Hebrew
עִבְרִית Ivrit (Classical: ʕibrit)
Pronunciation	standard Israeli: [(ʔ)ivˈʁit] - [(ʔ)ivˈɾit], standard Israeli (Sephardi): [ʕivˈɾit], Iraqi: [ʕibˈriːθ], Yemenite: [ʕivˈriːθ], Ashkenazi: [ˈivʀis]
Spoken in	Israel Global (as a liturgical language for Judaism). in The Palestinian Authority (Gaza, and West Bank) [1]
Native speakers	8 million  (1998) Second language: 3 million[citation needed] Extinct as a native language by the 4th century CE, revived in the 1880s
Language family	Afro-Asiatic Semitic Central Semitic Northwest Semitic Canaanite Hebrew
Writing system	Hebrew alphabet
Official status
Official language in	Israel
Regulated by	Academy of the Hebrew Language האקדמיה ללשון העברית (HaAkademia LaLashon Ha‘Ivrit)
Language codes
ISO 639-1	he
ISO 639-2	heb
ISO 639-3	Either: heb – Modern Hebrew hbo – Ancient Hebrew
Linguasphere	12-AAB-a
This page contains IPA phonetic symbols in Unicode. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Unicode characters.

Hebrew street sign, above in Hebrew alphabet, below in Latin letter transliteration

Hebrew (/ˈhiːbruː/) (עִבְרִית, Ivrit,  Hebrew pronunciation (help·info)) is a West Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Culturally, it is considered by Jews and other religious groups as the language of the Jewish people, although other Jewish languages had originated among diaspora Jews, and the Hebrew language was also used by non-Jewish groups, such as the ethnically related Samaritans.

Modern Hebrew is spoken by most of the eight million people in Israel, while Classical Hebrew is used for prayer or study in Jewish communities around the world. The language is attested from the 10th century BCE ^[2] to the late Second Temple period, after which the language developed into Mishnaic Hebrew. Modern Hebrew is one of the official languages of Israel, along with Arabic.

Ancient Hebrew is also the liturgical tongue of the Samaritans, while modern Hebrew or Arabic is their vernacular, though today only about 700 Samaritans remain. As a foreign language it is studied mostly by Jews and students of Judaism and Israel, archaeologists and linguists specializing in the Middle East and its civilizations, by theologians, and in Christian seminaries.

The core of the Torah (the first five books of the Hebrew Bible), and most of the rest of the Hebrew Bible, is written in Classical Hebrew, and much of its present form is specifically the dialect of Biblical Hebrew that scholars believe flourished around the 6th century BCE, around the time of the Babylonian exile. For this reason, Hebrew has been referred to by Jews as Leshon HaKodesh (לשון הקודש), "The Holy Language", since ancient times.

Naming[link]

The modern word "Hebrew" is derived from the word "ʕibri" (plural "ʕibrim") one of several names for the Jewish people. It is traditionally understood to be an adjective based on the name of Abraham's supposed ancestor, Eber ("ʕebr" עבר in Hebrew) mentioned in Genesis 10:21. This name is possibly based upon the root "ʕ-b-r" (עבר) meaning "to cross over". Interpretations of the term "ʕibrim" link it to this verb; cross over and homiletical or the people who crossed over the river Euphrates.^[3]

In the Bible, the Hebrew language is called Yәhudit (יהודית) because Judah (Yәhuda) was the surviving kingdom at the time of the quotation, late 8th century BCE (Is 36, 2 Kings 18). In Isaiah 19:18, it is also called the "Language of Canaan" (שְׂפַת כְּנַעַן).

History[link]

Hebrew belongs to the Canaanite group of languages. In turn the Canaanite languages are a branch of the Northwest Semitic family of languages.^[4]

Hebrew flourished as a spoken language in the kingdoms of Israel and Judah during the 10th to 7th centuries BCE. Scholars debate the degree to which Hebrew was a spoken vernacular in ancient times following the Babylonian exile, when the predominant language in the region was Old Aramaic.

Hebrew was nearly extinct as a spoken language by Late Antiquity, but it continued to be used as a literary language and as the liturgical language of Judaism, evolving various dialects of literary Medieval Hebrew, until its revival as a spoken language in the late 19th century.

Oldest Hebrew inscriptions[link]

In July 2008 Israeli archaeologist Yossi Garfinkel discovered a ceramic shard at Khirbet Qeiyafa which he claimed may be the earliest Hebrew writing yet discovered, dating around 3000 years ago.^[5][6] Hebrew University archaeologist Amihai Mazar said that the inscription was “proto-Canaanite" but cautioned that, "The differentiation between the scripts, and between the languages themselves in that period, remains unclear,” and suggested that calling the text Hebrew might be going too far.^[7]

The Gezer calendar also dates back to the 10th century BCE at the beginning of the Monarchic Period, the traditional time of the reign of David and Solomon. Classified as Archaic Biblical Hebrew, the calendar presents a list of seasons and related agricultural activities. The Gezer calendar (named after the city in whose proximity it was found) is written in an old Semitic script, akin to the Phoenician one that through the Greeks and Etruscans later became the Roman script. The Gezer calendar is written without any vowels, and it does not use consonants to imply vowels even in the places where later Hebrew spelling requires it.

The Shebna lintel, from the tomb of a royal steward found in Siloam, dates to the 7th century BCE.

Numerous older tablets have been found in the region with similar scripts written in other Semitic languages, for example Protosinaitic. It is believed that the original shapes of the script go back to Egyptian hieroglyphs, though the phonetic values are instead inspired by the acrophonic principle. The common ancestor of Hebrew and Phoenician is called Canaanite, and was the first to use a Semitic alphabet distinct from Egyptian. One ancient document is the famous Moabite Stone written in the Moabite dialect; the Siloam Inscription, found near Jerusalem, is an early example of Hebrew. Less ancient samples of Archaic Hebrew include the ostraca found near Lachish which describe events preceding the final capture of Jerusalem by Nebuchadnezzar and the Babylonian captivity of 586 BCE.

Classical Hebrew[link]

In its widest sense, Classical Hebrew means the spoken language of ancient Israel flourishing between the 10th century BCE and the turn of the 4th century CE.^[8] It comprises several evolving and overlapping dialects. The phases of Classical Hebrew are often named after important literary works associated with them.

• Archaic Biblical Hebrew from the 10th to the 6th century BCE, corresponding to the Monarchic Period until the Babylonian Exile and represented by certain texts in the Hebrew Bible (Tanach), notably the Song of Moses (Exodus 15) and the Song of Deborah (Judges 5). Also called Old Hebrew or Paleo-Hebrew. It was written in a form of the Canaanite script. (A script descended from this is still used by the Samaritans, see Samaritan Hebrew language.)

