The Making of Modern Hebrew
When Eliezer Ben–Yehuda arrived in the Land of Israel in 1881, Hebrew had not been a spoken language since the time of the Bible. Swimming against the tide of the disappearance of many minor languages, suspicion by religious authorities, political opposition and the paucity of words describing modern concepts, Ben-Yehuda’s vision prevailed. Today, Hebrew is spoken by 9 million Israelis, from Supreme Court judges to street walkers.