Posted on 06/24/2018 3:07:00 PM PDT by CondoleezzaProtege
There is wide consensus among scholars that Aramaic was the primary language spoken by the Jews of first century Palestine.
The vast majority of Jews spoke it. Jesus spoke it.
This has been the commonly accepted view since 1845, when Abraham Geiger, a German rabbi, showed that even Jewish rabbis from the first century would have spoken Aramaic. He convincingly argued that the Hebrew from the first century (Mishnaic Hebrew) only functioned as a written language, not as a living, spoken language.
There are two reasons most scholars believe Aramaic was the primary language of Jesus’s time—and the language Jesus spoke:
The overwhelming majority of documents and inscriptions recovered from the era are in Aramaic. Although documents do exist in Greek, Hebrew, Latin, and other languages, they are a minority. And even though many religious texts are in Hebrew (for example, of the Dead Sea Scrolls, 15% are in Aramaic, 3% are in Greek, and the rest in Hebrew), most nonreligious texts—contracts, invoices, ownership claims, and other kinds of ordinary communication—are in Aramaic. Moreover, of the Hebrew inscriptions found, almost all have been found in and around Jerusalem and the Judean wilderness—and virtually none have been found in Galilee. If Hebrew was spoken regularly in ordinary conversation, there is little written evidence to support it.
The second, and perhaps most convincing evidence of Aramaic primacy is that the Hebrew Scriptures were being translated into Aramaic. There may be many reasons why the Scriptures were being translated, but the most likely one is the simplest: most ordinary people could no longer understand the Scriptures in Hebrew. This doesn’t mean Hebrew wasn’t spoken. We’ve seen above that it was.
It simply means the instances where Hebrew was spoken were the exception, not the rule.
(Excerpt) Read more at zondervanacademic.com ...
Why do you keep breaking into jail? You're caught on this claim also:
How similar are Aramaic and Hebrew?
I get the impression they are similar, although I’ve not formally studied either.
That middle part of Daniel is in Aramaic - the Hebrew word for king and the Aramaic word are both “melek.”
Around 130 AD, Papias, bishop of Hieropolis in Asia Minor, wrote, "Matthew compiled the sayings [of the Lord] in the Aramaic language, and everyone translated them as well as he could." (Aramaic was very close to Hebrew.)
Around 180 AD, Irenaeus of Lyons wrote: "Matthew also issued a written Gospel among the Hebrews in their own dialect."
Although Paul was literate in Hebrew, most --- but not all --- scholars think his original autographs in Koine Greek.
But that wasn't the question. We were discussing whether Hebrew was the common spoken vernacular language of the 1st century Jewish people, the language Jesus spoke. It was not. Jesus' and His Jewish neighbors' spoken language was Aramaic.
By that time (the 1st Century) Hebrew was almost exclusively a written language. People outside of Jerusalem itself rarely or never used it conversationally.
As of the first century AD:
Jewish daily conversational language throughout the Middle East: Aramaic.
Plus, an educated religious Jewish man who was also a commercial traveler and/or a Roman citizen (like Paul) would be reasonably adept in all three languages: Aramaic face-to-face with other Jews, spoken; Hebrew and Greek written. And probably he could manage in spoken Latin as well, like in his frequent dealings with the Roman authorities.
Paul was a highly gifted man.
Jesus, while in the region of Lake Kenessaret, speaks Aramaic and is understood by bystanders, among whom was an eyewitness for Mark's Gospel(probably Simon barJona, relating it to John Mark, who was able to translate it):
"And he took the damsel by the hand, and said unto her, Talitha cumi; which is, being interpretedfrom the Aramaic,
Damsel, I say unto thee, arise" (Mar 5:41 AV; my superscript).
See also John 1:42 where "Kephas" is an Aramaic word spoken by Jesus, and translated by John the Gospel writer.
See Marh 3:17, where Jesus gave James and John the nickname title "Coanerges," a Chaldean=Aramaic term meaning "Sons of Thunder." Now if James and John, and all His other disciples, did not regularly use tha Aramaic language, why then would He pick such a descriptive term not understood by the whole community. Eh?
Why were eight chapters of the book of Daniel written in Aramaic if no one could understand them? Hmmmm?