Biblical Hebrew script

• Standard Biblical Hebrew around the 8th to 6th centuries BCE, corresponding to the late Monarchic period and the Babylonian Exile. It is represented by the bulk of the Hebrew Bible that attains much of its present form around this time. Also called Standard Biblical Hebrew, Early Biblical Hebrew, Classical Biblical Hebrew (or Classical Hebrew in the narrowest sense).
• Late Biblical Hebrew, from the 5th to the 3rd centuries BCE, that corresponds to the Persian Period and is represented by certain texts in the Hebrew Bible, notably the books of Ezra and Nehemiah. Basically similar to Classical Biblical Hebrew, apart from a few foreign words adopted for mainly governmental terms, and some syntactical innovations such as the use of the particle shel (of, belonging to). It adopted the Imperial Aramaic script.
• Israelian Hebrew is a proposed northern dialect of biblical Hebrew, attested in all eras of the language, in some cases competing with late biblical Hebrew as an explanation for non-standard linguistic features of biblical texts.
• Dead Sea Scroll Hebrew from the 3rd century BCE to the 1st century CE, corresponding to the Hellenistic and Roman Periods before the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem and represented by the Qumran Scrolls that form most (but not all) of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Commonly abbreviated as DSS Hebrew, also called Qumran Hebrew. The Imperial Aramaic script of the earlier scrolls in the 3rd century BCE evolved into the Hebrew square script of the later scrolls in the 1st century CE, also known as ketav Ashuri (Assyrian script), still in use today.
• Mishnaic Hebrew from the 1st to the 3rd or 4th century CE, corresponding to the Roman Period after the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem and represented by the bulk of the Mishnah and Tosefta within the Talmud and by the Dead Sea Scrolls, notably the Bar Kokhba Letters and the Copper Scroll. Also called Tannaitic Hebrew or Early Rabbinic Hebrew.

Sometimes the above phases of spoken Classical Hebrew are simplified into "Biblical Hebrew" (including several dialects from the 10th century BCE to 2nd century BCE and extant in certain Dead Sea Scrolls) and "Mishnaic Hebrew" (including several dialects from the 3rd century BCE to the 3rd century CE and extant in certain other Dead Sea Scrolls).^[9] However, today, most Hebrew linguists classify Dead Sea Scroll Hebrew as a set of dialects evolving out of Late Biblical Hebrew and into Mishnaic Hebrew, thus including elements from both but remaining distinct from either.^[10] By the start of the Byzantine Period in the 4th century CE, Classical Hebrew ceases as a regularly spoken language, roughly a century after the publication of the Mishnah, apparently declining since the aftermath of the catastrophic Bar Kokhba War around 135 CE.

Around the 6th century BCE, the Neo-Babylonian Empire conquered the ancient Kingdom of Judah, destroying much of Jerusalem and exiling its population far to the East in Babylon. During the Babylonian captivity, many Israelites were enslaved within the Babylonian Empire and learned the closely related Semitic language of their captors, Aramaic. The Babylonians had taken mainly the governing classes of Israel while leaving behind presumably more-compliant farmers and laborers to work the land.^{[citation needed]} Thus for a significant period, the Jewish elite became influenced by Aramaic.^[11] (see below, Aramaic spoken among Israelites).

After Cyrus the Great conquered Babylon, he released the Jewish people from captivity. "The King of Kings" or Great King of Persia, later gave the Israelites permission to return. As a result, a local version of Aramaic came to be spoken in Israel alongside Hebrew, also the Assyrian empire before that caused Israel to speak a variant of Aramaic for trade, in Israel-Judea these languages co-mingled. The Greek Era saw a brief ban on the Hebrew language until the period of the Hasmoneans. By the beginning of the Common Era, Aramaic was the primary colloquial language of Samarian, Babylonian and Galileen Jews, western and intellectual Jews spoke Greek,^{[citation needed]} but a form of so-called Rabbinic Hebrew continued to be used as a vernacular in Judea until it was displaced by Aramaic, probably in the 3rd century CE, certain Sadducee, Pharisee, Scribe, Hermit, Zealot and Priest classes maintained an insistence on Hebrew, all Jews maintained their identity with Hebrew songs, and simple easy to remember quotes from the Hebrew texts.^[12][13][14] (other opinions on the exact date range from the 4th-century BCE to the end of the Roman period).

Jewish diaspora[link]

Rashi script

While there is no doubt that at a certain point, Hebrew was displaced as the everyday spoken language of most Jews, and that its chief successor in the Middle East was the closely related Aramaic language, then Greek^{[12][note 1]}, scholarly opinions on the exact dating of that shift have changed very much.^[15] In the early half of the 20th century, most scholars followed Geiger and Dalman in thinking that Aramaic became a spoken language in the land of Israel as early as by the start of Israel's Hellenistic Period in the 4th century BCE, and that as a corollary Hebrew ceased to function as a spoken language around the same time. Segal, Klausner, and Ben Yehuda are notable exceptions to this view. During the latter half of the 20th century, accumulating archaeological evidence and especially linguistic analysis of the Dead Sea Scrolls has disproven that view. The Dead Sea Scrolls, uncovered in 1946-1948 near Qumran revealed ancient Jewish texts overwhelmingly in Hebrew, not Aramaic. The Qumran scrolls indicate that Hebrew texts were readily understandable to the average Israelite, and that the language had evolved since Biblical times as spoken languages do.^{[note 2]}. Recent scholarship recognizes that reports of Jews speaking in Aramaic indicates a multi-lingual society, not necessarily the primary language spoken. Alongside Aramaic, Hebrew co-existed within Israel as a spoken language.^[17] Most scholars now date the demise of Hebrew as a spoken language to the end of the Roman Period, or about 200 CE.^[18] It continued on as a literary language down through Byzantine Period from the 4th century CE. Many Hebrew linguists even postulate the survival of Hebrew as a spoken language until the Byzantine Period^[who?], but some historians do not accept this.^[who?]

The exact roles of Aramaic and Hebrew remain hotly debated. A trilingual scenario has been proposed for the land of Israel. Hebrew functioned as the local mother tongue with powerful ties to Israel's history, origins, and golden age and as the language of Israel's religion; Aramaic functioned as the international language with the rest of the Mideast; and eventually Greek functioned as another international language with the eastern areas of the Roman Empire.^{[citation needed]} Communities of Jews (and non-Jews) are known, who immigrated to Judea from these other lands and continued to speak Aramaic or Greek. According to another summary, Greek was the language of government, Hebrew the language of prayer, study and religious texts, and Aramaic was the language of legal contracts and trade.^[19] There was also geographic pattern: by the beginning of the Common Era, "Judeo-Aramaic was mainly used in Galilee in the north, Greek was concentrated in the former colonies and around governmental centers, and Hebrew monolingualism continued mainly in the southern villages and no man's land of Judea."^[12] In other words, "in terms of dialect geography, at the time of the tannaim Palestine could be divided into the Aramaic-speaking regions of Galilee and Samaria and a smaller area, Judaea, in which Rabbinic Hebrew was used among the descendants of returning exiles."^[13][14] In addition, it has been surmised that Koine Greek was the primary vehicle of communication in coastal cities and among the upper class of Jerusalem, and Aramaic was prevalent in the lower class of Jerusalem, but not in the surrounding countryside.^[19] After the suppression of the Bar Kokhba revolt, Judaeans were forced to disperse and many relocated to Galilee, so most remaining native speakers of Hebrew at that last stage would have been found in the north.^[20]

The Christian New Testament contains some clearly Aramaic place names and quotes.^[21] Although the language of such Semitic glosses (and in general the language spoken by Jews in scenes from the New Testament) is usually referred to as "Hebrew"/"Jewish" in the text,^[22] this term often seems to refer to Aramaic instead^{[note 3][note 4]} and is rendered accordingly in recent translations.^[24] Nonetheless, many glosses can be interpreted as Hebrew as well; and it has been argued that Hebrew, rather than Aramaic, lay behind the composition of the Gospel of Matthew.^[25] (See the Hebrew Gospel hypothesis or Aramaic of Jesus for more details on Hebrew and Aramaic in the gospels.)

