Hebrew

Tradition
Prepared and presented by:

Yağmur Sena Türkmen

Table of contents
01 02 03
Origin of Hebrew Translation The Middle Ages
During Antiquity

04 05 06
Haskalah: The The Revival Israel after the
Enlightenment Period 19th Century
Period
The Origin of
Hebrew
 Introduction:
Hebrew, is a language of rich cultural history and member of
the north-western branch of the Semitic family of languages.
It started as one of many Canaanite dialects, but its
beginnings as a language can be identified with the adoption
of that dialect roughly 3,000 years ago, in and around the
area we now call Israel, when a group of people who may
have called themselves ivri, and whom we call variously
“Hebrews,” “Israelites,” or more colloquially but less accurately
“Jews,” began an experiment in writing.
Translation
During
Antiquity
● The Hebrew Bible includes clear
references to translation, including
liaison interpreting.
● Quite a number of passages in the
Old Testament may have been
translated from other sources.
● Translation into Hebrew took place
during the early phases of the post-
biblical period.
The Middle Ages
After a long break, translation into Hebrew resumed in medieval Europe
and was in full swing by the end of the twelfth century. Most of the texts
being translated were ‘works of wisdom’, or in other terms scientific
texts.

Most of the works that were first translated were treatises in Arabic on
Jewish law and ethics written by Jews in Muslim Spain and North Africa.
But these were scholarly works and there was no need for any other kind
of translation since the Jewish lives in areas where Arabic was a shared
literary language, but, by the twelfth century, Jewish families had moved
to Christian territories, most notably in southern France and Northern
Italy, and their children and descendants were unable to read Arabic.

However, their interest in the achievements of Jewish scholarship

remained, and it created the need for translation. Hebrew, which was in
use as a privileged literary language, became the TL, partly because Jews
living in different places no longer shared any other means of
communication.
Some examples of translations
of Jewish ‘works of wisdom’
made during this time:
 Bahya ibn Paquda –
Revival
Despite being red, Mars
Hovot ha-Levavot
is actually a cold place.
It’s full of iron oxide dust
(Duties of the Heart)
: discusses topics such as
Reform the unity of God, devotion
Venus has a beautiful to God and repentance.
name and is the second
planet from the Sun
Maimonides –
Moreh Nevukhim
(Guide of the Perplexed)
: written in the form of a
letter to his student.
Rambam’s objection to
anthropomorphism, an
explanation of the
Biblical account of
creation, and a
description of the
Merkavah.
Judah Halevi –
Sefer ha-Kuzari
: describes how the king of the Khazars (an Asian
tribe that converted to Judaism in the eighth
century), in an attempt to determine which is the
true religion, invites representatives of each of the
three major religions to come and explain his beliefs.
The group includes a Muslim imam, a Christian
priest, and a rabbi. The king is won over by the
rabbi's arguments, and during the ensuing dialogue,
the rabbi demonstrates the superiority of his faith
by bringing clear proof to the biblical account of the
giving of the Torah at Sinai and explains the
commandments in rational terms. Instead of using
complicated philosophical ideas, he bases his
arguments on history, tradition, and common sense.
- Many medieval translations were preceded by lengthy
introductions, which were overwhelmingly apologetic in tone.

- Medieval translators had two different strategies to choose

from, depending to a large extent on the prestige of the text
submitted to translation:

I) For ‘important’ works (works of wisdom), staying as close

to the ST’s structure as possible.
II) For literary and ‘less-privileged’ texts, sticking much closer
to domestic models, especially those offered by the
quasibiblical language used in Hebrew medieval poetry.
 Judah ibn Tibbon
: has come to be regarded in Jewish
historiography as the ‘father of all translators’.
Among his major translations are Bahya ibn
Paquda’s Duties of the Heart, Judah Halevi’s Sefer
ha-Kuzari and Sacadia’s Beliefs and Opinions.

His will to his son Shmuel ibn Tibbon constitutes

an important theoretical document on translation.
The most important translation by Shmuel himself
is Maimonides’ Guide of the Perplexed.
 Haskalah:
The Enlightenment
Period
 The Haskalah
The Haskalah, or the Jewish
Enlightenment Period as it is referred
to by many scholars, is a movement
that started around the 1770s,
continuing for about a century until
the 1880s. The primary goals in this
was for the Jews to preserve their
intellectual and unique identity and
put an end to the cultural and
societal isolation of the Jewish
community; as well as revive Hebrew
to be spoken in secular settings.
- There was virtually no chance of catching up with the
civilized world without a major investment in translation.

