1.
Cush (Bible)
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Cush, also spelled as Kush, was, according to the Bible, the eldest son of Ham, who was a son of Noah. He was the brother of Mizraim, Canaan, and Phut, Cush is traditionally considered the eponymous ancestor of the people of the land of Cush, an ancient territory that is believed to have been located on either side or both sides of the Red Sea. As such, Cush is alternately identified in Scripture with the kingdom of Kush, ancient Ethiopia, according to Genesis, Cushs other sons were Seba, Havilah, Sabtah, Raamah, and Sabtecah. The Book of Numbers 12,1 calls the wife of Moses a Cushite woman and it is inhabited by tribes of various peoples, Ethiopians, dark men. One man is the ruler of the land, he is king and general. He rules the state, judges the people, and is priest and this man is my father and theirs. The rhetorical question Can the Cushite change his skin, in Jeremiah 13,23 implies brown skin color, of most likely a Nubian people, also, the Septuagint uniformly translates Cush as Αἰθιοπία Aithiopia. Another person named Cush in the Hebrew Bible is a Benjamite who is mentioned only in Psalm 7, during the 5th century AD, Syrian writers described the Himyarites of South Arabia as Cushaeans and Ethiopians. The Cushitic-speaking peoples today comprise the Agaw, Oromo, Somali, Afar, and several other tribes, the Beja people, who also speak a Cushitic language, have specific genealogical traditions of descent from Cush. Explorer James Bruce, who visited the Ethiopian Highlands c, there they ascended and built Axum, and sometime later returned to the lowland, building Meroe. Hebrew scholar David M. Goldenberg has suggested that the Hebrew name is derived from Kash, the form Kush appears in Egyptian records as early as the reign of Mentuhotep II, in an inscription detailing his campaigns against the Nubian region. At the time of the compilation of the Hebrew Bible, and throughout classical antiquity, scholars like Johann Michaelis and Rosenmuller have pointed out that the name Cush was applied to tracts of country on both sides of the Red Sea, in the Arabian Peninsula and Northeast Africa
2.
Canaan (son of Ham)
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Canaan, according to the Book of Genesis in the Hebrew Bible, was a son of Ham and grandson of Noah, and was the father of the Canaanites. He was the recipient of the so-called Curse of Ham and this territory is roughly the areas of modern-day Israel, Palestine, Lebanon, western Jordan, and western Syria. Canaans firstborn son was Sidon, who shares his name with the Phoenician city of Sidon in present-day Lebanon, according to Genesis 9, 20-27, Noah became drunk then cursed his grandson Canaan, for the transgression of Canaans father, Ham. This is the Curse of Canaan, to which the misnomer Curse of Ham has been attached since Classical antiquity, some modern scholars view the curse of Canaan in Genesis 9, 20-27 as an early Hebrew rationalization for Israels conquest of Canaan. In the subsequent passage, of Shem. may Canaan be his servant, dwell not in the dwelling of Shem, for to Shem and to his sons did it come by their lot. Cursed art thou, and cursed shalt thou be beyond all the sons of Noah, by the curse by which we bound ourselves by an oath in the presence of the holy judge, and in the presence of Noah our father. But he did not hearken unto them, and dwelt in the land of Lebanon from Hamath to the entering of Egypt, he, and for this reason that land is named Canaan. The English term Canaan comes from the Hebrew כנען, via Greek Χαναάν Khanaan and it appears as KUR ki-na-ah-na in the Amarna letters, and knʿn is found on coins from Phoenicia in the last half of the 1st millennium. It first occurs in Greek in the writings of Hecataeus as Khna, scholars connect the name Canaan with knʿn, Kanaan, the general Northwest Semitic name for this region. One explanation is that it has a meaning of lowlands, from a Semitic root knʿ to be low, humble, depressed, in contrast with Aram
3.