Mishnah and Talmud[link]

The term generally refers to the Hebrew dialects found in the Talmud תלמוד, excepting quotations from the Hebrew Bible. The dialects organize into Mishnaic Hebrew (also called Tannaitic Hebrew, Early Rabbinic Hebrew, or Mishnaic Hebrew I), which was a spoken language, and Amoraic Hebrew (also called Late Rabbinic Hebrew or Mishnaic Hebrew II), which was a literary language. The earlier section of the Talmud is the Mishnah משנה that was published around 200 CE, though many of the stories take place much earlier, and was written in the earlier Mishnaic dialect. The dialect is also found in certain Dead Sea Scrolls. Mishnaic Hebrew is considered to be one of the dialects of Classical Hebrew that functioned as a living language in the land of Israel. A transitional form of the language occurs in the other works of Tannaitic literature dating from the century beginning with the completion of the Mishnah. These include the halachic Midrashim (Sifra, Sifre, Mechilta etc.) and the expanded collection of Mishnah-related material known as the Tosefta תוספתא. The Talmud contains excerpts from these works, as well as further Tannaitic material not attested elsewhere; the generic term for these passages is Baraitot. The dialect of all these works is very similar to Mishnaic Hebrew.

About a century after the publication of the Mishnah, Mishnaic Hebrew fell into disuse as a spoken language. The later section of the Talmud, the Gemara גמרא, generally comments on the Mishnah and Baraitot in two forms of Aramaic. Nevertheless, Hebrew survived as a liturgical and literary language in the form of later Amoraic Hebrew, which sometimes occurs in the text of the Gemara.

Because as early as the Torah's transcription the Scribe has been the highest position in Judaism, Hebrew was always regarded as the language of Israel's religion, history and national pride, and after it faded as a spoken language, it continued to be used as a lingua franca among scholars and Jews traveling in foreign countries throughout history.^[26] After the 2nd century CE when the Roman Empire exiled most of the Jewish population of Jerusalem following the Bar Kokhba revolt, the Israelites adapted to the societies in which they found themselves, yet letters, contracts, commerce, science, philosophy, medicine, poetry, and laws continued to be written mostly in Hebrew, which adapted by borrowing and inventing terms.

Medieval Hebrew[link]

Aleppo Codex: 10th century Hebrew Bible with Masoretic pointing (Joshua 1:1).

After the Talmud, various regional literary dialects of Medieval Hebrew evolved. The most important is Tiberian Hebrew or Masoretic Hebrew, a local dialect of Tiberias in Galilee that became the standard for vocalizing the Hebrew Bible and thus still influences all other regional dialects of Hebrew. This Tiberian Hebrew from the 7th to 10th century CE is sometimes called "Biblical Hebrew" because it is used to pronounce the Hebrew Bible; however properly it should be distinguished from the historical Biblical Hebrew of the 6th century BCE, whose original pronunciation must be reconstructed. Tiberian Hebrew incorporates the remarkable scholarship of the Masoretes (from masoret meaning "tradition"), who added vowel points and grammar points to the Hebrew letters to preserve much earlier features of Hebrew, for use in chanting the Hebrew Bible. The Masoretes inherited a biblical text whose letters were considered too sacred to be altered, so their markings were in the form of pointing in and around the letters. The Syriac alphabet, precursor to the Arabic alphabet, also developed vowel pointing systems around this time. The Aleppo Codex, a Hebrew Bible with the Masoretic pointing, was written in the 10th century likely in Tiberias and survives to this day. It is perhaps the most important Hebrew manuscript in existence.

In the Golden age of Jewish culture in Spain important work was done by grammarians in explaining the grammar and vocabulary of Biblical Hebrew; much of this was based on the work of the grammarians of Classical Arabic. Important Hebrew grammarians were Judah ben David Hayyuj, Jonah ibn Janah and later (in Provence) David Kimhi. A great deal of poetry was written, by poets such as Dunash ben Labrat, Solomon ibn Gabirol, Judah ha-Levi and the two Ibn Ezras, in a "purified" Hebrew based on the work of these grammarians, and in Arabic quantitative or strophic meters. This literary Hebrew was later used by Italian Jewish poets.^[27]

The need to express scientific and philosophical concepts from Classical Greek and Medieval Arabic motivated Medieval Hebrew to borrow terminology and grammar from these other languages, or to coin equivalent terms from existing Hebrew roots, giving rise to a distinct style of philosophical Hebrew. This is used in the translations made by the Ibn Tibbon family. (Original Jewish philosophical works were usually written in Arabic.) Another important influence was Maimonides, who developed a simple style based on Mishnaic Hebrew for use in his law code, the Mishneh Torah. Subsequent rabbinic literature is written in a blend between this style and the Aramaized Rabbinic Hebrew of the Talmud.

Hebrew persevered through the ages as the main language for written purposes by all Jewish communities around the world for a large range of uses - not only liturgy, but also poetry, philosophy, science and medicine, commerce, daily correspondence and contracts. There have been, of course, many deviations from this generalization such as Bar Kokhba's letters to his lieutenants, which were mostly in Aramaic,^[28] and Maimonides' writings, which were mostly in Arabic;^[29] but overall, Hebrew did not cease to be used for such purposes. This meant not only that well-educated Jews in all parts of the world could correspond in a mutually intelligible language, and that books and legal documents published or written in any part of the world could be read by Jews in all other parts, but that an educated Jew could travel and converse with Jews in distant places, just as priests and other educated Christians could once converse in Latin.^[30]

Revival[link]

Hebrew has been 'revived' several times as a literary language, and most significantly by the Haskalah (Enlightenment) movement of early and mid-19th century Germany. Near the end of that century the Jewish activist Eliezer Ben-Yehuda, owing to the ideology of the national revival (Shivat Tziyon,^{[note 5]} later Zionism), began reviving Hebrew as a modern spoken language. Eventually, as a result of the local movement he created, but more significantly as a result of the new groups of immigrants known under the name of the Second Aliyah, it replaced a score of languages spoken by Jews at that time. Those languages were Jewish dialects such as the Judeo-Spanish language (also called Judezmo or Ladino), Yiddish, Judeo-Arabic, and Bukharian language, or local languages spoken in the Jewish diaspora such as Russian, Persian, and Arabic.

