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It is also a timely reminder that Arab "Palestinian identity" hardly existed in 1943 or 1948. The term "Palestinian Pride" was a synonym for Zionism

The First Hebrew Language Textbook Set in Modern Jewish Palestine



For an English speaking/reading audience in the United States and Great Britain and the Commonwealth, the term Palestine and Palestinian were everywhere understood to apply to Jews only. There was nothing unusual or contradictory in the use of the terms Palestine and Palestinian in a Jewish context -- they had been in universal use in English speaking countries for generations and from approximately the time of early Zionist activity under the British mandate, Arabs in the country were generally reluctant to define themselves as anything but "Arabs" and all the U.N. resolutions including the partition plan spoke only of Jews and Arabs. Ironically, the term 'Palestinian' was in general use only for the Jewish segment of Palestine. Yiddish radio stations in the United States frequently played what they called "Palestinian folk songs" to refer to the popular tunes describing Jewish pioneers (halutzim) working the land.

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Even tin-pan Alley Jewish songwriters like Irving Berlin employed the term "Palestine" to refer to the country's Jewish identity and associations. One such big hit from 1920 was "Lena is The Queen of Palestina," played to a Klezmer tune and even sung in a Yiddish version. Language textbooks often try to present the cultural aspects of a tongue in its homeland as well as the formal training in the various learning skills of speaking, listening comprehension, reading and writing. Obviously, where English, French, Spanish, or Portuguese is spoken in many different lands with quite distinct literatures, dialects, social relations and a wide range of national idiomatic expressions, the textbooks often provide clarifying footnotes to varying usage. If the language is spoken only in a single nation such as Danish or Hungarian, there may be more space to help the student understand the history of the linguistic homelands, their national traditions, music, and culinary specialties. When it comes to the unique case of Hebrew that had previously served for many centuries only as a liturgical language without a single homeland for speakers in which the language was the spoken idiom from birth, textbooks with national content were entirely lacking. As a former resident of Israel, now an instructor of Hebrew at a University in Florida, I can appreciate how difficult it was for the first textbooks of modern Hebrew to make the transition from a language taught for centuries without a living tie to a homeland to the situation today of a spoken national language like any other. Perhaps the first (at least to my knowledge) item of this transition was the book, Everyday Hebrew; Twenty-nine simple conversations with English translation and full grammatical introduction (London, J,M, Dent & Sons Ltd., 1943, 1945), by Chaim Rabin, a German born scholar of Oriental languages, who later emigrated with his parents to Palestine and then settled in Britain. For many years, he was a distinguished Professor of Hebrew at the University of Oxford. The book was first published in 1943 and a second edition appeared in 1948 almost simultaneously with the establishment of the State of Israel. The "Twenty-nine conversations" follow Simon and Rachel, a newly married couple, on their way to the land of Israel by ship to visit family and friends. Rachel is from England and Simon is a native born "tsabra" (named for the local cactus plant). From the very first conversation, the Jews define themselves as "proud Palestinians" and call "Palestine" their homeland. Even textbooks for the study of Hebrew published a decade later for use in the Diaspora often featured dialogues set either in Biblical times, or dealt with legends and folklore from the East European shtetl, Medieval Spain or the the Israel and Babylon of Talmudic times. In the Hebrew text of Haim's book, the terms for Palestine used for the country are "Eretz-Yisrael" (The Land of Israel) and for those Jews born in the country or long term residents (i.e. Palestinians) "Eretz-Yisraeli" (male) and Eretz -- Yisraelit" (female). Rabin faced a dilemma and resolved it by creating characters who typify ideal types of veteran and new Jewish arrivals in mandatory Palestine for his conversations that reflected the sense of the Zionist mission in their adaptation to the new chosen homeland. Their dedication, enthusiasm and love of the Hebrew language enabled them to overcome the hardships of family separation. The language of the conversations in both Hebrew and the English translations are somewhat stilted, overly polite, and formal as we might expect from a distinguished Oxford professor. Rabin struggled with the problem of both trying to produce a textbook with all the traditional rules of classic Hebrew grammar