Hebrew
Language - Jewish Languages
Jewish languages are a set
of languages that developed in various Jewish communities, in Europe,
southern and south-western Asia, and northern Africa. The usual course
of development for these languages was through the addition of Hebrew
words and phrases, used to express uniquely Jewish concepts and
concerns, to the local vernacular. Due to the insular nature of many
Jewish communities, many Jewish languages retain vocabulary and
linguistic structures long after they have been lost or changed in later
forms of the language from which they are descended.
Background
The oldest and most treasured books of the Jewish people have been the
Torah and Tanakh (i.e. the Hebrew Bible) written almost entirely in
Biblical Hebrew and widely used by Jews during their history. Jews
zealously studied these detailed Hebrew texts, observed the commandments
formulated in them, based their prayers on them, and spoke its language.
Jews maintained a belief that Hebrew was God's "language" as well (as it
was the language God uses in the Torah itself), hence its name "lashon
hakodesh" ("Holy language" or "tongue").
The earliest surviving Hebrew inscription, the Gezer Calendar, dates
from the 10th century BCE; it was written in the so-called Paleo-Hebrew
alphabet, which continued to be used through the time of Solomon's
Temple until changed to the new "Assyrian lettering" (ktav ashurit) by
Ezra the Scribe following the Babylonian Exile. During this time there
were also changes in the language, as it developed towards Mishnaic
Hebrew. Until then, most Jews had spoken Hebrew in Israel and Judea,
however, by the destruction of the Second Temple, most had already
shifted to speaking Aramaic, with a significant number in the large
diaspora speaking Greek. As Jews emigrated to far-flung countries, and
as the languages of the countries they were in changed, they often
adopted the local languages, and thus came to speak a great variety of
languages. During the early Middle Ages, Aramaic was the principal
Jewish language. The Targum and most of the Talmud is written in
Aramaic; later in the Middle Ages, most Jewish literary activity was
carried out in Judæo-Arabic: Arabic written in the Hebrew alphabet; this
is the language Maimonides wrote in. Hebrew itself remained in vigorous
use for religious and official uses such as for all religious events,
Responsa, for writing Torah scrolls, and along with Aramaic, retained a
position of importance for the writing of marriage contracts and other
literary purposes.
As time passed, these Jewish dialects often became so different from the
parent languages as to constitute new languages, typically with a heavy
influx of Hebrew and Aramaic loanwords and other innovations within the
language. Thus were formed a variety of languages specific to the Jewish
community; perhaps the most notable of these are Yiddish in Europe
(mainly from German) and Ladino (from Spanish), originally in al-Andalus
but spreading to other locations, mainly around the Mediterranean, due
to the 1492 expulsion of practicing Jews from Spain and the persecution
by the Inquisition of the conversos.
Jews in the diaspora have tended to form segregated communities, in part
due to ostracisation and persecution by the surrounding communities, and
in part due to a desire to maintain their own culture. This sociological
factor contributed to the formation of dialects that often developed and
diverged to form separate languages.
At the beginning of the nineteenth century, Yiddish was the main
language of Jews in Eastern Europe (thus making it the language spoken
by the majority of Jews in the world), while Ladino was widespread in
the Maghreb, Greece, and Turkey; smaller groups in Europe spoke such
languages as Italkian, Yevanic, or Karaim. The Jews of the Arab world
spoke Judæo-Arabic varieties, while those of Iran spoke Dzhidi (Judæo-Persian);
smaller groups spoke Judæo-Berber, Judæo-Tat or even, in Kurdistan,
Judæo-Aramaic. The Beta Israel were abandoning their Kayla language for
Amharic, while the Cochin Jews continued to speak Malayalam.
Contemporary Trends
This broad picture was substantially modified by major historical shifts
beginning in the late nineteenth century. The immigration of millions of
European Jews to North America caused a dramatic increase in the number
of Jewish English-speakers; colonialism in the Maghreb led most of its
Jews to shift to French or Spanish; Zionism revived Hebrew as a spoken
language, giving it a substantially increased vocabulary and a
simplified sound system; the Holocaust tragically and massively
eradicated the vast majority of Yiddish-speaking European Jews; and the
Arab-Israeli conflict led many Jews to leave the Arab world for other
countries (mainly Israel and France), whose languages they largely
adopted.