The major result of the literary work of the Hebrew intellectuals along the 19th century was a lexical modernization of Hebrew. New words and expressions were adapted as neologisms from the large corpus of Hebrew writings since the Hebrew Bible, or borrowed from Turkish and Arabic (mainly by Eliezer Ben-Yehuda) and older Aramaic and Latin. Many new words were either borrowed from or coined after European languages, especially English, Russian, German, and French. Modern Hebrew became an official language in British-ruled Palestine in 1921 (along with English and Arabic), and then in 1948 became an official language of the newly declared State of Israel. Hebrew is the most widely spoken language in Israel today.

In the Modern Period, from the 19th century onward, the literary Hebrew tradition as pronounced in Jerusalem revived as the spoken language of modern Israel, called variously Israeli Hebrew, Modern Israeli Hebrew, Modern Hebrew, New Hebrew, Israeli Standard Hebrew, Standard Hebrew, and so on. Israeli Hebrew exhibits many features of Sephardic Hebrew from its local Jerusalemite tradition but adapts it with numerous neologisms, borrowed terms (often technical) from European languages and adopted terms (often colloquial) from Arabic.

Eliezer Ben-Yehuda

The literary and narrative use of Hebrew was revived beginning with the Haskalah (Enlightenment) movement. The first secular periodical in Hebrew, Hameassef (The Gatherer), was published by Maskilim literati in Königsberg (today's Kaliningrad) from 1783 onwards.^[31] In the mid-19th century, publications of several Eastern European Hebrew-language newspapers (e.g. HaMagid, founded in Lyck, Prussia, in 1856) multiplied. Prominent poets were Chaim Nachman Bialik and Shaul Tchernichovsky; there were also novels written in the language.

The revival of the Hebrew language as a mother tongue was initiated in the late 19th century by the efforts of Eliezer Ben-Yehuda. He joined the Jewish national movement and in 1881 immigrated to Palestine, then a part of the Ottoman Empire. Motivated by the surrounding ideals of renovation and rejection of the diaspora "shtetl" lifestyle, Ben-Yehuda set out to develop tools for making the literary and liturgical language into everyday spoken language. However, his brand of Hebrew followed norms that had been replaced in Eastern Europe by different grammar and style, in the writings of people like Achad Ha-Am and others. His organizational efforts and involvement with the establishment of schools and the writing of textbooks pushed the vernacularization activity into a gradually accepted movement. It was not, however, until the 1904-1914 Second Aliyah that Hebrew had caught real momentum in Ottoman Palestine with the more highly organized enterprises set forth by the new group of immigrants. When the British Mandate of Palestine recognized Hebrew as one of the country's three official languages (English, Arabic, and Hebrew, in 1922), its new formal status contributed to its diffusion. A constructed modern language with a truly Semitic vocabulary and written appearance, although often European in phonology, was to take its place among the current languages of the nations.

While many saw his work as fanciful or even blasphemous^[32] (because Hebrew was the holy language of the Torah and therefore some thought that it should not be used to discuss everyday matters), many soon understood the need for a common language amongst Jews of the British Mandate who at the turn of the 20th century were arriving in large numbers from diverse countries and speaking different languages. A Committee of the Hebrew Language was established. After the establishment of Israel, it became the Academy of the Hebrew Language. The results of Ben-Yehuda's lexicographical work were published in a dictionary (The Complete Dictionary of Ancient and Modern Hebrew). The seeds of Ben-Yehuda's work fell on fertile ground, and by the beginning of the 20th century, Hebrew was well on its way to becoming the main language of the Jewish population of both Ottoman and British Palestine. At the time, members of the Old Yishuv and a very few Hasidic sects, most notably those under the auspices of Satmar, refused to speak Hebrew and only spoke Yiddish. There still remains a sizable population in Jerusalem, particularly in the Meah Shearim area, that still prefers to stick to the language of the original settlers of the area, Yiddish. They only learn enough Hebrew to speak to shopkeepers and get jobs.^{[citation needed]}

Modern Hebrew[link]

Hebrew signs on an Israeli highway

Standard Hebrew, as developed by Eliezer Ben-Yehuda, was based on Mishnaic spelling and Sephardi Hebrew pronunciation. However, the earliest speakers of Modern Hebrew had Yiddish as their native language and often brought into Hebrew idioms and literal translations from Yiddish.

The pronunciation of modern Israeli Hebrew is based mostly on the Sephardic Hebrew pronunciation. However, the language has adapted to Ashkenazi Hebrew phonology in some respects, mainly the following:

• the elimination of pharyngeal articulation in the letters chet (ח) and ayin (ע) by many speakers.
• the conversion of (ר) /r/ from an alveolar flap [ɾ] to a voiced uvular fricative [ʁ] or trill [ʀ], by most of the speakers. see Guttural R
• the pronunciation (by many speakers) of tzere ֵ as [eɪ] in some contexts (sifrey and teysha instead of Sephardic sifré and tésha)
• the partial elimination of vocal Shva ְ (zman instead of Sephardic zĕman)^[33]
• in popular speech, penultimate stress in proper names (Dvóra instead of Dĕvorá; Yehúda instead of Yĕhudá) and some other words^[34]
• similarly in popular speech, penultimate stress in verb forms with a second person plural suffix (katávtem "you wrote" instead of kĕtavtém).^{[note 6]}

In Israel, Modern Hebrew is currently taught in institutions called Ulpanim (singular: Ulpan). There are government owned as well as private Ulpanim offering online courses and face-to-face programs.

Status[link]

Modern Hebrew is, along with Arabic, an official language of the State of Israel.

The Soviet authorities considered the use of Hebrew "reactionary" since it was associated with both Judaism and Zionism, and the teaching of Hebrew at primary and secondary schools was officially banned by the Narkompros (Commissariat of Education) as early as 1919, as part of an overall agenda aiming to secularize education (the language itself did not cease to be studied at universities for historical and linguistic purposes^[35]). The official ordinance stated that Yiddish, being the spoken language of the Russian Jews, should be treated as their only national language, while Hebrew was to be treated as a foreign language.^[36] Hebrew books and periodicals ceased to be published and were seized from the libraries, although liturgical texts were still published until the 1930s. Despite numerous protests,^[37] a policy of suppression of the teaching of Hebrew operated from the 1930s on. Later in the 1980s in the USSR, Hebrew studies reappeared due to people struggling for permission to go to Israel (refuseniks). Several of the teachers were imprisoned, for example, Ephraim Kholmyansky, Yevgeny Korostyshevsky and others responsible for a Hebrew learning network connecting many cities of USSR.

Phonology[link]

Biblical Hebrew had a typical Semitic consonant inventory, with pharyngeal /ʕ ħ/, a series of "emphatic" consonants (possibly ejective, but this is debated), lateral fricative /ɬ/, and in its older stages also uvular /χ ʁ/. /χ ʁ/ merged into /ħ ʕ/ in later Biblical Hebrew, and /b ɡ d k p t/ underwent allophonic spirantization to [v ɣ ð x f θ] (known as begadkefat spirantization). The earliest Biblical Hebrew vowel system contained the Proto-Semitic vowels /a aː i iː u uː/ as well as /oː/, but this system changed dramatically over time.