Noah
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In the Abrahamic religions, Noah was the tenth and last of the pre-flood Patriarchs. The story of Noahs Ark is told in the Bibles Genesis flood narrative, the biblical account is followed by the story of the Curse of Canaan. Noah was the subject of much elaboration in the literature of later Abrahamic religions, the primary account of Noah in the Bible is in the Book of Genesis. Noah was the tenth of the pre-flood Patriarchs and his father was Lamech and his mother is unknown. When Noah was five hundred years old, he begat Shem, Ham, the Genesis flood narrative makes up chapters 6–9 in the Book of Genesis, in the Bible. Thus, the flood was no ordinary overflow but a reversal of creation, and God blessed Noah and his sons, and said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth. They were also told that all fowls, land animals, furthermore, as well as green plants, every moving thing would be their food with the exception that the blood was not to be eaten. Mans life blood would be required from the beasts and from man, whoso sheddeth mans blood, by man shall his blood be shed, for in the image of God made he man. Noah died 350 years after the flood, at the age of 950, the maximum human lifespan, as depicted by the Bible, diminishes rapidly thereafter, from almost 1,000 years to the 120 years of Moses. After the flood, Noah became a husbandman and he planted a vineyard, and he drank of the wine, and was drunken, and was uncovered within his tent. Noahs son Ham, the father of Canaan, saw the nakedness of his father and told his brethren, in Jewish tradition and rabbinic literature, rabbis blame Satan for the intoxicating properties of the wine. In the field of biblical criticism, J. H. Ellens and W. G. Rollins address the narrative of Genesis 9. Because of its brevity and textual inconsistencies, it has suggested that this narrative is a splinter from a more substantial tale. A fuller account would explain what exactly Ham had done to his father, or why Noah directed a curse at Canaan for Hams misdeed, or how Noah came to know what occurred. The narrator relates two facts, Noah became drunken and he was uncovered within his tent, and Ham saw the nakedness of his father, and told his two brethren without. Thus, these passages revolve around sexuality and the exposure of genitalia as compared with other Hebrew Bible texts, such as Habakkuk 2,15 and Lamentations 4,21. Genesis 10 sets forth the descendants of Shem, Ham, and Japheth, among Japheth’s descendants were the maritime nations. Ham’s son Cush had a son named Nimrod, who became the first man of might on earth, a mighty hunter, king in Babylon, from there Asshur went and built Nineveh
4.
Hebrew language
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Hebrew is a language native to Israel, spoken by over 9 million people worldwide, of whom over 5 million are in Israel. Historically, it is regarded as the language of the Israelites and their ancestors, the earliest examples of written Paleo-Hebrew date from the 10th century BCE. Hebrew belongs to the West Semitic branch of the Afroasiatic language family, Hebrew is the only living Canaanite language left, and the only truly successful example of a revived dead language. Hebrew had ceased to be a spoken language somewhere between 200 and 400 CE, declining since the aftermath of the Bar Kokhba revolt. Aramaic and to a lesser extent Greek were already in use as international languages, especially among elites and it survived into the medieval period as the language of Jewish liturgy, rabbinic literature, intra-Jewish commerce, and poetry. Then, in the 19th century, it was revived as a spoken and literary language, and, according to Ethnologue, had become, as of 1998, the language of 5 million people worldwide. After Israel, the United States has the second largest Hebrew-speaking population, with 220,000 fluent speakers, Modern Hebrew is one of the two official languages of the State of Israel, while premodern Hebrew is used for prayer or study in Jewish communities around the world today. Ancient Hebrew is also the tongue of the Samaritans, while modern Hebrew or Arabic is their vernacular. For this reason, Hebrew has been referred to by Jews as Leshon Hakodesh, the modern word Hebrew is derived from the word Ivri, one of several names for the Israelite people. It is traditionally understood to be a based on the name of Abrahams ancestor, Eber. This name is based upon the root ʕ-b-r meaning to cross over. Interpretations of the term ʕibrim link it to this verb, cross over, in the Bible, the Hebrew language is called Yәhudit because Judah was the surviving kingdom at the time of the quotation. In Isaiah 19,18 it is called the Language of Canaan, Hebrew belongs to the Canaanite group of languages. In turn, the Canaanite languages are a branch of the Northwest Semitic family of languages, according to Avraham ben-Yosef, Hebrew flourished as a spoken language in the Kingdoms of Israel and Judah during about 1200 to 586 BCE. Scholars debate the degree to which Hebrew was a vernacular in ancient times following the Babylonian exile. 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. The Gezer calendar also dates back to the 10th century BCE at the beginning of the Monarchic Period, classified as Archaic Biblical Hebrew, the calendar presents a list of seasons and related agricultural activities. The Gezer calendar is written in an old Semitic script, akin to the Phoenician one that through the Greeks, 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
5.
