[DManA]

Was there ever a time when Hebrew was the mother tongue of the Hebrews? I wonder what the Moses generation spoke. Egyptian?

[vladimir998]

I would think that many knew both Hebrew and Egyptian. Think of the Gypsies. They know Romany and they speak the language of the land they live in too.

[katana]

Yes, but it became a written and liturgical language like Latin in Europe after the fall of Rome. Spoken by priests and highly educated people and used, like Latin, for written communication, government decrees, and as the language of scholars. Aramaic was the language of everyday life, as was Vulgar as opposed to Classical Latin.

By the Middle Ages spoken Hebrew was a dead language. The grammar of modern Hebrew was adapted from Arabic - sister Semitic languages - and revived in Andalusia under Muslim rule when Jews were employed as functionaries by the rulers. They were literate, and since they were hated more by the Christians of that age than by their Muslim rulers they could be trusted to not betray their masters. One reason they were expelled or forced to convert (see: Conversos) in 1492 along with all Muslims from Reconquista Spain.