The Revival of Hebrew

One of my favorite blogs, Rishon Rishon, has a very illuminating post about the revival of the Hebrew language. He is, of course, correct that the revival itself is not just due to Eliezer Ben Yehuda, but more importantly, the successful spread of the language itself among a highly diversified group of Jews.

However, I don't think he managed to cover the whole story. While it is true that the beginning of this spread of Hebrew began with small, highly ideological units - it did not just spread because of their rise to power. Rather, two more widespread forces were at work: the Zionist movement and the Jewish educational system in "Palestine" and later the state of Israel.

The Zionist movement, and more importantly, the leadership in the Yishuv, were fiercely zealous when it came to teaching and speaking Hebrew. After the "language wars" during the 'Second Aliya' period, Hebrew became the increasingly dominant teaching language in an increasingly Zionist-dominated education network. Almost all Zionist leaders (including "Cultural Zionists") spoke Hebrew or at least advocated its teaching - at the newly-founded Hebrew university, for instance. During the Mandate, when large groups of Jews speaking diverse languages arrived here, the educational system available to Jews was almost exclusively Zionist and Hebrew-oriented. It goes without saying that Hebrew became THE language in the state of Israel, learned by generations of Olim thereafter. Thus, the adults may or may not have been successful in learning Hebrew, but their children most certainly would.

Moreover, Zionist leaders and activists worked very hard at making Hebrew the sole language used in the Yishuv, as aginst Yiddish and German. Sometimes this even went so far as to try to legally ban certain German-spoken activities within Tel Aviv, for instance. A book recently came out on the "underground" use of Yiddish in the Yishuv, though I haven't read it (I have suspicions that it's another "post-Zionist" initiative - describing a genuine reality solely to undermine Zionism).

All of this, of course, would not have been successful, if it weren't for the willingness of the Jewish Olim to have their children learn Hebrew. The Zionist movement provided the means and the ideological incentive, the Olim gave their consent. These forces, and not just the identity of the leadership, were responsible for the amazing success of the Hebrew language.