# Is Hebrew unique in not changing? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [September 18, 2012, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hebrew-unique-in-not-changing/635107 "2012-09-18T21:07:09Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Kiyoshi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e19adc/32.png) [@Kiyoshi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kiyoshi)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2012, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hebrew-unique-in-not-changing/635107/61 "2012-09-20T16:14:32Z")
I’ve made some further spelling modernizations to the passage from _The Legend of Good Women_: This woeful Cleopatra has made such ruth That there is tongue none that may it tell. But on the morrow she would no longer dwell But made her subtle workmen make a shrine Of all the rubies and the stones fine In all Egypt that she could espy And put full the shrine of spicery And let the corpse embalm; and forth she fetched This dead corpse, and in the shrine it set. With the spelling updated, it’s very easily understandable. There are a few words that we no longer use (“ruth”) or whose meaning has changed (“subtle”), and the word order is a little different from Modern English, but nothing too difficult. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2012, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hebrew-unique-in-not-changing/635107/62 "2012-09-20T16:36:02Z")
Some of those changes, though, involve a bit of grammatical modification, not just updating spelling. For instance, “nis” is not just a Middle English spelling of “is”, but rather a contraction of “ne is”, meaning “is **not** ”. Middle English isn’t so strict against double negatives as modern English. So yes, “ther nis tonge noon” does **mean** the same thing as “there is tongue none”, but what it **says** is “there not is tongue none”. I agree with the basic point that Chaucerian English is still recognizably readable as English with a little effort, though. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2012, 5:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hebrew-unique-in-not-changing/635107/63 "2012-09-20T17:00:52Z")
And keep in mind that Chaucer is writing poetry, which itself is generally different from either written prose or spoken vernacular. I suspect that even to the contemporary listener, Chaucer would sound a bit odd. ---
**Author:** ![Valdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/df705f/32.png) [@Valdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Valdi)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2012, 5:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hebrew-unique-in-not-changing/635107/64 "2012-09-20T17:38:07Z")
“Supposedly speakers of Icelandic can understand the Icelandic sagas, which were written down 800 years ago. This isn’t really quite true. They can only understand them in the sense that English speakers can understand Shakespeare. They need to have the texts respelled in modern spelling, they would have a hard time understanding the pronunciations of the people at that time, and they need footnotes. So Icelandic speakers can understand something from 800 years ago in the way that English speakers can understand something from 400 years ago. Icelandic has changed slower, but it’s changed.” Icelandic has changed and is a living, changing language but it actually true that a modern Icelander can read the sagas, not respelled in modern spelling but in a standardised one and the only issues of the sagas that have footnotes are those published for students. The idea that Icelandic does not allow loanwords (by law!) is also untrue. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2012, 11:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hebrew-unique-in-not-changing/635107/65 "2012-09-21T11:30:50Z")
Valdi writes: \> . . . not respelled in modern spelling but in a standardised one . . . What does this mean? What is the standardized spelling? Is it the one used today? Is it the one used back then? What is the relationship between the spelling used back then and the spelling used today? It’s fairly common in modern English-language editions of Shakespeare to make no mention of the fact that the spelling has been modernized, leading most people not even to know this. Has this happened in Icelandic? Some editions of Shakespeare today don’t have footnotes. Some English speakers today like to pretend that they don’t have any problems reading Shakespeare and that people who do are obviously a little slow. These are people who’ve read Shakespeare several times already and who try to pretend that the reason they can understand it is purely their intelligence, not all the practice they’ve gotten from previous reading. Do Icelanders really instantly understand the sagas, or is it just that they get lots of practice in understanding it from reading it in schools? ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [September 21, 2012, 11:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hebrew-unique-in-not-changing/635107/66 "2012-09-21T11:35:30Z")