By the early Middle Ages, /ɬ/ had shifted to /s/ in the Jewish traditions, though for the Samaritans it merged with /ʃ/ instead. The Tiberian reading tradition of the Middle Ages had the vowel system /a ɛ e i ɔ o u ă ɔ̆ ɛ̆/, though other Medieval reading traditions had fewer vowels.

A number of reading traditions have been preserved in liturgical use. In Oriental (Sephardi and Mizrahi) Jewish reading traditions, the emphatic consonants are realized as pharyngealized, while the Ashkenazi (eastern European) traditions have lost emphatics and pharyngeals, and show the shift of /w/ to /v/. The Samaritan tradition has a complex vowel system which does not correspond closely to the Tiberian systems.

Modern Hebrew pronunciation developed from a mixture of the different Jewish reading traditions, generally tending towards simplification. Emphatic consonants have shifted to their ordinary counterparts, /w/ to /v/, and [ɣ ð θ] are not present. Many Israelis merge /ʕ ħ/ with /ʔ χ/, do not have contrastive gemination, and pronounce /r/ as a uvular trill [ʀ] rather than an alveolar trill, as in many varieties of Ashkenazi Hebrew. The consonants /tʃ dʒ/ have become phonemic due to loan words, and /w/ has similarly been re-introduced.

Hebrew grammar[link]

Hebrew grammar is partly analytic, expressing such forms as dative, ablative, and accusative using prepositional particles rather than grammatical cases. However, inflection plays a decisive role in the formation of the verbs and nouns. E.g. nouns have a construct state, called "smikhut", to denote the relationship of "belonging to": this is the converse of the genitive case of more inflected languages. Words in smikhut are often combined with hyphens. In modern speech, the use of the construct is sometimes interchangeable with the preposition "shel", meaning "of". There are many cases, however, where older declined forms are retained (especially in idiomatic expressions and the like), and "person"-enclitics are widely used to "decline" prepositions.

Morphology[link]

Like all Semitic languages, the Hebrew language exhibits a pattern of stems consisting typically of "triliteral", or 3-consonant consonantal roots (2- and 4-consonant roots also exist), from which nouns, adjectives, and verbs are formed in various ways: e.g. by inserting vowels, doubling consonants, lengthening vowels, and/or adding prefixes, suffixes, or infixes.

Hebrew uses a number of one-letter prefixes that are added to words for various purposes. These are called inseparable prepositions or "Letters of Use" (Hebrew: אותיות השימוש, Otiyot HaShimush). Such items include: the definite article ha- (/ha/) (="the"); prepositions be- (/bə/) (="in"), le- (/lə/) (="to"), mi- (/mi/) (="from"; a shortened version of the preposition min); conjunctions ve- (/və/) (="and"), she- (/ʃe/) (="that"), ke- (/kə/) (="as", "like").

The vowel accompanying each of these letters may differ from those listed above, depending on the first letter or vowel following it. The rules governing these changes, hardly observed in colloquial speech as most speakers tend to employ the regular form, may be heard in more formal circumstances. For example, if a preposition is put before a word which begins with a moving Shva, then the preposition takes the vowel /i/ (and the initial consonant may be weakened): colloquial be-kfar (="in a village") corresponds to the more formal bi-khfar.

The definite article may be inserted between a preposition or a conjunction and the word it refers to, creating composite words like mé-ha-kfar (="from the village"). The latter also demonstrates the change in the vowel of mi-. With be and le, the definite article is assimilated into the prefix, which then becomes ba or la. Thus *be-ha-matos becomes ba-matos (="in the plane"). Note that this does not happen to mé (the form of "min" or "mi-" used before the letter "he"), therefore mé-ha-matos is a valid form, which means "from the airplane".

* indicates that the given example is grammatically non standard.

Syntax[link]

Like most other languages, the vocabulary of the Hebrew language is divided into verbs, nouns, adjectives, and so on, and its sentence structure can be analyzed by terms like object, subject, and so on. However, speakers of languages such as English, French, Urdu or Persian may find the structure of Hebrew sentences quite surprising.

• Many Hebrew sentences have a few correct orders of words. One can change the order of the words in the sentence and keep the same meaning. For example, the sentence "Dad went working", in Hebrew, includes a word for Dad (אבא aba), for went (הלך halaḵ), and for working (to the working place = לעבודה la-ʿavoda). However, unlike in English, you can put those three words almost in any combination (אבא הלך לעבודה‎/ לעבודה אבא הלך‎/ לעבודה הלך אבא‎/ הלך אבא לעבודה and so on).
• In Hebrew, there is no word that is supposed to come before every singular noun.
• Hebrew sentences do not have to include verbs; the verb To Be in present tense is omitted (although might be implied). For example, the sentence "I am here" (אני פה ani po) has only two words; one for I (אני) and one for here (פה). In the sentence "I am that person" (אני הוא אדם זה ani hu adam ze), the word for "am" corresponds to the word for "he" (הוא).
• Unlike the verb "to have" in English, none of the possession terms in Hebrew is a verb.

Writing system[link]

Hebrew alphabet

Modern Hebrew is written from right to left using the Hebrew alphabet, which is an abjad, or consonant-only script of 22 letters. The ancient paleo-Hebrew alphabet is similar to those used for Canaanite and Phoenician. Modern scripts are based on the "square" letter form, known as Ashurit (Assyrian), which was developed from the Aramaic script. A cursive Hebrew script is used in handwriting: the letters tend to be more circular in form when written in cursive, and sometimes vary markedly from their printed equivalents. The medieval version of the cursive script forms the basis of another style, known as Rashi script. When necessary, vowels are indicated by diacritic marks above or below the letter representing the syllabic onset, or by use of matres lectionis, which are consonantal letters used as vowels. Further diacritics are used to indicate variations in the pronunciation of the consonants (e.g. bet/vet, shin/sin); and, in some contexts, to indicate the punctuation, accentuation, and musical rendition of Biblical texts (see Cantillation).

Hebrew in Judaism[link]

According to some Jewish religious traditions, Hebrew was the language of the creation.^[38][39] Likewise, Hebrew is considered to be the one language spoken by the united mankind before the dispersion connected with the Tower of Babel.^[39][40] According to Jewish esoteric teachings, the Hebrew letters are the lifeforce of all things created, determining their essence.^[41]

Liturgical use[link]

	Audio example of liturgical Hebrew noicon This is a portion of the blessing that is traditionally chanted before the Aliyah La-Torah (reading of the Torah).
Problems listening to this file? See media help.

Hebrew has always been used as the language of prayer and study, and the following pronunciation systems are found.

Ashkenazi Hebrew, originating in Central and Eastern Europe, is still widely used in Ashkenazi Jewish religious services and studies in Israel and abroad, particularly in the Haredi and other Orthodox communities. It was influenced by the Yiddish language.

Sephardi Hebrew is the traditional pronunciation of the Spanish and Portuguese Jews and Sephardi Jews in the countries of the former Ottoman Empire. This pronunciation, in the form used by the Jerusalem Sephardic community, is the basis of the Hebrew phonology of Israeli native speakers. It was influenced by the Judezmo language.

