Mishnaic Hebrew


Mishnaic Hebrew is a form of the Hebrew language that is found in the Talmud. The forms of the Hebrew in the Talmud can be divided into Classical Hebrew for direct quotations from the Hebrew Bible, and Mishnaic Hebrew can be further sub-divided into Mishnaic Hebrew proper, which was a spoken language, and Amoraic Hebrew, which was a literary language only.
The Mishnaic Hebrew language, or Early Rabbinic Hebrew language, is one of the direct ancient descendants of Biblical Hebrew as preserved after the Babylonian captivity, and definitively recorded by Jewish sages in writing the Mishnah and other contemporary documents. It was not used by the Samaritans, who preserved their own form of Hebrew, Samaritan Hebrew.
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 and the expanded collection of Mishnah-related material known as the Tosefta. 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 language of all these works is very similar to Mishnaic Hebrew.

Historical occurrence

Mishnaic Hebrew is found primarily from the 1st to the 4th centuries CE, corresponding to the Roman period after the destruction of the Temple in Jerusalem. It developed under the profound influence of spoken Aramaic. Also called Tannaitic Hebrew or Early Rabbinic Hebrew, it is represented by the bulk of the Mishnah and the Tosefta within the Talmud, and by some of the Dead Sea Scrolls, notably the Copper Scroll and the Bar Kokhba Letters.
Dead Sea Scrolls archaeologist Yigael Yadin mentions that three Bar Kokhba documents he and his team found at Nahal Hever are written in Mishnaic Hebrew, and that it was Bar Kokhba who revived the Hebrew language and made Hebrew the official language of the state during the Bar Kokhba revolt. Yadin also notes the shift from Aramaic to Hebrew during the time of the Bar Kokhba revolt in his book Bar Kokhba: The Rediscovery of the Legendary Hero of the Last Jewish Revolt Against Imperial Rome; he says, "It is interesting that the earlier documents are written in Aramaic while the later ones are in Hebrew. Possibly the change was made by a special decree of Bar-Kokhba who wanted to restore Hebrew as the official language of the state". In the book A Roadmap to the Heavens: An Anthropological Study of Hegemony among Priests, Sages, and Laymen by Sigalit Ben-Zion, Yadin remarks: "it seems that this change came as a result of the order that was given by Bar Kokhba, who wanted to revive the Hebrew language and make it the official language of the state."
However, less than a century after the publication of the Mishnah, Mishnaic Hebrew began to fall into disuse as a spoken language. The Babylonian Gemara, as well as the earlier Jerusalem Talmud published between 350 and 400, generally comment on the Mishnah and Baraitot in Aramaic. Nevertheless, Hebrew survived as a liturgical and literary language in the form of later Amoraic Hebrew, which sometimes occurs in the Gemara text.

Phonology

Many of the characteristic features of Mishnaic Hebrew pronunciation may well have been found already in the period of Late Biblical Hebrew. A notable characteristic distinguishing it from Biblical Hebrew of the classical period is the spirantization of post-vocalic stops, which it has in common with Aramaic.
A new characteristic is that final /m/ is often replaced with final /n/ in the Mishna, but only in agreement morphemes. Perhaps the final nasal consonant in the morphemes was not pronounced, and the vowel previous to it was nasalized. Alternatively, the agreement morphemes may have changed under the influence of Aramaic.
Also, some surviving manuscripts of the Mishna confuse guttural consonants, especially ʾaleph and ʿayin . That could be a sign that they were pronounced the same way in Mishnaic Hebrew.

Reconstructed Mishnaic Hebrew pronunciation

Consonants
NameAlefBetGimelDaletHeVavZayinChetTetYodKafLamedMemNunSamechAyinPeTzadiKofReshShinTav
Letterאבגדהוזחטיכלמנסעפצקרשת
Pronunciation, ∅, , , , ∅, , ∅, , ,

Vowels
NameShva NachShva NaPatachHataf PatachKamatz GadolKamatz KatanHataf KamatzTzere, Tzere MaleSegolHataf SegolHirikHirik MaleHolam, Holam MaleKubutzShuruk
Letterְְֲֳֵַָָ, ֵיֱִִֶיׂ, וֹֻוּ
Pronunciation∅?~~~, ~

Morphology

Mishnaic Hebrew displays various changes from Biblical Hebrew, some appearing already in the Hebrew of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Some, but not all, are retained in Modern Hebrew.
For the expression of possession, Mishnaic Hebrew mostly replaces the Biblical Hebrew status constructus with analytic constructions involving של 'of'.
Missing in Mishnaic Hebrew is the waw-consecutive.
The past is expressed by using the same form as in Modern Hebrew. For example, : "משה קיבל תורה מסיני".
Continuous past is expressed using the present tense of to be unlike Biblical but like Modern Hebrew. For example, : "הוא היה אומר"
Present is expressed using the same form as in Modern Hebrew, by using the participle. For example, : "על שלושה דברים העולם עומד".
Future can be expressed using עתיד + infinitive. For example, : "ולפני מי אתה עתיד ליתן דין וחשבון". However, unlike Modern Hebrew but like contemporary Aramaic, the present active participle can also express the future. It mostly replaces the imperfect form in that function.
The imperfect form, which is used for the future in modern Hebrew, expresses an imperative, volition or similar meanings in Mishnaic Hebrew. For example, : "הוא היה אומר, אל תהיו כעבדים המשמשין את הרב". In a sense, one could say that the form pertains to the future in Mishnaic Hebrew as well, but it invariably has a modal aspect in the main clause.