Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Yigal Levin <leviny1 AT mail.biu.ac.il>]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Herman Meester" <crazymulgogi AT gmail.com>
To: <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Saturday, February 25, 2006 11:16 PM
Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] translation v. interpretation


> Dear members
>
> For example, why is there no translation of the Hebrew Bible into
> modern Hebrew? I think modern Hebrew is about the only language left
> the Bible has not been translated to!
> (But I may well have missed the latest developments in modern Hebrew
> bible scholarship)
> Fascinating, isn't it? And b-Hebrew and modern Hebrew most certainly
> are two different languages.

Dear Herman,

The reason that no-one has undertaken to translate the Bible into modern 
Hebrew, is that biblical and modern Hebrew are most definately NOT two 
different languages. Of course they are not identical, and represent 
different stages in the development of the language, but modern Hebrew is 
very much based on BH. Yes, MH has thousands of words that BH is lacking; 
its syntax is closer to that of modern European languages and it has adopted 
modern European punctuation. There are also many words and expressions in BH 
that are not usually used in MH, and many more words that have been given a 
diferent meaning. However, this is only natural. The Bible remains one of 
the classical sources of MH. It is much easier for native speakers of MH to 
understand BH than it is for native English speakers to understand 
Shakespeare, for example. I do. So do my grade-school aged children. Of 
course, children have difficulty with a lot of the concepts in the Bible, 
and the language is "high literary" language, not what is spoken on TV. But 
it is still the same language.

And of course, there are renderings of Bible stories in easy MH, meant for 
children. But they soon grow out of needing them. Try seeing the Hebrew 
version of the animated film "Prince of Egypt". You'll be amazed at the 
amount of direct quotes of BH used in the dialogue. And I have yet to hear 
an Israeli child claim that he can't understand it.

Yigal