Mizrahi (Oriental) Hebrew is actually a collection of dialects spoken liturgically by Jews in various parts of the Arab and Islamic world. It was possibly influenced by the Aramaic and Arabic languages, and in some cases by Sephardi Hebrew, although some linguists maintain that it is the direct heir of Biblical Hebrew and thus represents the true dialect of Hebrew. The same claim is sometimes made for Yemenite Hebrew or Temanit, which differs from other Mizrahi dialects by having a radically different vowel system, and distinguishing between different diacritically marked consonants that are pronounced identically in other dialects (for example gimel and "ghimel".)

These pronunciations are still used in synagogue ritual and religious study, in Israel and elsewhere, mostly by people who are not native speakers of Hebrew, though some traditionalist Israelis are bi-dialectal.

Many synagogues in the diaspora, even though Ashkenazi by rite and by ethnic composition, have adopted the "Sephardic" pronunciation in deference to Israeli Hebrew. However, in many British and American schools and synagogues, this pronunciation retains several elements of its Ashkenazi substrate, especially the distinction between tsere and segol.

See also[link]

• Revival of the Hebrew language
• Cantillation
• Cursive Hebrew
• Hebraization of English
• Hebrew acronyms
• Hebrew alphabet
• Hebrew literature
• Biblical Hebrew phonology
• Modern Hebrew phonology
• Jewish languages
• Romanization of Hebrew
• Study of the Hebrew language

Notes[link]

1. ^ Sáenz-Badillos, Ángel and John Elwolde: "There is general agreement that two main periods of RH (Rabbinical Hebrew) can be distinguished. The first, which lasted until the close of the Tannaitic era (around 200 CE), is characterized by RH as a spoken language gradually developing into a literary medium in which the Mishnah, Tosefta, baraitot and Tannaitic midrashim would be composed. The second stage begins with the Amoraim, and sees RH being replaced by Aramaic as the spoken vernacular, surviving only as a literary language. Then it continued to be used in later rabbinic writings until the tenth century in, for example, the Hebrew portions of the two Talmuds and in midrashic and haggadic literature."^[13]
2. ^ Fernández & Elwolde: "It is generally believed that the Dead Sea Scrolls, specifically the Copper Scroll and also the Bar Kokhba letters, have furnished clear evidence of the popular character of MH [Mishnaic Hebrew]."^[16]
3. ^ The Cambridge History of Judaism: "Thus in certain sources Aramaic words are termed "Hebrew," ... For example: η επιλεγομενη εβραιστι βηθεσδα "which is called in the Hebrew tongue Bethesda" (John 5.2). This is not a Hebrew name but rather an Aramaic one: בית חסדא, "the house of Hisda".^[17]
4. ^ Fitzmyer, Joseph A.: "The adverb ἐβραïστὶ (and its related expressions) seems to mean 'in Hebrew', and it has often been argued that it means this and nothing more. As is well known, it is used at times with words and expressions that are clearly Aramaic. Thus in John 19:13, ἐβραιστὶ δὲ Γαββαθᾶ is given as an explanation of the Lithostrotos, and γαββαθᾶ is a Grecized form of the Aramaic word gabbětā, 'raised place.'"^[23]
5. ^ "Shivat", from "Lashoov", "Shav", returning. "Tziyon" is the Hebraic pronunciation of "Zion".
6. ^ These pronunciations may have originated in learners' mistakes formed on the analogy of other suffixed forms (katávta, alénu), rather than being examples of residual Ashkenazi influence.

References[link]

Bibliography[link]

• Hoffman, Joel M, In the Beginning: A Short History of the Hebrew Language. New York: NYU Press. ISBN 0-8147-3654-8.
• Izre'el, Shlomo, "The emergence of Spoken Israeli Hebrew", in: Benjamin Hary (ed.), The Corpus of Spoken Israeli Hebrew (CoSIH): Working Papers I (2001)
• Kuzar, Ron, Hebrew and Zionism: A Discourse Analytic Cultural Study. Berlin & New York: Mouton de Gruyter 2001. ISBN 3-11-016993-2, ISBN 3-11-016992-4.
• Laufer, Asher. "Hebrew", in: Handbook of the International Phonetic Association. Cambridge University Press 1999. ISBN 0-521-65236-7, ISBN 0-521-63751-1.
• Sáenz-Badillos, Angel, 1993 A History of the Hebrew Language (trans. John Elwolde). Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-55634-1

External links[link]

Look up Category:Hebrew language in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Look up Hebrew in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Hebrew language edition of Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Hebrew edition of Wikisource, the free library

Wikibooks has a book on the topic of Hebrew

• Ancient Hebrew Research Center Research and Learning Hebrew Resources
• Fully Transliterated Modern Hebrew Course (with listing of verb roots and derived verbs)
• Morfix online dictionary
• Early Hebrew Newspapers Thousands of pages of mid- to late-19th-century and early 20th-century newspapers written in Hebrew and readable on line.
• Categorized Hebrew language study resources on the Internet
• Hebrew fonts
• USA Foreign Service Institute (FSI) Hebrew basic course
• History of the Ancient and Modern Hebrew Language, David Steinberg
• Biblical Hebrew Poetry and Word Play – Reconstructing the Original Oral, Aural and Visual Experience
• Short History of the Hebrew Language, Chaim Rabin
• Hebrew Pronunciation - a blog post by Rabbi Gil Student about how Hebrew should be pronounced in prayer (liturgically), in accordance with Halakha and Poskim

lez:Чувуд чӀал

The Greek is a fictional character on the HBO drama The Wire, played by actor Bill Raymond. The Greek is the head of an international criminal organization involved in narcotics and human trafficking.^[1] The Greek is a mysterious figure involved in numerous criminal activities. His given name is never mentioned on the show, and though he is known only as "The Greek", he has stated (in the episode Port in a Storm) that he is not actually Greek. A quiet and unassuming man, the Greek prefers to keep a low profile, operating all of his business through his lieutenant Spiros "Vondas" Vondopoulos. His smuggling organization operated from a small diner in Baltimore for years, and while Vondas would conduct business the Greek would listen in quietly at the counter. Nick Sobotka, upon seeing the Greek identify himself, was amazed that the shadowy figure had been in plain sight the entire time.

Despite his calm appearance, the Greek is cunning and ruthless, and only interested in facts that make him more money. Series creator David Simon has said that The Greek is an embodiment of raw unencumbered capitalism.^[2] Anyone interfering in this process is eliminated immediately, and he prefers to leave victims headless and handless to hinder identification.

The Greek's smuggling operation includes importing sex trade workers, illicit drugs, stolen goods and chemicals for drug processing. He bribes union stevedores to move containers through the Baltimore port for him and uses his muscle, Sergei "Serge" Malatov, to run containers back and forth from the port to his warehouse, a front managed by "Double G" Glekas. The Greek supplies the major drug dealers in East Baltimore with pure cocaine and heroin, using Eton Ben-Eleazer to move his drugs. His chief client is Proposition Joe, but he is also affiliated with smaller drug dealing organizations like those run by "White Mike" McArdle. His sex trade interests in Baltimore include a brothel run by a madam named Ilona Petrovitch, bringing in girls from eastern Europe. He manages to avoid prosecution for his crimes because an FBI counter-terrorism agent named Kristos Koutris tips him off if a criminal investigation gets too close. It is suggested he and Vondas may serve as federal informants.