Modern Hebrew
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Modern Hebrew or Israeli Hebrew, generally referred to by speakers simply as Hebrew, is the standard form of the Hebrew language spoken today. It was revived as a language in the 19th and 20th centuries and is one of the two official languages of Israel, along with Modern Standard Arabic. Modern Hebrew is spoken by about nine people, counting native, fluent. The organization that directs the development of the Modern Hebrew language. The most common term for the language is Modern Hebrew. Most people refer to it simply as Hebrew, the term Modern Hebrew has been described as somewhat problematic as it implies unambiguous periodization from Biblical Hebrew. Rosén supported the now widely used term Israeli Hebrew on the basis that it represented the nature of Hebrew. In 2006, Israeli linguist Ghilad Zuckermann proposed the term Israeli to represent the origins of the language. Jewish contemporary sources describe Hebrew flourishing as a language in the kingdoms of Israel and Judah. Scholars debate the degree to which Hebrew remained a spoken vernacular following the Babylonian captivity, Hebrew died out as a vernacular language somewhere between 200 and 400 CE, declining after the Bar Kokhba revolt of 132–136 CE, which devastated the population of Judea. After the exile Hebrew became restricted to liturgical use, the revival of the Hebrew language was led by Eliezer Ben-Yehuda in the late 19th century and early 20th century. Modern Hebrew used Biblical Hebrew morphemes, Mishnaic spelling, and Sephardic pronunciation, idioms and calques were made from Yiddish. Ben-Yehuda used a stock of 8,000 words from the Bible and 20,000 words from rabbinical commentaries and codified and planned the new language, some words he invented, such as ḥatzilīm for eggplants and ḥashmal for electricity. Sometimes, old Hebrew words took on different meanings altogether, for example, the Hebrew word kǝvīš, which now denotes a street or a road, is actually an Aramaic adjective meaning trodden down, blazoned, rather than a common noun. It was originally used to describe a blazoned trail, for a simple comparison between the Sephardic version of Mishnaic Hebrew and the Yemenite version of the same, see Yemenite Hebrew. Modern Hebrew is classified as an Afroasiatic language of the Semitic family, although it has been influenced by non-Semitic languages, Modern Hebrew retains its Semitic character in its morphology and in much of its syntax. A minority of scholars argue that the language had been so influenced by various substrate languages that it is genealogically a hybrid with Indo-European. These theories have not been met with acceptance, and Modern Hebrew continues to be considered a Semitic language by most experts
6.
Tiberian vocalization
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The system soon became used to vocalize other Hebrew texts as well. The Tiberian vocalization marks vowels and stress, makes fine distinctions of consonant quality and length, the sin dot distinguishes between the two values of ש. A dagesh indicates a consonant is geminate or unspirantized, and a raphe indicates spirantization, the mappiq indicates that ה is consonantal, not silent, in syllable-coda position. Each of the vowel phonemes could be lengthened, occasionally. The ultrashort vowels are more complicated. There were two graphemes corresponding to the vowel /ă/, attested by alternations in manuscripts like ארֲריך~ארְריך, ואשמֳעָה~ואשמְעָה. . In addition, one of the graphemes could also be silent, Shva was used both to indicate lack of a vowel and as another symbol to represent the phoneme /ă/, the latter also represented by hataf patah. The phoneme /ă/ had a number of allophones, /ă/ had to be written with shva rather than hataf patah when it was not pronounced as, before a laryngeal-pharyngeal, mobile šwa was pronounced as an ultrashort copy of the following vowel and as preceding /j/. Using ḥataf vowels was mandatory under gutturals but optional under other letters, קָ֫מֶץ also denotes a slighter, as שׁוּרֶק and קִבּוּץ a firmer, compression or contraction of the mouth. Segôl takes its name from its form, so שָׁלֹשׁ נְקֻדּוֹת is another name for Qibbúṣ. Moreover the names were mostly so formed, that the sound of each vowel is heard in the first syllable, in order to carry this out consistently some even write Sägôl, Qomeṣ-ḥatûf, cantillation signs mark stress and punctuation. Metheg may mark secondary stress, and maqqaf conjoins words into one stress unit, babylonian vocalization Palestinian vocalization Niqqud Cardinal vowels Blau, Joshua. Phonology and Morphology of Biblical Hebrew, a History of the Hebrew Language
7.