Jews today speak a large variety of languages, typically adopting the
languages of their countries of residence. The largest single language
spoken by Jews is English: The largest Jewish population in the world is
in the United States, and there are also large, substantial communities
in Canada (a majority of Canadian Jews speak English, not French), the
United Kingdom, Australia, and South Africa. Ireland and New Zealand
also have small English-speaking Jewish communities.
English is closely followed by Modern Hebrew, the spoken language in
Israel, and by Israeli emigrants who live in other countries. Hebrew is
the language of daily life in Israel, though a substantial proportion of
the country's citizens are immigrants who speak it as their second
language.
After English and Hebrew, the next largest language spoken by large
populations of Jews is Russian, with perhaps two million speakers from
the former Soviet Union, a majority of whom now live in Israel.
Approximately 1.5 million Israelis speak Russian fluently.
French, Spanish, and Portuguese constitute the final "tier" of languages
spoken by major Jewish populations. French is spoken by hundreds of
thousands of Jews in France and Quebec, most of them immigrants from
North Africa who originally spoke Arabic. Spanish and Portuguese are
spoken by large Jewish communities in Central and South America. A
substantial number of current immigrants to Israel speak French or
Spanish as their mother tongue.
Yiddish continues to be spoken by older generations of Jews, as well is
in Haredi communities. Although the number of older speakers is
continually decreasing, there is revived interest in Yiddish in academia
and the arts.
Thus Yiddish, once the language of the majority of the world's Jews,
continues to be spoken, as are nearly all the languages discussed in the
preceding section. However, some of these languages, (notably Judæo-Aramaic)
are considered to be gravely endangered.
List of Jewish Languages
Afro-Asiatic languages
* Semitic: Hebrew, Aramaic (referred to as Jewish Aramaic or Talmudic
Aramaic), Neo-Aramaic (dialects include: Lishanid Noshan, Lishanid Janan,
Lishana Noshan, Lishana Deni, Lishan Didan), Judaeo-Arabic (many
dialects, including: Judæo-Iraqi—all are qeltu Arabic dialects), Judæo-Moroccan,
Judæo-Yemeni, Judæo-Libyan, Judæo-Algerian, also several Judæo-Arabic
dialects spoken in northern Syria and Iraq.
* Berber: Judæo-Berber
* Cushitic: Kayla (Qwara), Kaïliña
Indo-European languages
* Germanic: Yiddish, Yinglish, Yeshivish
* Italic: Judæo-Latin and its putative descendants, the Judæo-Romance
languages: Ladino, Shuadit (Judæo-Provençal), Zarphatic (Judæo-French),
Judæo-Portuguese, Italkian (Judæo-Italian), Catalanic (Judæo-Catalan),
Judæo-Aragonese
* Slavic: Knaanic (Judæo-Czech)
* Greek: Yevanic (Judæo-Greek)
* Indo-Iranian (Judæo-Persian languages): Dzhidi, (Judæo-Persian),
Judæo-Bukharic, Judæo-Golpaygani, Judæo-Yazdi, Judæo-Kermani,
Judæo-Shirazi, Judæo-Esfahani, Judæo-Hamedani, Judæo-Kashani,
Judæo-Borujerdi, Judæo-Nehevandi, Judæo-Khunsari, Judæo-Tat, Judæo-Marathi
Uralo-Altaic
* Turkic: Krymchak (Judæo-Tartar), Karaim (Spoken by the Karaites of
Crimea and Lithuania)
Kartvelic
* Gruzinic
Dravidian
* Judæo-Malayalam
Alphabetical list
* Bukhori (Judæo-Tajiki-Persian)
* Dzhidi (Judæo-Persian)
* Gruzinic (Judæo-Georgian)
* Hulaula
* Italkian (Judæo-Italian)
* Judæo-Arabic
* Judæo-Aramaic
* Judæo-Berber
* Judæo-Portuguese
* Judæo-Malayalam
* Juhuri (Judæo-Tat)
* Kayla
* Karaim
* Knaanic (Judæo-Czech)
* Krymchak (Judæo-Crimean-Tatar)
* Ladino (Judæo-Spanish)
* Lishán Didán
* Lishana Deni
* Lishanid Noshan
* Shuadit (Judæo-Provençal)
* Yevanic (Judæo-Greek)
* Yiddish (Judæo-German)
* Zarphatic (Judæo-French)
From:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_languages
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