Biography[link]

Season 2[link]

The Greek began to draw police attention in Baltimore when his contact at the docks, Frank Sobotka, became the target of an investigation. At the same time a container of thirteen dead young women intended for the sex trade was discovered at the docks, triggering a high-profile homicide investigation. The container belonged to the Greek and the girls were killed by a crewman onboard the vessel that had delivered them. The ship's crew had been paying the girls for sex and when one of the girls refused, she was killed. The crewman responsible dumped her overboard and collapsed the air pipe to kill the remaining women. The Greek had Sergei track the crewman down, interrogated him personally, and had Vondas kill him.

As the investigation continued the police were able to link Eton and Sergei to the drug smuggling operation. When police began tracking containers as they left the port, The Greek and Vondas began to close down the operation temporarily by dumping their cell phones and stealing "clean" containers. Persuading Sobotka to keep the smuggling operation going he bought further protection from Agent Koutris by betraying a load of Colombian cocaine, giving him time to destroy incriminating evidence in the warehouse and Glekas' store.

The Greek recognized that the investigation was too extensive to stop and made plans to leave, sending Vondas to assure Proposition Joe that supply of drugs would continue albeit with new faces. He attempted to buy Sobotka's silence with promised legal aid for his son, but when he learned from Koutris that Frank was planning to turn informant he had the union man killed. Although Frank's nephew Nick Sobotka was able to identify The Greek in a photo and Sergei was pressured to give up the location of his hotel suite, Vondas and the Greek had already boarded a flight to Chicago. Aware that the Greek and Vondas were gone, the police left the investigation behind and moved on to the drug dealers he supplied.

Seasons 4 & 5[link]

The Greek continued to supply "Proposition Joe" Stewart, who formed an organization with other drug dealers called the New Day Co-Op to provide The Greek's product to them in exchange for reduced violence and sharing of territory. When Omar Little steals an entire shipment of heroin from the Greek's men as it is being delivered to Stewart's people, Marlo Stanfield demands a meeting with Spiros "Vondas" Vondopoulos in order to allay his fears that Stewart was responsible.^[3][4] Once Stanfield is satisfied, he waits for the Major Crimes Unit's investigation into his activities to cease and then moves to establish a direct relationship with Vondas and the Greek. After getting in communication with Vondas through former soldier Sergei,^[5][6] Marlo eventually sells himself as Joe's replacement by convincing the Greek that he requires an insurance policy in the form of a replacement for Proposition Joe, in the event that anything should happen to him. Realizing that Stanfield will move against Stewart regardless of his approval, the Greek accepts Marlo's proposal to act as an "insurance policy," knowing that it will mean Joe's death.^[7][8]

After Stewart's murder, Stanfield meets with Vondas to initiate their new business relationship.^[9][10] Stanfield's tenure proves short lived when he is forced into retirement by an investigation, and the other Co-Op members purchase the connection from Stanfield. In the closing scenes of the series finale, Slim Charles and Fat-Face Rick take over meeting with Vondas while the Greek listens quietly in the background.^[11][12]

References[link]

Natalie Portman
Portman at the premiere of Black Swan during the 2010 Toronto International Film Festival
Born	Natalie Hershlag (Hebrew: נטלי הרשלג‎) (1981-06-09) June 9, 1981 (age 31) Jerusalem, Israel
Alma mater	Harvard College, A.B. 2003
Occupation	Actress
Years active	1994–present
Agent	International Creative Management, 8942 Wilshire Blvd., Beverly Hills, CA 90211
Spouse	Benjamin Millepied (2012–present)
Children	1
Notes [1]

Natalie Hershlag^[2][3] (Hebrew: נטלי הרשלג‎; born June 9, 1981), better known by her stage name Natalie Portman, is an actress with dual American and Israeli citizenship. Her first role was as an orphan taken in by a hitman in the 1994 French action film Léon, but mainstream success came when she was cast as Padmé Amidala in the Star Wars prequel trilogy (released in 1999, 2002 and 2005).^[4] In 1999, she enrolled at Harvard University to study psychology while still working as an actress.^[5] She completed her bachelor's degree in 2003.

In 2001, Portman opened in New York City's Public Theater production of Anton Chekhov's The Seagull.^[4] In 2005, Portman received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress as well as winning the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress - Motion Picture for the drama Closer. She won a Constellation Award for Best Female Performance, and a Saturn Award for Best Actress for her starring role in V for Vendetta (2006). She played leading roles in the historical dramas Goya's Ghosts (2006) and The Other Boleyn Girl (2008). In May 2008, she served as the youngest member of the 61st Annual Cannes Film Festival jury.^[6] Portman's directorial debut, Eve, opened the 65th Venice International Film Festival's shorts competition in 2008.^[7] Portman directed a segment of the collective film New York, I Love You.

In 2011, Portman won the Academy Award, the Golden Globe Award, the Screen Actors Guild Award, Independent Spirit Awards, and the BAFTA Award for her lead performance as Nina Sayers in Black Swan.

Early life[link]

Portman was born in Jerusalem, Israel.^[8][9][10] She is the only child of Shelley (née Stevens), an American homemaker who works as Portman's agent, and Avner Hershlag, an Israeli citizen who is a fertility specialist and gynecologist.^[11][12][13] Portman's maternal ancestors were Jewish immigrants to the United States, from Austria and Russia (her mother's family had changed their surname from "Edelstein" to "Stevens").^[14] Her paternal ancestors were Jews who moved to Israel from Poland and Romania. Her paternal grandfather, whose parents died at Auschwitz, was an economics professor in Israel, and her Romanian-born great-grandmother was a spy for British Intelligence during World War II.^[15][16]

Portman's parents met at a Jewish student center at Ohio State University, where her mother was selling tickets. They corresponded after her father returned to Israel, and were married when her mother visited a few years later. In 1984, when Portman was three years old, the family moved to the United States, where her father received his medical training.^[13] Portman, a dual citizen of the United States and Israel,^[17] has said that although she "really love[s] the States... my heart's in Jerusalem. That's where I feel at home."^[15]

Portman and her family first lived in Washington, D.C., but relocated to Connecticut in 1988, and then settled on Long Island, New York, in 1990.^{[4][18][19][20]}

Education[link]

In Washington, D.C., Portman attended Charles E. Smith Jewish Day School. Portman learned to speak Hebrew^[21] in addition to English, and attended a Jewish elementary school, the Solomon Schechter Day School of Glen Cove, New York.^[22] She graduated from Syosset High School in Syosset, Long Island, in 1999.^[23][24][25] Portman skipped the premiere of her film Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace so she could study for her high school final exams.^[26]