- The inability of Hebrew to express everything that had

been, let alone could have been, formulated in other cultures
was revealed. The solution came from an ingenious reversal
of medieval practices, which were still very much in force.

- The priority assigned to complying with the norms of ‘pure’

Hebrew was to protect the emerging new culture from being
submerged under the weight of a huge volume of imported
texts.
German influence
- As the Haskalah emerged from Germany, it was naturally the local culture
which was called upon to act as a supplier of texts and models, especially
since mastery of German was another ideal of the Haskalah itself.

- The new cultural paradigm played it safe by using earlier forms of German
as a reference point, selecting items and models which had once attained
some canonization.

- German was a mediator language as indirect translations of other languages

such as French and English were made.

- In the earlier decades of the movement, shorter texts were preferred as

source texts.
Moses Mendelssohn
Contributed many translations during
this period, following the German-to-
Hebrew pattern, despite the fact he
could have translated from the English
original. Works include:

● A fragment of Edward Young’s The

Complaint

● Night Thoughts on Life

● Death and Immortality

 No single translation undertaken
during the Enlightenment period
stands out as instrumental in the
evolution of Hebrew culture.
However, translation as a mode of
generating texts, as well as the
cumulative weight of translated
products – texts and models alike
– had an enormous impact on its
course.
The Revival Period
- During the nineteenth century, the cultural center gradually
moved further East, first within the German cultural domain itself
and then out of it and into the Slavic region.

- The gradual shift eastwards inevitably brought Hebrew writers

into contact with new cultures. This had two complementary
effects: new gaps in the language were being identified and, at
the same time, various options for filling them. The gaps were no
longer just in the realm of text-type, theme and composition.
Rather, they were on the language plane as well. In view of the
new tasks it had to perform, the current form of Hebrew could no
longer be regarded as adequate.
Russian influence
- Starting in the 1820s, Russian had gradually become the
closest available system, and it was this culture would began
to affect Hebrew.

- Russian also became the main source of texts for

translation, both original and mediated. Indirect translation
was still common.
Avraham Shlonsky
- One of the most prolific translators at the
time and ever.
- Introduced significant changes in
translational norms which were picked up by
a growing number of translators.
Works include:
-The Inspector General
-Marriage
-Sholokhov’s Virgin Soil Upturned
-Quietly Flows the Don
-Pushkin’s Yevgeny Onegin
-Shakespeare’s Hamlet
- The behavior of Hebrew in relation to Russian during this period, which has
come to be known in Hebrew historiography as the Revival Period, involved
much more than a simple recognition of the latter’s availability. One could
say that Hebrew behaved as if the Russian system were part of it, and a
dominant part at that. Especially since the 1860s, when the dependency
patterns had already been established , the new paradigm which took shape
gradually replaced the previous one based on German and was to dominate
Hebrew culture for many generations, even after the center had moved out
of Russia again.

-Hebrew purism was still strongly advocated, though no longer on the Bible
alone. However, the underlying model which was applied to both original
writing and translation, regardless of source language, was in fact highly
Russified.
Israel after
the
19 century
th
- Towards the end of the nineteenth century, with the rise of
Zionism and the first waves of Jewish immigration to
Palestine, the center of Hebrew culture started to move back
to the ancient homeland. The immigrants had been brought
up in the Russified tradition, and the writers and translators
among them carried on their activities in the new
environment. Consequently, many of the old habits were
perpetuated, especially as most of the readership was still in
Europe.
 Thank you
for listening!
 Resources
Baker, Mona, and Gabriela Saldanha. Routledge
encyclopedia of translation studies. Routledge, 2019.
Feiner, Shmuel. Haskalah and history: The
emergence of a modern Jewish historical consciousness.
Liverpool University Press, 2001.
Litvak, Olga. Haskalah: the romantic movement in
Judaism. Vol. 3. Rutgers University Press, 2012.
Hoffman, Joel. In the beginning: A short history of
the Hebrew language. NYU Press, 2004.