All Scriptures Related

EVIDENCE FOR HEBREW AS THE SPOKEN LANGUAGE IN JUDEA by Martin J. Mann

It has been believed for many years among scholars and laymen alike that Aramaic replaced Hebrew as the only spoken language of the Jews in Judea, Samaria, and Galilee during the Second Temple Period of Jewish history (516 B.C.-A.D. 70). Many famous and well-respected scholars, Schurer being one, claimed this was particularly so during the final centuries before the Christian era. -1-Even when sources written during that period refer to the use of Hebrew as a spoken means of communication, modern scholars have understood this to mean Aramaic and its dialects and not Hebrew. -2-This opinion prevailed in scholarly circles for over 150 years. -3-

However, examination of coins, inscriptions, written sources dating from the period 200 B.C. to A.D. 200, and written sources dating immediately after this period testify to the fact that Hebrew "was the main vehicle of speech in Jerusalem and the surrounding country (Judea), as well as the language most used for literary purposes during this period." -4-

A brief historical overview is necessary to understand the relationship between Aramaic, the Hebrew-speaking kingdoms of Israel and Judah, and the later provinces of Galilee, Samaria (Israel), and Judea (Judah).

Aramaic became the language of the Aramean tribes in Syria around 1100 B.C. and spread rapidly throughout the Near East. -5- The lingua franca of the Assyrians was Aramaic and it was also adopted later by the Neo-Babylonians and Persians as the language of international relations and trade. This is borne out by the vast number of Aramaic inscriptions discovered throughout the Near East. Aramaic served as the lingua franca from India to Ethiopia and from Arabia to the Anatolian Peninsula -6-from approximately 1000 B.C. to 332 B.C.

The northern Kingdom of Israel was conquered by Assyria in 721 B.C., and many Jews were taken into captivity in Assyria. The Assyrians also attempted to take the southern Kingdom of Judah at the very end of the eighth century B.C. but failed. The fact that ordinary Judeans did not understand Aramaic at the end of the eighth century B.C. is explained in II Kings 18:26. -7-Two Judean officers in Jerusalem interrupt the messenger of the Assyrian king while he is delivering an ultimatum to the Judeans in Hebrew. The Judean officers ask the Assyrian messenger to speak "in Aramaic, for we understand it, and do not speak with us in Judean [Hebrew], in the hearing of the people who are on the wall." -8-Clearly the officers want the people not to be frightened by the Assyrian's message and ask him to speak in a language the people do not understand: Aramaic. This passage illustrates that Hebrew was distinct from Aramaic and that Judah had retained her linguistic identity despite the fact that by this time Aramaic had been the lingua franca of the Near East for over 200 years.

The southern Kingdom of Judah and the Jerusalem Temple eventually fell to the Neo-Babylonians in 587 B.C. Nebuchadnezzar, the victorious Babylonian king, also took many Jews into captivity like the Assyrians before him.

The fall of the two Jewish kingdoms, in 721 B.C. and 587 B.C., coupled with the captivity of the Jews both in Assyria and Babylon, has been cited by proponents of the Aramaic theory as reason for the replacement of Hebrew with Aramaic as the spoken language among the Jews. Aramaic theorists claim that since the Jews were exiled to Assyria and Babylon, empires where Aramaic was the dominant language, the Jews naturally adopted it and forgot their mother tongue of Hebrew. Although no one argues that Aramaic did have an influence on those Jews who were exiled, -9-to claim that Aramaic replaced Hebrew as a spoken language from this point on until modern times seems somewhat premature. It must be pointed out that many Jews, especially in Judah, were not taken into exile and thus remained in their native land and kept their native tongue. Hebrew never died out as a spoken language at any time in the sixth century B.C. or thereafter.

With the return to Jerusalem of some of those previously exiled Jews under the decree of the Persian King Cyrus in 538 B.C., Aramaic became introduced to those Hebrew-speaking Jews who had not been exiled and who had remained in Israel and Judah. -10-Aramaic did not replace Hebrew. Judah became a multilingual society with Hebrew and Aramaic used side by side. -11-Later, when Alexander the Great conquered the Near East in 332 B.C., this catapulted Greek into becoming the lingua franca of the Near East and yet another language was introduced to the areas of Israel and Judah.

One event was primarily responsible for establishing Hebrew as the dominant language of Judea in the second century B.C. The desecration of the Jerusalem Temple by the Syrian Seleucid King Antiochus IV in 167 B.C. prompted a revolution of the Jews led by Judas Maccabaeus. The revolution was successful and in 164 B.C., the Temple was cleansed. It seems apparent that this sparked a religious and nationalistic revival among the Jews in all of Israel, particularly those in Judea. This revolutionary victory led to a reinstatement of Hebrew as the dominant language in all of Judea and even to a large degree in Samaria and Galilee. -12-A parallel can clearly be drawn between this reinstatement of Hebrew and the nationalistic reinstatement of Hebrew as the official language of modern-day Israel. -13-

The Dead Sea Scrolls provide substantial evidence that Hebrew was a spoken language from early in the second century B.C. Discovered over a sixteen-year period from 1947 to 1963 on the northwestern shores of the Dead Sea, the Dead Sea Scrolls consist of approximately 600 manuscripts of biblical books, non-biblical books, and original writings of the Jewish sect responsible for writing the manuscripts. Tens of thousands of fragments comprise these 600 manuscripts. The ages of these fragments and scrolls range from 200 B.C. to A.D. 100. -14-

The original writings of this sect are particularly fascinating for they give us insight into the language used by the sect itself. Among the original sectarian compositions were a vast number of commentaries on various books of the Bible, including Isaiah, Hosea, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Psalms, and others. It is most profound that all these commentaries, without exception, were composed in Hebrew. -15-In addition, manuals to guide and direct new members of the sect in the ways of the community were discovered. These were also written in Hebrew. -16-

This is striking. It is hardly conceivable that a commentary or manual of instruction would be written in a language other than the vernacular of the people for whom those texts were intended.