wonder about the statement further up in the article that Afro-Asiatic originated in Mesopotamia and then moved northeast "eventually reaching the Middle East" - surely this cannot be? Vice 23:59, 19 Mar 2005 (UTC)

You're right. It sounds idiotic. Originally, it said "northeast africa" or something like that, which I changed to "the fertile crescent", and someone else changed to "mesopotamia". In any of those three cases, "eventually reaching the ME" is tautologically and repetitively redundant at best, and just plain silly at worst. Fixing... TShilo12 01:08, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

"Mesopotamia" is wrong. Almost all historical linguists agree that Afro-Asiatic originated in Africa, and the one exception I know of thinks it came from Palestine. See Afro-Asiatic languages. - Mustafaa 03:55, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

You are correct. My original alteration of the article to say "Fertile Crescent" was as a result of my misreading of the paragraph, whereby I thought it was saying that the Semitic branch itself developed in Africa (exclusively)...a theory for which there is neither extensive evidence nor widespread academic support. This, of course, does nothing to resolve the issue about the definite article verbiage. -t TShilo12 07:13, 20 Mar 2005 (UTC)

Number of speakers of Hebrew

The vast majority of Israeli Arabs and even of Arabs living in "the territories", in addition to Arabic, also speak Hebrew. Of less concern to me than the inclusion of "as well as its Arab citizens" or whatever the article used to say, is the fact that there are probably 100,000 Russians, Jews or otherwise, who stubbornly (and quite obnoxiously) refuse to learn Hebrew. Also, the US census number is kind of a bizarre thing to include as a separate number...what should be differentiated is "first language" and "second/additional language" speakers. I would say, comfortably, that there are probably about 800,000 to as many as 1.5M Hebrew speakers in the US, whereas the US Census numbers reflect only those who speak Hebrew as their home language (i.e., "native speakers"). Tomer ^TALK 05:53, Mar 30, 2005 (UTC)

The number 195,375 in the U.S. was from my research (and somebody linked it). If you can find different (larger) numbers then by all means please post it there.

Falcoboy7 02:05, Apr 1, 2005 (UTC)

spawning sections to new articles

I took the Grammar section and sent it to Hebrew grammar, and the Sounds section and sent it to Hebrew phonology. Hope nobody minds too much... This article is getting big enough. (For justification, see relevant argument at Talk:Yiddish_language#Recommendation_to_split_article) Tomer ^TALK 07:34, Apr 11, 2005 (UTC)

Good idea. Jayjg ^(talk) 15:42, 11 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Displaying vowels correctly

I've noticed that the vowel diacritics don't seem to display as well in Firefox as in MSIE. Does anyone know of a fix for that? :) — Helpful Dave 12:21, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Heave a sigh of disgust and switch to MSIE6 until Firefox has better extended character-set support. IE has the best support for non-English languages I've seen, which is why I've been using it almost exclusively (except for testing) instead of Netscape or Mozilla, ever since IE5 came out. (Mozilla's language support has been vastly improved over the past 2 years, but it's still fraught with problems.) Tomer ^TALK 12:26, Apr 14, 2005 (UTC)

No, MSIE has plenty of problems. I'll keep Firefox as my default browser, although I commonly have that, Opera and Avant Browser (based on MSIE) open at any one time. My concern is not so much about how I can view the characters correctly, but whether I can make sure that all visitors to my website can view my material. Chinese seems to display not too badly, but Hebrew is tricky.

If I want to write "Shem", this should do the trick, shouldn't it?

<bdo dir="rtl" class="Unicode" lang="he-IL">שֵׁם</bdo>

Hey, that displays fine for me in Firefox! The problem must be the font then. The above box uses Courier New, I believe. I had been using Arial Unicode MS (specified for the class "Unicode" in the stylesheet). Does anyone know which fonts I should specify to make the dots display correctly across all browsers and platforms? The answer to this question could also help us display Hebrew correctly on Wikipedia. :) — Helpful Dave 14:13, 14 Apr 2005 (UTC)

Yes, IE has its share of problems, but most of them are security-related, not display-related. BTW, what did you think was "helpful" about removing the "superfluous accent" from Judæo-Catalán? If you're that opposed to accents, why did you not change the word "Catalán" to "Catalonian"? Catalán is not the correct English name for the language, but if you're going to use the spanish word Catalán, it should retain its accent. Either that your you should insist on using the Catalán word for the language, Català, which OOPS! still has a pesky accent in it!!! Tomer ^TALK 03:52, Apr 15, 2005 (UTC)

"Diaspora Hebrew"

i've come across several vague references to "diaspora hebrew" (as opposed to israeli hebrew).

can anyone on here who is more familiar with hebrew than i am tell me whether or not there is such a thing?

Gringo300 00:11, 16 Jun 2005 (UTC)

"Diaspora Hebrew" is Hebrew as spoken outside Eretz Yisrael. In ancient times, it referred to the liturgical forms of Hebrew in use, and in modern times, it refers to their modern forms. There is no language "Diaspora Hebrew", if that's what you're asking. In modern times, it's just a catch-all for "Non-Israeli Hebrew". Tomer ^TALK 04:48, Jun 22, 2005 (UTC)

"What makes it unique"

From the article:

What makes it unique is that the original Hebrew Bible, the Torah, that Judaism teaches to have been recorded in the time of Moses 3,300 years ago, was written in (Biblical) Classical Hebrew.

I don't understand why this makes the Hebrew language unique. Tempshill 21:45, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)

In a technical sense, yes, there is only one language in which the Torah was written. But of course, as you note, this is just a peacock phrase. - Mustafaa 22:48, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)

It makes it "unique" only to people who consider the OT/Hebrew Bible to be holy, viz. Jews and Christians. If I were a Hindu say I wouldn't be impressed with the statement ;) Kuratowski's Ghost 23:58, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I made a first stab at rewriting it to reflect what I thought the original author was trying to convey without the "peacock phrase"ology. Tomer ^TALK 05:00, Jun 22, 2005 (UTC)

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