The Academy is the premier institution for research of the Hebrew language; our primary enterprise is the Historical Dictionary Project (HDP), formally established in the 1950s. The overarching goal of the HDP is to present the history and development of the Hebrew lexicon, tracking words through shifts in form, meaning, and frequency of usage from their earliest attestations in the sources to their most recent documentation.

A historical dictionary requires a large textual database. Whereas historical dictionaries of European languages make do with select quotations from previous centuries, the HDP set itself the ambitious goal of creating a computerized database containing all extant Hebrew texts composed up to the 11th century CE and a large selection of Hebrew works from the 11th century to the founding of the State of Israel, spanning more than 2000 years of Hebrew writing. To optimize the management of this enormous amount of data and access to the information within it, the HDP was among the world pioneers in utilizing modern technology for a computerized concordance. This concordance has grown into a vast treasure trove, an incredible research tool in its own right; it is available to the public on the Ma'agarim website.

In 2005, after half a century of dedicated work by dozens of scholars of Hebrew language, Hebrew literature, and Judaic studies, the HDP decided that it had amassed enough material to begin writing entries for the ancient period.

Early Days

Credit for the first historical dictionary bringing together Hebrew from different periods, A Complete Dictionary of Ancient and Modern Hebrew, 1908–1959, belongs to Eliezer Ben-Yehuda (1858–1922), shown at right (photo courtesy of the Central Zionist Archives). However, one person could not truly complete such a monumental task alone: he died before finishing his dictionary, and the latter volumes were written or edited by others.

naftali tur-sinai

As early as 1937, Prof. N. H. Tur-Sinai (pictured at right), then president of the Language Committee and later the first president of the Academy, proposed the establishment of “a large enterprise for the preparation of an academic dictionary of our language, encompassing all its periods and all the transformations that it has undergone from its earliest historical documentation to the present day.” Upon the founding of the Academy in 1953, we decided to pursue this colossal project as our central undertaking.

Prof. Ze’ev Ben-Ḥayyim (at right), one of the founders of the HDP, served as the first editor (1956–1992). He spent the beginning of his term developing the ideological vision and technical blueprints for such a large undertaking. In 1957–1958 he visited similar historical-dictionary projects across Europe. Upon his return, he reported to the Academy’s Historical Dictionary committee on what he had learned and proposed a plan of action for the HDP, including the use of computers, a revolutionary idea at the time.

After some initial debate about whether to produce a series of dictionaries by period or by literary genre or to labor toward a single comprehensive dictionary, the latter option prevailed in 1959. The work began with gathering material from post-Biblical ancient literature (200 BCE–1100 CE) and then moved on to modern literature (since 1750).

Manuscripts offer a much more accurate view of the language than do printed editions. Working with manuscripts, including small fragments found in the Cairo Geniza, is demanding and requires considerable time and effort, but the linguistic information obtained from them compensates for the extra investment.

Working from the best available manuscript of each composition, the HDP’s researchers process the text in two stages: first they transcribe it and add markups; then they analyze each word grammatically, assign it to a dictionary entry, and tag it as warranted. At each stage, the work undergoes review by two additional HDP researchers. If there are several extant manuscripts, the HDP chooses the clearest and most complete one for incorporation into the dictionary.

The compositions processed by the HDP include not just “literature”: the section on ancient literature, for example, is based on inscriptions, coins, the Judean Desert scrolls, liturgy, Talmud and Midrash, poetry, Karaite literature and Geonic texts. The inclusion and classification of material from this period is almost finished.

The work on modern literature began in 1969. There is no way to fully catalog all the material due to its enormous breadth. Material here includes belles-lettres, scientific, natural, and medical texts, history, geography, journalist, periodicals, and more. The entire corpora of three authors are included in the dictionary: Mendele Moicher Sforim, Haim Nahman Bialik and Shmuel Yosef Agnon. By 2010 some 600 works from 80 authors had been entered into the dictionary, on the whole according to their first editions of the works.

During the past decade work has begun on Medieval literature. It is during the Medieval Period that there was the largest dispersion of the Jewish people and the variety of texts reflects the extent of the dispersion. Among the first texts to have been analyzed were Spanish poetry and rabbinic literature from 1050 to 1550.

