Inches to Metric: The Magic of Hebrew # 1

The Magic of Hebrew… Part one in a three part series is a brief overview of the creation of Modern Israel and Hebrew, how the two are interconnected and essential to who we are as a People.

One of my favorite books is The Jew in the Lotus, by Rodger Kamenetz. Roger chronicles a trip he took with a group of Jewish leaders (representing various backgrounds/observance levels) to Dharamsala, India in 1990 on a quest to visit the Dalai Lama. It is bittersweet/funny as the group struggles to come up with a few questions for the Dalai while attempting to articulate what unifies them. Age old question who/what is a Jew?

The Jew in the Lotus, book image. Photo courtesy Beth Kopin.

The Dalai and his people had been expelled from Tibet. They reestablished Tibetan Buddhism in India, were in mourning and yearned to return. The Dalai recognized the Jewish people had been exiled from their land, stayed united and found their way back to Israel/Zion. The Dalai had one simple request. He wanted to learn about the Jewish People’s secret to survival and success.

Much has been speculated as to why the Jewish People survive and thrive (when allowed to do so).

We have many reasons/secrets to our success. We are a global family with a unified mission, Zionism. We dreamt and prayed about Israel/Zion while wandering through the desert; then established Zion during the Biblical era. We ruled the land, had kings, a currency and spoke ancient/Biblical Hebrew.

The power of Hebrew

After being conquered and expelled we prayed for our return for over two thousand years. Imbedded into our mission was retaining ancient Biblical Hebrew and its alphabet. We discontinued speaking but Hebrew remained the language of our prayers, writings and Torah scroll. We teach Hebrew to our young and expect them to chant from our scroll at age 13 (Bar Mitzvah), a rite of passage. I think its one of our super powers.

There is a mystical power to our alphabet. We have a numbering system associated with each letter. For example: Chai is Hebrew for life. We associate chai/life with 18, the equation of the letter chet = 8 + yud = 10 = 18! A form of mysticism including shakras sprung up around our letters which we call Kabbalah and Sefirot.

While adapting into various cultures we brilliantly morphed our Hebrew alphabet into existing languages and created new ones. The most widely recognized is Yiddish based on German. Yiddish words like schlep, oy, klutz, chutzpah, and nosh have been woven into the modern English lexicon.

 Modern Zionism 

A powerful theme running throughout our history and prayers is eventually forces will rise up and try to destroy us. We take that literally. It has happened repeatedly. It is happening now.

Jewish communities had a presence throughout Europe for over a thousand years. Late 19th century (pre-Hitler) antisemitism began rising in Europe. It was becoming dangerous for Jewish people to continue living there. Theodor Herzl (a secular Jew born in Budapest who moved to Vienna) took fate into his own hands. He held meetings discussing a concept he coined, “Modern Zionism.” He wrote books which changed our destiny, A Jewish State and Altneuland: The Old-New-Land. His thesis: If Jews had their own land, it would be a safe haven for Jews worldwide. His most noteworthy quote is, “If you will it, it is no dream.” He was a visionary prophet.

Theodor Herzl image from Beth’s collection. Photo courtesy Beth Kopin

Modern Hebrew

The Zionist movement grew. Another visionary Eliezer Ben-Yehuda moved to what is now Israel late 19th century from Russia. Having faith modern Israel could/would be established and recognizing a need for “Our People’s” language, Ben-Yehuda began creating modern Hebrew based on ancient Biblical Hebrew.

When Israel was established in 1948 modern Hebrew became the official language and now has 12 million speakers worldwide. Israel and Hebrew (link to learn how a modern Hebrew word is invented) are modern miracles. Hebrew speakers include Jews, Muslims, Christians, Druze, Bedouins, Armenians, and Buddhist. Herzl and Ben-Yehuda died pre-Holocaust before witnessing the manifestation of their dreams.

Quote from Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks

I recently returned from Panama and Brazil with my husband. We were invited to a wedding in Brazil and had friends in both countries. We seized the opportunity diving deep into both Jewish communities. We attended services, Shabbat dinners, and the wedding. We toured synagogues, Conservative, Orthodox, Chabad, the JCC in Sao Paulo and dined at kosher restaurants.

Singing Hebrew prayers alongside fellow worshippers was exhilarating. We prayed from books in Spanish/Hebrew in Panama and Portuguese/Hebrew in Brazil. We have been fortunate to have visited synagogues in other regions of the world, praying from Italian/Hebrew, Czech/Hebrew, Polish/Hebrew, and German/Hebrew books.

We spoke with the Panamanian Rabbi in “our” common language Hebrew. We heard how Jewish people fleeing Europe found their way to Latin America and we shared  how/when our families fled Europe came to North America. We felt connected and figured we must have had family from the same shtetl (Yiddish for small town) in Europe. Jewish life is thriving in Latin America! To be continued…

   Reading/speaking “Our language” is essential to who we are as a people.