Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Isaac Fried <if AT math.bu.edu>]

Of course languages change, yet they my still remain the same. A  
definite statement about what is "the same" and what is "different"  
requires a norm, or a measure, which is elusive for such a  
complicated thing as language. Yet I believe that were Moses to  
reappeared today in a coffee house in Tel Aviv he would understand  
most of the talk. He would certainly recognize the words מים  
חמים, כוס, צלחת, עוגה, לחם, חמאה, ירקות  
טריים, מרק בשר, as well as the exclamation איזה ערב  
נעים but he would not recognize סוכר, קפה, עגבניה,  
מלפפון. He would certainly understand the people asking him  
מה הענינים מושיקו, הכול בסדר אצלכם Yet I  
suspect he would not recognize the people he took out of Egypt, but  
it should not take him more than a couple of days to adapt and become  
fluent in "modern" Hebrew.

Isaac Fried, Boston University

On Oct 31, 2010, at 1:49 PM, Jack Kilmon wrote:

> I cannot get a handle on the proposition that modern Hebrew is  
> virtually unchanged since the Bronze Age.  Languages are cultural  
> and cultures are never static.