The Hebrew of 1500 years ago, is indeed the Hebrew of today. Of course Hebrew in Israeli newspapers has lots of modern vocabulary, it’s still the same language. In fact the Hebrew of today, was a dead language, a lot like Latin, 130 years ago. It was purposely brought back—when Jews started moving back into Palestine—and it spread and became popular—a living language.
Hebrew saw a revision in the early Medieval period—when the form of the modern letters and punctuation were formed. Jews had stopped speaking it daily—and it became a liturgical/religious language (as occurred with Latin). Since Hebrew is a consonantal (no vowels) Jews were forgetting the vowel sounds between the consonants, so a series of dots and dashes below the letters was invented to serve as the reminders of the vowels.
Modern Bibles in Hebrew have these dots and dashes in them—helping non-native Hebrew readers know the vowels. Interestingly though, modern Hebrew in Israel (newspapers and books and such) doesn’t need the dots and dashes—since if you’re used to a language, you really don’t need to see the vowels. (f yr usd t lngg y dnt nd th vwls).
The Hebrew of Jesus’s day had different stylizing of the letters (though readable by modern Hebrew readers) but that of King David’s day (3000 years ago)... had a very different style and is difficult for modern readers to read.
Thanks for all the great info. I knew none of that.
This was especially interesting: “In fact the Hebrew of today, was a dead language, a lot like Latin, 130 years ago. It was purposely brought back—when Jews started moving back into Palestine—and it spread and became popular—a living language.”