An even better example in English is the King James Bible. Many English-speaking Christians understand it easily and without thinking about its differences from current English because they’ve grown up hearing it read aloud and then reading it themselves. Someone who didn’t have that experience from childhood onward would be more likely to notice the odd grammar and vocabulary when they first read it as an adult. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2012, 1:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hebrew-unique-in-not-changing/635107/67 "2012-09-22T13:46:08Z")
> [@kanicbird](#): > > Just like the speed limit is the law and no one ever exceeds that? Just because something is the law does not mean it is not subject to change nor does that mean that the law corresponds with reality. > > You can call total bullcrap if you want but that simply doesn’t jibe with reality. Just because something ‘is a law’ doesn’t make it true. Actually, Icelandics are extremely proud to maintain their language’s purity, and English words rarely find their way into print. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2012, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hebrew-unique-in-not-changing/635107/68 "2012-09-22T15:25:38Z")
I think kanicbird is right in a way. The law works because there is popular support for it. The same thing is true of speeding laws. They work if there is popular support for them. Passing a law is not enough unless there is some sort of a general feeling that the law is a good idea. ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2012, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hebrew-unique-in-not-changing/635107/69 "2012-09-22T18:25:27Z")
Plus, I suspect most Icelanders speak English anyway, so it’s not like its some exotic, prestige language. ---
**Author:** ![Lust4Life](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/ecc23a/32.png) [@Lust4Life](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lust4Life)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2012, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hebrew-unique-in-not-changing/635107/70 "2012-09-22T18:34:19Z")
Surely all languages must change over time as new technology arise, and new scientific concepts aswell ? As in Lasers, tectonic plates, Quantum particles, modems, Red Shift etc. ---
**Author:** ![Wendell\_Wagner](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/8491ac/32.png) [@Wendell\_Wagner](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wendell_Wagner)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2012, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hebrew-unique-in-not-changing/635107/71 "2012-09-22T21:24:49Z")
Yes, but even beyond that, all living languages slowly change in grammar, pronunciation, and vocabulary that has nothing to do with innovation. ---
**Author:** ![sjc](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e5b9ba/32.png) [@sjc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sjc)\ **Post date:** [September 24, 2012, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hebrew-unique-in-not-changing/635107/72 "2012-09-24T21:45:00Z")
> [@Sattua](#): > > As others have said–speakers of modern Hebrew can understand ancient texts because the language was dead for so long. Dead languages don’t change. Live ones do. Now that Hebrew is alive again, it does change. That was one ignorant rabbi. > > But if we’re throwing around examples of languages in which modern speakers can easily read old texts–Italian speakers can still read the original Dante without any problem. In fact, a person who has taken just a couple years of Italian classes can read Dante without any problem (and with a dictionary). Now\* that’s\* consistency. I have studied Italian and can speak and understand it fairly well, and I’ve read the Inferno with a side-by-side english translation. It’s probably about like Chaucer from my perspective. Maybe sometimes moving towards Shakespeare, but different enough from what I’ve learned to be sometimes quite hard to puzzle out. I wouldn’t be surprised if it was more obvious to a native speaker than to me, but it still felt more in the Chaucer level of difficulty. ---
**Author:** ![TonySinclair](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/49beb7/32.png) [@TonySinclair](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TonySinclair)\ **Post date:** [September 25, 2012, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hebrew-unique-in-not-changing/635107/73 "2012-09-25T00:10:50Z")
> [@Wendell\_Wagner](#): > > An even better example in English is the King James Bible. Many English-speaking Christians understand it easily and without thinking about its differences from current English because they’ve grown up hearing it read aloud and then reading it themselves. When I was growing up, I went to a pretty generic Protestant church, which used the Revised Standard Version for Sunday School and church Bible readings. Nevertheless, whenever the minister addressed God during a spoken prayer, he would revert to “thee” and “thou” and “thy,” and put “est” or “eth” on his verbs, as if God was stuck in the 16th century. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-hebrew-unique-in-not-changing/635107.md?page=3)