but one that would also serve as a modern textbook with a colloquial and contemporary 'Jewish-Palestinian flavor'. He begins his little tale of new arrivals in the country, a young couple just married Simon and Rachel and is at pains to explain to the reader much of the new social environment of Jewish Palestine and the prevailing British administration. In chapter one, Rachel proudly exclaims to her Palestinian born husband upon their arrival that "I have been a full Palestinian for a fortnight, ever since I was married to you." She is questioned by the customs officer at the Haifa port of arrival in the following chapter: "Is this your first visit to Palestine, Madam?" to which she responds..."Yes, only it's hardly a visit. I've come to stay",prompting the response...."That's the right spirit!" Simon, Rachel's husband offers a generous "tip" (bakshish) to a cab driver of one piaster. The book offers a footnote explaining that the Palestinian pound is ....."divided into one thousand mills, one-tenth of which is a coin referred to as a "grush" or piaster, i.e. a twopence farthing and that half a grush (5 mills) is roughly a penny. While sitting at a restaurant enjoying lunch and waiting for their bus to Jerusalem, Simon already presses Rachel for her first impressions of the country. She exclaims "It's marvelous! The sun and these colours! It's like a dream I always thought people were exaggerating when they spoke so enthusiastically of the beauty of Palestine, but now I see that the reality is far better than the description." Right away, her attention is diverted to the menu because she has never seen one in Hebrew and she admits that she hardly understands a word of it although she studied Hebrew abroad. Simon calmly reassures her....."No wonder. It's not so easy to get the hand of practical Hebrew outside the country. Your Hebrew conversation is fluent enough, but you will still have a lot of difficulties in the kitchen and in the shops." Simon is basically introducing the reader/learner of the textbook to the new colloquial Hebrew of a living community in their homeland and not the dry bones Hebrew found in hundreds of books, brochures and teaching aids spanning centuries and aimed either at Biblical scholars, for use in prayer and religious services, but very rarely duplicated natural conversation in the setting of a real community of speakers. Readers were made to follow the daily routine of characters in the text, who, apart from their typically Jewish names, were divorced from any identifiable rooted culture and society. The first negative mundane remarks of everyday life are those of the alert Simon who calls upon the waiter..."to give us another fork, please, this one isn't clean. Also we have no napkins." The English version of the conversation is thoroughly British with expressions like "....We shan't be able to explore Tel Aviv before we leave," and when meeting a friend....Well, if it isn't Gabriel, you've got so fat. How are you, old man?"; and...after all, I mayn't get the job." In Jerusalem, Rachel is impressed by the tall buildings that she imagines have 'an American appearance' and by the lovely gardens to which Simon clarifies that they are the result of hard labor and that, once, all the land Rachel sees between them and the Kiriyat Shaul neighborhood was a 'stony wasteland' when he left Palestine a few years earlier. The couple is welcomed by Simon's mother who calls them 'my children' and summons a maid to prepare dinner. Simon's mother immediately offers Rachel an orange from 'my orchard in Ra'ananah'. Obviously, Simon belongs to a tiny affluent minority of the country's Jewish population wh own their own plot of productive land at some distance from their primary residence. The mother then assures Rachel and Simon that her health has improved since she took the 'water cure' at the hot springs in Tiberias. Like any good language book today, Rabin finds a way to introduce important aspects of the country's geography and institutions in his story line. Rachel next urges Simon to get a new suit for an upcoming job interview and that it should be a light linen one suitable to the climate. The salesman assures the couple that the material is the "first quality Palestinian fabric and that you can't find such quality even in imported goods." Next the reader encounters a scene of the great cultural vitality of modern Hebrew culture and the Zionist enterprise -- The Habimah Theatre in Jerusalem (located today in Tel-Aviv) that is putting on "Danton's Death" and "Your People." Both plays are nearly sold-out so it is difficult to get tickets. Simon is however ready to pay the exorbitant price of ten piastres to get seats together. Suddenly, Rachel is taken ill and it is necessary to call a doctor. She has a mild temperature and the wise doctor calms her, explaining that it is only a mild complaint from which many new immigrants suffer. It will pass in three or four days and he recommends natural light food such as semolina pudding, rusks