In 2003, Portman graduated from Harvard College with a A.B. degree in psychology.^{[25][27][28][29]} "I don't care if [college] ruins my career," she told the New York Post. "I'd rather be smart than a movie star."^[30][31] At Harvard, Portman was Alan Dershowitz's research assistant.^[32][33] While attending Harvard, she was a resident of Lowell House^[34] and wrote a letter to the Harvard Crimson in response to an essay critical of Israeli actions toward Palestinians.^[35]

Portman took graduate courses at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in the spring of 2004.^[36] In March 2006, she was a guest lecturer at a Columbia University course in terrorism and counterterrorism, where she spoke about her film V for Vendetta.^[37]

Portman has professed an interest in foreign languages since childhood and has studied French,^[38] Japanese,^[38] German,^[39] and Arabic.^[40]

As a student, Portman co-authored two research papers that were published in scientific journals. Her 1998 high school paper, "A Simple Method to Demonstrate the Enzymatic Production of Hydrogen from Sugar", co-authored with scientists Ian Hurley and Jonathan Woodward, was entered in the Intel Science Talent Search.^[41] In 2002, she contributed to a study on memory called "Frontal Lobe Activation during Object Permanence: Data from Near-Infrared Spectroscopy" during her psychology studies at Harvard.^[42][43] This publication placed Portman among a very small number of professional actors with a defined Erdős–Bacon number.^[42][44][45]

Career[link]

Early work[link]

Portman started dancing lessons at age four^[4] and performed in local troupes. At the age of ten, a Revlon agent asked her to become a child model,^[4][46] but she turned down the offer to focus on acting. In a magazine interview, Portman said that she was "different from the other kids. I was more ambitious, I knew what I liked and what I wanted, and I worked very hard. I was a very serious kid."^[47]

Portman spent her school holidays attending theater camps. When she was ten, she auditioned for the Off-Broadway show Ruthless!, a musical about a girl who is prepared to commit murder to get the lead in a school play. Portman and future pop star Britney Spears were chosen as the understudies for star Laura Bell Bundy.^[36] In 1994, she auditioned for the role of a child who befriends a middle-aged hitman in Luc Besson's film, Léon (aka The Professional). Soon after getting the part, she took her grandmother's maiden name "Portman" as her stage name, in the interest of privacy and to protect her family's identity.^[4][48] Léon opened on November 18, 1994, marking her feature film debut. That same year she appeared in the short film Developing, which aired on television.

1995–99[link]

During the mid-1990s, Portman had roles in the films Heat, Everyone Says I Love You, and Mars Attacks!, as well as a major role in Beautiful Girls.^[4] She was the first choice to play Juliet in William Shakespeare's Romeo + Juliet, but producers felt her age wasn't suitable.^[46] In 1997, Portman played the role of Anne Frank in a Broadway adaptation of The Diary of Anne Frank.

Also in 1997, Portman was cast as Padmé Amidala in the Star Wars prequel trilogy. The first film, The Phantom Menace, began filming in June 1997 and opened in May 1999.^[4][49] Following production on The Phantom Menace, she initially turned down a lead role in the film Anywhere but Here after learning it would involve a sex scene, but director Wayne Wang and actress Susan Sarandon (who played Portman's mother in the film) demanded a rewrite of the script. Portman was shown a new draft, and she decided to accept the role.^[4] The film opened in late 1999, and she received a Golden Globe nomination for Best Supporting Actress for her role as Ann August.^[50] Critic Mary Elizabeth Williams of Salon called Portman "astonishing" and said that "[u]nlike any number of actresses her age, she's neither too maudlin nor too plucky."^[51] She then signed on to play the lead role of a teenaged mother in Where the Heart Is, which opened in April 2000.

2000–05[link]

Amos Gitai with Hana Laszlo and Natalie Portman on the set of Free Zone, (2005)

After filming Where the Heart Is, Portman moved into the dorms of Harvard University to pursue her bachelor's degree in psychology.^[4] She said in a 1999 interview that, with the exception of the Star Wars prequels, she would not act for the next four years in order to concentrate on studying.^[52] During the summer break from June to September 2000, Portman filmed Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones in Sydney, along with additional production in London.^{[citation needed]}

In July 2001, Portman opened in New York City's Public Theater production of Chekhov's The Seagull, directed by Mike Nichols; she played the role of Nina alongside Meryl Streep, Kevin Kline, and Philip Seymour Hoffman.^[4] The play opened at the Delacorte Theater in Central Park.^[53] That same year, she was one of many celebrities who made cameo appearances in the 2001 comedy Zoolander. Portman was cast in a small role in the film Cold Mountain alongside Jude Law and Nicole Kidman.^[4]

In 2004, Portman appeared in the independent movies Garden State and Closer.^[4] Garden State was an official selection of the Sundance Film Festival and won Best First Feature at the Independent Spirit Awards. Her performance as Alice in Closer earned her a Supporting Actress Golden Globe as well as a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress.^[54][55]

The final Star Wars prequel, Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith, was released on May 19, 2005. The film was the highest grossing domestic film of the year,^[56] and was voted Favorite Motion Picture at the People's Choice Awards. Also in 2005, Portman filmed Free Zone and director Miloš Forman's Goya's Ghosts. Forman had not seen any of her work but thought she looked like a Goya painting, so he requested a meeting.^[57]

2006–09[link]

Portman at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival (jury member)

Portman hosted Saturday Night Live on March 4, 2006.^[58] In a SNL Digital Short, she portrays herself as an angry gangsta rapper (with Andy Samberg as her Flavor Flav-esque partner in Viking garb) during a faux-interview with Chris Parnell, saying she cheated at Harvard University while high on marijuana and cocaine.^[59] The song, titled "Natalie's Rap," was released – alongside other sketches from the show – in 2009 on Incredibad, an album by the Lonely Island.^[60] In another sketch, she portrays a student named Rebecca Hershlag (her actual surname) attending a Bar Mitzvah, and in an installment of the recurring sketch The Needlers (also known as Sally and Dan, The Couple That Should Be Divorced), plays a fertility specialist (her father's profession).

V for Vendetta opened in early 2006. Portman portrayed Evey Hammond, a young woman who is saved from the secret police by the main character, V. Portman worked with a voice coach for the role, learning to speak with an English accent, and she famously had her head shaved.^[61]

Portman has commented on V for Vendetta's political relevance and mentioned that the main character, who recruits Evey to join an underground anti-government group, is "often bad and does things that you don't like" and that "being from Israel was a reason I wanted to do this because terrorism and violence are such a daily part of my conversations since I was little." She said the film "doesn't make clear good or bad statements. It respects the audience enough to take away their own opinion".^[62]

Both Goya's Ghosts and Free Zone received limited releases in 2006. Portman starred in the children's film Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium, which began filming in April 2006 and was released in November 2007; she has said that she was "excited to do a kids' movie."^[61] In late 2006, Portman filmed The Other Boleyn Girl, a historical drama in which she plays Anne Boleyn; Eric Bana and Scarlett Johansson co-starred. She was named one of the hottest women of film and TV by Blender Magazine.^[63]