How Similar Are Biblical Hebrew and Biblical Aramaic?

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In this episode I examine Biblical Hebrew and Biblical Aramaic – the languages of the Hebrew Bible (or "Old Testament") – and see how similar they are!

In this video I did my best to pronounce Biblical Hebrew and Aramaic with their original full range of phonemes, including sound distinctions that you won't hear in Modern Hebrew. If you know some Modern Hebrew (or a modern form of Aramaic) the pronunciation in this video will sound different. I'm sure I didn't do it perfectly, but I tried to make it as authentic as possible.

Creative Commons images used in this video:

Commercial images licensed from Shutterstock.com

Chapters:

00:00 Introduction
00:19 Brief history
01:14 General similarities between Biblical Hebrew & Aramaic
03:05 Similar cognate vocabulary
03:51 MyHeritage (the sponsor of this episode)
06:42 Sound correspondences between Hebrew and Aramaic cognates
09:13 Differences in grammar
15:31 Comparing an Aramaic Bible verse with Hebrew translation
20:34 Comparing an Aramaic Targum verse with the Hebrew original

Jean Antoine
 

  • Langfocus says:

    A big thanks to MyHeritage for sponsoring this episode! Use the following link to get a DNA kit and use the coupon code “Langfocus” for free shipping: https://bit.ly/Langfocus

  • Mod Maker 🇵🇱 says:

    I honestly would’ve preferred a comparison between Biblical Hebrew and Modern Hebrew.

  • Maitreya Jambhulkar says:

    Yeah. Excited for this video. Jesus Christ spoke Aramaic language I know that but how Hebrew is oldest language I also want to know.

    • Dyivu Lee says:

      I don’t think that is the case. It’s just a dialect of Aramaic spoken in Canaan. Abraham himself was an Aramaic.

  • Grim Reaper says:

    Aramaic seems closer to Arabic than Hebrew

    • Langfocus says:

      You might change your mind after watching this video, at least for the *Biblical* form of the languages.

    • chacham says:

      Yeah, Aramaic is much closer to Hebrew than Arabic. In many cases, it’s just letter tradeoffs, but the same roots.

    • Grim Reaper says:

      @chacham well based on the thumbnail shlam is closer to the arabic slam than the hebrew shalom

    • chacham says:

      ​@Grim Reaper If you know enough Aramaic, it becomes obvious. But, i guess it is up to each person’s bias. 🙂

    • Grim Reaper says:

      @chacham no bias here simply pointing out an obvious fact, but since u brought it up seems like ur the one with bias 🤔

  • Bram van den Heuvel says:

    Cool!
    I’ve actually studied both. Given the limited corpus of Biblical Aramaic, I’m not sure you can understand it unless you learn Biblical Hebrew (or perhaps another dialect of Aramaic) first.

  • Alon Bechor says:

    As a native Hebrew speaker , I am able to read Aramaic letters but dont even have the slightest idea what they really mean.. Aramaic inscriptions are usually incorporated into Jewish prayer books but they just seem to me as an unreasonable mixture of Hebrew letters

    • chacham says:

      There are plenty of books on the subject. If you do Unkilus each week, it’s much easier to see the connection.

    • vassilopoula says:

      there are also some aramaic components in modern Hebrew words- when you are saying ” amphibious ” “hypocrite” “three dimensional” etc

    • chacham says:

      @vassilopoula I wonder if that that has more to do with Modern Hebrew (Ivrit) borrowing from Arabic. Arabic would also influence Aramaic speakers, as many only speak Aramaic in the home, but use Arabic as their everyday language.

  • M H says:

    As a native modern Hebrew speaker, this is going to be very interesting for me

  • Solomon's Cave says:

    Always glad to see other content creators discuss Biblical Hebrew 😁

  • Hoàng Kim Việt says:

    The language that Jesus knew vs the language that Jesus spoke.

  • P says:

    i love your videos!

  • Tato Darjany says:

    This is one of the more exciting episodes I’ve seen from you in a while. Looking forward to it!

    Can’t wait for a Tagalog overview!

  • Margaret Juliana Altamirano says:

    I’m back to your channel again 😊

  • Shem'on says:

    Such videos about Semitic languages are the best. It would be great if you could make more similar videos in the future. Especially about Aramaic.

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