Your arguments are full of holes, and do not withstand even the most cursory examination.
Well being Jewish I respectfully disagree.
The USA is basically a monolingual country, as much so among the intelligencia as the red necks.
Go anywhere in the rest of the world and locals speak and/or understand several languages. This is especially true in countries favored by tourists or with foreign military bases or industrial plants.
I would guess that a significant portion of Jesus’ neighbors spoke some Latin and Greek. The fully human side of the carpenter Jesus probably spoke both languages in order to deal with customers. Obviously, the God-incarnate Jesus speaks & understands ALL languages.
It was Judea in the time of Christ. The name Palestine was only invented after the Diaspora.
You are referred to Post #43 of this thread.
More so, he was educated in Hebrew, as a candidate for the Sanhedrin, for which he was studying with Gamaliel. But after his conversion, he was sent back to Tarsus, a cosmopolitan university city, to study the languages and culture of the Gentiles so as to be an effective itinerant evangelist to all manner of them. His time there in Tarsus was eleven years for this purpose. However, he was born as a Roman citizen of parents whose heritage was having been awarded citizenship for their services to the Emperor.
While Jesus doubtlessly chose unschooled men of his locality to demonstrate that ordinary men outside of the Jewish clergy were trainable to be carriers of the good news that "Jesus saves" throughout the Hebrew-dominant regions in Eretz Yisroel and beyond.
But again without question His foresight enabled Him to choose Judas Iscariot and give him every chance for salvation, though knowing that he would fail in commitment, and was to be replaced by a highly-trained pre-selected adversary-tuned-saint fit to write a body of discipline for the management of the churches and their communicants. Paul was schooled by Jesus apart from the other eleven, and commended to his work with the Gentiles by them, having talents that none of them could begin to match, even under Spirit guidance.
Jesus spoke Ebonics.
LOL...
I have been going to church my whole life with Israel-supporters and listened or read the works of countless, highly educated preachers. It’s not uncommon for them to refer to “the land of Palestine” in the context of ancient times and geography. Not a nation-state in the modern sense.
Mine too! A masterpiece. And Caviezel's performance is stunning.
I especially loved how Jesus seamlessly switched over to speaking in Latin when he spoke privately with Pilate, and the surprise on Pilate’s face.
Oh my! I never thought to notice that. Will pay special attention to that part next time.
And I think it was not the same in Aramaic. But it is my opinion and worth nothing.
I have heard the Jehoshua argument before but there are other textual referents which argue for Jeshua.
Boy, I am feeling dumb today. I forgot about the dzhey sound was not used back then in Hebrew or Aramaic. It would be yeh. I was really out of it last night and obviously garbling in my sleep. My apologies.
It is so hard to explain these things without getting into a whole semester of linguistics. For instance, all English-speakers think the word “Elijah” should sound like “ee-LIE-dzyah” when in Hebrew it really sounds like “ay-lee-YAW” with an alphabet of written characters quite different than the modern English alphabet of variable sounding dependent on a capricious local dialect. Greek handles it much better, for there Elijah is pronounced “ay-lee-YAH”, but in the New Testament, the Greek transliterated into English is spelt “Elias” and pronounced “ee-LIE-uss”. That really messes up the ordinary English speaker unaquainted with the old tongues.
Oh, I understand totally. As I said, I was really brain dead last night.
I speak fluent Russian, Serbo-Croatian and am pretty good in Spanish and German.
My issue is that I know the difference and STILL messed it up.
Yet, because it was taught that way in schools, churches, etc., for the last 1500 years, when the Palestinians go before the UN and demand their own State based on history, it is a false history. They have no legitimate claim to the land. That was my point.
Thanks for your patience and even temperament.
The square, precisely penned lettering that is now used in all Hebrew copying of the Tanach is the Aramaic character set which was adopted in place of the Paleo-Hebrew lettering long, long ago. It seems to me that Hebrew versus Aramaic might be in spelling, pronunciation, and some words and idioms not shared; perhaps like the differences between Spanish and Portugese. But this comparison is only what I’ve briefly read — just a total novice still tentatively poking at memorizing the Hebrew alphabet and vowel pointing sounds.
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