Greek language
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Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European family of languages, native to Greece and other parts of the Eastern Mediterranean. It has the longest documented history of any living language, spanning 34 centuries of written records and its writing system has been the Greek alphabet for the major part of its history, other systems, such as Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary, were used previously. The alphabet arose from the Phoenician script and was in turn the basis of the Latin, Cyrillic, Armenian, Coptic, Gothic and many other writing systems. Together with the Latin texts and traditions of the Roman world, during antiquity, Greek was a widely spoken lingua franca in the Mediterranean world and many places beyond. It would eventually become the official parlance of the Byzantine Empire, the language is spoken by at least 13.2 million people today in Greece, Cyprus, Italy, Albania, Turkey, and the Greek diaspora. Greek roots are used to coin new words for other languages, Greek. Greek has been spoken in the Balkan peninsula since around the 3rd millennium BC, the earliest written evidence is a Linear B clay tablet found in Messenia that dates to between 1450 and 1350 BC, making Greek the worlds oldest recorded living language. Among the Indo-European languages, its date of earliest written attestation is matched only by the now extinct Anatolian languages, the Greek language is conventionally divided into the following periods, Proto-Greek, the unrecorded but assumed last ancestor of all known varieties of Greek. The unity of Proto-Greek would have ended as Hellenic migrants entered the Greek peninsula sometime in the Neolithic era or the Bronze Age, Mycenaean Greek, the language of the Mycenaean civilisation. It is recorded in the Linear B script on tablets dating from the 15th century BC onwards, Ancient Greek, in its various dialects, the language of the Archaic and Classical periods of the ancient Greek civilisation. It was widely known throughout the Roman Empire, after the Roman conquest of Greece, an unofficial bilingualism of Greek and Latin was established in the city of Rome and Koine Greek became a first or second language in the Roman Empire. The origin of Christianity can also be traced through Koine Greek, Medieval Greek, also known as Byzantine Greek, the continuation of Koine Greek in Byzantine Greece, up to the demise of the Byzantine Empire in the 15th century. Much of the written Greek that was used as the language of the Byzantine Empire was an eclectic middle-ground variety based on the tradition of written Koine. Modern Greek, Stemming from Medieval Greek, Modern Greek usages can be traced in the Byzantine period and it is the language used by the modern Greeks, and, apart from Standard Modern Greek, there are several dialects of it. In the modern era, the Greek language entered a state of diglossia, the historical unity and continuing identity between the various stages of the Greek language is often emphasised. Greek speakers today still tend to regard literary works of ancient Greek as part of their own rather than a foreign language and it is also often stated that the historical changes have been relatively slight compared with some other languages. According to one estimation, Homeric Greek is probably closer to demotic than 12-century Middle English is to modern spoken English, Greek is spoken by about 13 million people, mainly in Greece, Albania and Cyprus, but also worldwide by the large Greek diaspora. Greek is the language of Greece, where it is spoken by almost the entire population
8.
Ge'ez
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Geez is an ancient South Semitic language that originated in Eritrea and the northern region of Ethiopia in the Horn of Africa. It later became the language of the Kingdom of Aksum. However, in Ethiopia Amharic or other languages, and in Eritrea and Tigray Region in Ethiopia. Tigrinya and Tigre are closely related to Geez, with at least four different configurations proposed, the foremost Ethiopian experts such as Amsalu Aklilu point to the vast proportion of inherited nouns that are unchanged, and even spelled identically in both Geez and Amharic. Geez is transliterated according to the system, Because Geez is no longer a spoken language. There is, however, no evidence either in the tradition or in Ethiopian Semitic what value these consonants may have had in Geez, a similar problem is found for the consonant transliterated ḫ. Gragg notes that it corresponds in etymology to velar or uvular fricatives in other Semitic languages, though the use of a different letter shows that it must originally have had some other pronunciation, what that pronunciation was is not certain. The chart below lists /ɬ/ and /ɬʼ/ as possible values for ś and ḍ respectively and it also lists /χ/ as a possible value for ḫ. These values are tentative, but based on the reconstructed Proto-Semitic consonants that they are descended from, in the chart below, IPA values are shown. When transcription is different from the IPA, the character is shown in angular brackets, question marks follow phonemes whose interpretation is controversial. In Geez, Emphatic consonants are phonetically ejectives, as is the case with Arabic, emphatic velars may actually be phonetically uvular. Geez consonants have an opposition between voiceless, voiced, and ejective obstruents. The Proto-Semitic emphasis in Geez has been generalized to include emphatic p̣. Geez has phonologized labiovelars, Geez ś ሠ Sawt is reconstructed as descended from a Proto-Semitic voiceless lateral fricative. Like Arabic, Geez merged Proto-Semitic š and s in ሰ, apart from this, Geez phonology is comparably conservative, the only other Proto-Semitic phonological contrasts lost may be the interdental fricatives and ghayin. Geez distinguishes two genders, masculine and feminine, which in certain words is marked with the suffix -t, there are two numbers, singular and plural. The plural can be constructed either by suffixing -āt to a word, plural using suffix, ʿāmat – ʿāmatāt year, māy – māyāt water. Internal plural, bet – ʾābyāt house, houses, qərnəb – qarānəbt eyelid, nouns also have two cases, the nominative which is not marked and the accusative which is marked with final -a. Triconsonantal nouns follow one of the following patterns, quadriconsonantal and some triconsonantal nouns follow the following pattern
