The Story of Hebrew and the Story of Judaism

"All things are mortal but the Jew; all other forces pass, but he remains. What is the secret of his immortality?"

So mused Mark Twain in the nineteenth century. One such "secret" surely resides in the immortal language that the Jewish people kept alive—and that in many senses kept them alive—throughout their history. In his new book, The Story of Hebrew, Dartmouth College's Lewis Glinert busts the myth that Hebrew was a "dead" language in the centuries between the ancient dispersion and the birth of Zionism. On June 21, 2017, Professor Glinert visited The Tikvah Center in New York City for a wide-ranging discussion highlighting the many forms of Hebrew's survival and renewal throughout the Jewish history.