Revival of the Hebrew language in the context of "First Aliyah"

Hebrew is a Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic language family. A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages, it was natively spoken by the Israelites and remained in regular use as a first language until after 200 CE and as the liturgical language of Judaism (since the Second Temple period) and Samaritanism. The language was revived as a spoken language in the 19th century, and is the only successful large-scale example of linguistic revival. It is the only Canaanite language, as well as one of only two Northwest Semitic languages, with the other being Aramaic, still spoken today.

The earliest examples of written Paleo-Hebrew date to the 10th century BCE. Nearly all of the Hebrew Bible is written in Biblical Hebrew, with much of its present form in the dialect that scholars believe flourished around the 6th century BCE, during the time of the Babylonian captivity. For this reason, Hebrew has been referred to by Jews as Lashon Hakodesh (לְשׁוֹן הַקֹּדֶש, lit. 'the holy tongue' or 'the tongue [of] holiness') since ancient times. The language was not referred to by the name Hebrew in the Bible, but as Yehudit (transl. 'Judean') or Səpaṯ Kəna'an (transl. "the language of Canaan"). Mishnah Gittin 9:8 refers to the language as Ivrit, meaning Hebrew; however, Mishnah Megillah refers to the language as Ashurit, meaning Assyrian, which is derived from the name of the alphabet used, in contrast to Ivrit, meaning the Paleo-Hebrew alphabet.

Ashkenazi Jews (/ˌɑːʃkəˈnɑːzi, ˌæʃ-/ A(H)SH-kə-NAH-zee; also known as Ashkenazic Jews) Ashkenazis or Ashkenazim form a distinct subgroup of the Jewish diaspora that emerged in the Holy Roman Empire in the Early Middle Ages, originating from the Jewish communities who lived in the 10th century in the Rhineland valley and in neighbouring France before migrating eastward after the Crusades. Facing persecution in Western Europe, particularly following the Black Death in the 14th century, the bulk of the Ashkenazi Jews migrated to the Kingdom of Poland, at the encouragement of Casimir III the Great and his successors, making Poland the main centre of Ashkenazi Jewry until the Holocaust.

They traditionally follow the German rite synagogue ritual and speak Yiddish, an offshoot of Middle High German written in a variety of the Hebrew script, with significant Hebrew, Aramaic and Slavic influence. Hebrew, on the other hand, was primarily used as a literary and sacred language until its 20th-century revival as a common language in Israel. Ashkenazim adapted their traditions to Europe, and underwent a transformation in their interpretation of Judaism. In the late 18th and 19th centuries, Jews who remained in or returned to historical German lands experienced a cultural reorientation. Under the influence of the Haskalah and the struggle for emancipation, as well as the intellectual and cultural ferment in urban centres, some gradually abandoned Yiddish in favor of German and developed new forms of Jewish religious life and cultural identity. Throughout the centuries, Ashkenazim made significant contributions to Europe's philosophy, scholarship, literature, art, music, and science.

Ashkenazi Jews (/ˌɑːʃkəˈnɑːzi, ˌæʃ-/ A(H)SH-kə-NAH-zee; also known as Ashkenazic Jews), Ashkenazis, or Ashkenazim form a distinct subgroup of the Jewish diaspora that emerged in the Holy Roman Empire in the Early Middle Ages, originating from the Jewish communities who lived in the 10th century in the Rhineland valley and in neighbouring France before migrating eastward after the Crusades. Facing persecution in Western Europe, particularly following the Black Death in the 14th century, the bulk of the Ashkenazi Jews migrated to the Kingdom of Poland, at the encouragement of Casimir III the Great and his successors, making Poland the main centre of Ashkenazi Jewry until the Holocaust.

They traditionally follow the German rite synagogue ritual and speak Yiddish, an offshoot of Middle High German written in a variety of the Hebrew script, with significant Hebrew, Aramaic and Slavic influence. Hebrew, on the other hand, was primarily used as a literary and sacred language until its 20th-century revival as a common language in Israel. Ashkenazim adapted their traditions to Europe, and underwent a transformation in their interpretation of Judaism. In the late 18th and 19th centuries, Jews who remained in or returned to historical German lands experienced a cultural reorientation. Under the influence of the Haskalah and the struggle for emancipation, as well as the intellectual and cultural ferment in urban centres, some gradually abandoned Yiddish in favor of German and developed new forms of Jewish religious life and cultural identity. Throughout the centuries, Ashkenazim made significant contributions to Europe's philosophy, scholarship, literature, art, music, and science.

HaZvi (Hebrew: הצבי, also Hatzevi and Hazewi, literally 'The Gazelle') was a Hebrew-language newspaper published in Jerusalem from 1884 to 1914 by Eliezer Ben-Yehuda, a pioneer of the revival of Hebrew as a spoken tongue.

Eliezer Ben‑Yehuda (born Eliezer Yitzhak Perlman; 7 January 1858 – 16 December 1922) was a Russian–Jewish linguist, lexicographer, and journalist who immigrated to Jerusalem in 1881, when the Ottoman Empire ruled it. He is renowned as the lexicographer of the first Hebrew dictionary and also as the editor of Jerusalem-based HaZvi, one of the first Hebrew newspapers published in Palestine. Ben-Yehuda was the primary driving force behind the revival of the Hebrew language.

The Hebraization of surnames (also Hebraicization; Hebrew: עברות Ivrut) is the act of amending one's Jewish surname, so that it is tied to the Hebrew language, which was natively spoken by Jews and Samaritans until it died out of everyday use by around 200 CE. For many Jews of diaspora and Palestinian origin, immigration to the land of Israel and taking up a Hebrew surname has long been conceptualized as a way to erase remnants of their diaspora oppression, particularly since the inception of Zionism in the 19th century. This notion, which was part of what drove the revival of the Hebrew language, was further consolidated after the founding of Israel in 1948.

Hebraizing surnames has been an especially common practice among Ashkenazi Jews; many Ashkenazi families had acquired permanent surnames (rather than patronyms) only when surnames were forced upon them by Emperor Joseph II of the Holy Roman Empire following an official decree on 12 November 1787. Sephardic Jews often had hereditary family names (e.g., Cordovero, Abrabanel, Shaltiel, de Leon, Alcalai, Toledano, Lopez) since well before the Spanish expulsion of Jews near the end of the Reconquista, which had begun after the Muslim conquest of the Iberian Peninsula in the 8th century.