Ancient Literature

Based on the best manuscript witnesses from libraries worldwide, the Historical Dictionary Project has compiled all Hebrew compositions from the post-Biblical era to the end of the Geonic Period. Naturally, for the ancient period, the vast majority of the original manuscripts are no longer extant. Of the witnesses to ancient Hebrew, the most faithful, unmediated by copyists, come from archeological excavations: tombstones, synagogue dedications, coins, and seal impressions.

Unlike the Judean Desert Scrolls, which accurately reflect the Hebrew of their day, most ancient texts have reached us in late copies. In the process of being copied, in some cases hundreds of times, many mistakes were introduced, especially when copyists corrected texts without fully understanding the language of the original. Thinking to improve, they actually corrupted the text. Therefore, the Historical Dictionary Project seeks the best transmission of each text, based on expert scholarly advice.

At present, most of the material assigned to the ancient literature section has been compiled and analyzed in the Historical Dictionary database. The Geonic material still awaits analysis.

Medieval Literature

The first decades of the Historical Dictionary Project were primarily devoted to collection and analysis of ancient and Haskalah literature, leaving a seven-century gap, from the eleventh to the eighteenth centuries. The time has come to fill this lacuna. But, because of the wide geographical distribution of Jewish cultural centers during this period, and the scope and variety of its most significant literature, only a portion of the extant medieval compositions will be analyzed for the database.

Prose

In 2009 the HDP undertook compilation of the sourcebook for selected eleventh- to sixteenth-century rabbinical works, the most widespread genre of the age in Hebrew writing, whose influence on future generations was decisive. The chosen sources encompass halakhic, exegetical, and homiletical works from different traditions and periods. Additional literary genres will be analyzed in the future, first and foremost scientific tracts and Hebrew translations of classical works.

Poetry

The poetry of the Spanish Jews, both religious and secular, was preserved by the Spanish exiles. Viewed by many in the Jewish and non-Jewish world alike as the acme of Hebrew poetry, it influenced other centers of poetry—Yemen, Italy, and even Ashkenaz. The poetry of the early Spanish poets (such as Dunash ibn Labrat, Menahem ben Saruq, and their disciples) has already been entered into the database. At present, the works of the “Golden Age” in Spain (11th–12th centuries), including works by the three outstanding poets of the day—Samuel ha-Nagid, Solomon ibn Gabirol, and Judah Halevi—are being processed.

Modern Literature

In 1969 the HDP began its compilation of Modern Hebrew works, starting with works from the Haskalah period in Germany (mid-eighteenth century) and concluding with the founding of the State of Israel. In 2009 this scope was broadened to include Hebrew literature composed in Italy and Amsterdam from the fifteenth century on.

Modern Hebrew writing constitutes an important building block in the formation of modern spoken Hebrew. Composed in a modern European cultural and intellectual setting, it was influenced by and adapted itself to the majority culture. Its works reflect a variety of new genres: belles letters, autobiography, and journalism, among others, as well as scientific literature. In all these genres we find words, phrases, and meanings that are currently in use. The processes sparked by the printing revolution that continued with the creation of Mendele Mokher Seforim’s style and culminated in the renewal of Hebrew speech, laid the foundations for a modern secular Hebrew language.

The works by three of the modern period’s most eminent writers—Mendele Mokher Seforim, H̱ayyim Naẖman Bialik, and Shmuel Yosef Agnon—will be processed in their entirety. For the works of other writers, including Aẖad Ha'Am, Joseph Brenner, Y. D. Berkowitz, Uri Gnessin, H̱ayyim Hazaz, Ze'ev Jabotinsky, Abraham Mapu, Moses Mendelssohn, Perets Smolenskin, and Moses H̱ayyim Luzzatto—selected texts will be processed.

In the database, the texts for Modern Hebrew literature are typeset according to their first printed edition. At present, over 600 texts of varying length—containing some 10 million words produced by about 100 writers—have been processed, and concordance entries have been prepared for about one-third of these compositions.

Archive of the Hebrew Language

From the beginning, the Historical Dictionary Project intended not only to produce a dictionary, but also to create an archive of the Hebrew language. In 2010, the Hebrew texts from the post-Biblical Period down through the 11th century were fully integrated into the computerized database. In this archive there are not only individual words, but also complete texts that have been painstakingly copied according to the best manuscripts available. This archive is available online.

In addition to the ability to perform grammatical analyses and concordance searches, the archives also contain unique texts, such as the poetry from the 11th century. The archive is an indispensable tool used by researchers of Hebrew literature and language.