Eliezer Ben-Yehuda
Eliezer Ben‑Yehuda[a] (born Eliezer Yitzhak Perlman;[b] 7 January 1858 – 16 December 1922)[1] was a Russian-Jewish linguist, lexicographer, and journalist. 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 the Land of Israel. Ben-Yehuda was the primary driving force behind the revival of the Hebrew language.
"Ben-Yehuda" redirects here. For other people with the surname, see Ben-Yehuda. For a general overview, see Ben-Yehuda (disambiguation).
Eliezer Ben-Yehuda
16 December 1922 (aged 64)
- Linguist
- journalist
-
Devora Jonas(m. 1881; died 1891)
- Itamar Ben-Avi (with Devora)
- Dola Ben-Yehuda (with Hemda)
Personal life[edit]
Ben-Yehuda was married twice, to two sisters.[11] His first wife, Devora (née Jonas), died in 1891 of tuberculosis, leaving him with five small children.[12] Her final wish[13] was that Eliezer marry her younger sister, Paula Beila. Soon after his wife Devora's death, three of his children died of diphtheria within a period of 10 days. Six months later, he married Paula,[4] who took the Hebrew name "Hemda".[14] Hemda Ben-Yehuda became an accomplished journalist and author in her own right, ensuring the completion of the Hebrew dictionary in the decades after Eliezer's death, as well as mobilising fundraising and coordinating committees of scholars in both Palestine and abroad.
Death and legacy[edit]
In December 1922, Ben-Yehuda, 64, died of tuberculosis, from which he suffered most of his life. He was buried on the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem.[15] His funeral was attended by 30,000 people.[5]
Ben-Yehuda built a house for his family in the Talpiot neighborhood of Jerusalem, but died three months before it was completed.[16] His wife Hemda lived there for close to thirty years. Ten years after her death, her son Ehud transferred the title of the house to the Jerusalem municipality for the purpose of creating a museum and study center. Eventually it was leased to a church group from Germany who established a center there for young German volunteers.[17] The house is now a conference center and guesthouse run by the German organization Action Reconciliation Service for Peace (ARSP), which organizes workshops, seminars and Hebrew language ulpan programs.[18]
Cecil Roth was quoted by historian Jack Fellman as having summed up Ben-Yehuda's contribution to the Hebrew language: "Before Ben‑Yehuda, Jews could speak Hebrew; after him, they did."[19][20] This comment reflects the fact that there are no other examples of a natural language without any native speakers subsequently acquiring several million native speakers, and no other examples of a sacred language becoming a national language with millions of "first language" speakers.[20]