and weak tea. I actually had to look at the Hebrew text to find out what is meant by 'rusks' (cinnamon). Rachel intends to visit her sister in Hadera and so we get a brief geographical picture of the journey via coach to Lydda and then train. We learn that the sister actually lives in a kibbutz near Hadera and it is referred to as "The English Kibbutz." Simon is careful to address the members of the Kibbutz as "comrade." It consists entirely of huts and tents. The sister, Elizabeth, works in the chicken run and is training to take part in settling a new kibbutz on "our land in the Beisan Valley." Rachel is thrilled by the way her sister refers to 'our land' although security considerations require leaving the children for the time being in the care of others. Rachel admits she is jealous and that from the moment she landed in Haifa, she has experienced the marvelous feeling of speaking about 'our country' and that she envies her sister the privilege of "upbuilding the country." Even the mother of Rachel and Elizabeth in England, who was so disturbed by their emigration to Palestine, is affected by her daughters' enthusiasm and the prevailing good feelings and prosperity that she too is considering settling there. In this way, Rabin smoothes over the pain and anguish that was caused to so many Jewish parents in the Diaspora by their children's decision to embark on the treacherous journey and the dangers of life in Palestine. The Arabs are only briefly alluded to in several remarks, the most important of which is that ..."Our relations with our Arab neighbors are excellent just now, it's true, but who can tell? One must be prepared for any emergency." The first edition of the book, written in 1943 was published at a time of considerable prosperity and good will in the country due to prosperity and the demand provided by the British forces in the Middle East and the large number of recent Jewish arrivals from Germany and Austria and the skills they brought with them. Three of the photos show Jewish volunteers in the British forces marching through the streets of Tel-Aviv, British Army recruiting posters in Hebrew and a recruiting office for young Palestinian Jews. Other photos dramatize Jews working in agriculture and industry including a woman in a knitting mill. The text was probably nearly finished sometime shortly after the surrender of the French Army in 1940 and the prospect of a possible German or Italian strike in the Middle East through Egypt to Palestine. In Chapter 26, "A Political Conversation," a friend, Mr. Keren, speaks to Simon about the possibility of Italy entering the war (Tel-Aviv was actually bombed several times during 1941-42 by Italian planes). He reassures Simon that the number of Civil Defense volunteers is growing and that "We have a fine system of shelters" and when queried about whether he is not afraid of an Italian invasion, Mr. Keren asserts that the Italians may try, but ..."It's pretty certain that the English will give them a hot time." When Simon voices his apprehensions of the suffering war would cause, Mr. Keren (an older and even more convinced Zionist apparently than Simon) explains that ...."After all, our fate as Jews depends on the victory of the democratic powers. If fascism should win, which God forbid, what good will it be to us that we were not directly affected by the war?" Of course, the thread running through the entire book is one of naive wishful thinking and optimism as well as devotion to the Zionist ideal. All problems and hardships are minimized. This was the spirit of the time that enabled the construction of a Jewish homeland and the victory of the reinvigorated, dynamic, earthy modern Hebrew language to triumph. The book is a delightful combination of how students were offered both a novel textbook for language learning and an introduction to the pioneering spirit and rebirth of the Hebrew nation in its old-new homeland. It is also a timely reminder that Arab "Palestinian identity" hardly existed in 1943 or 1948. The term "Palestinian Pride" was a synonym for Zionism. The U.N. resolutions favoring partition spoke only of Arabs and Jews. The media has been hypnotized since by the tactics of Arab nationalists who resorted to a Palestinian card when the Jews no longer had to argue in international forums in English for the right to their homeland (Eretz-Yisrael in Hebrew) after winning independence. Thus, the term Palestine became available to the Arabs by default. For the media, it became part of their 'Newspeak' that has obliterated the past and totally changed the meaning of words, much like 'gay'.


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Dr. Norman Berdichevsky -- Bio and Archives

Dr. Norman Berdichevsky nberdichevsky.com, Ph.D. - Geography, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1974, is an author, freelance writer, editor, researcher, lecturer, translator and teacher with sophisticated communications skills.


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