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August 2001 Issue

Motorcycles, Watermelon, and the Hebrew Humdrum of Everyday Life

By Jill Suzanne Jacobs

Hebrew was once almost exclusively a holy language. A language of prayers and ritual. Of the Bible and other sacred texts. A language above the humdrum of the everyday.

No longer true. That same ancient and holy tongue in now the language of the beach, of eating watermelon, and of the myriad of activities and emotions that make up a life.

For me in particular, Hebrew is a language of ofnoah--a motorcycle, shirah--song and poetry, of yedidut--friendship, and of course Midinat Yisrael--the State of Israel.

All languages are portals. Openings to culture and friendship, literature and ideas. Learn any one, and a whole new world opens to you. Learn Hebrew, and a whole Jewish and Israeli world is yours.

I confess to not being a very good Hebrew student in college. I'll even confess to getting a C- at one point--a grade that was really an act of mercy on the part of my Hebrew professor. But a mark, nonetheless, that wreaked such havoc on my GPA that it almost prevented my acceptance to the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

As they say in Hebrew, davka--isn't that ironic.

When I arrived in Israel, I was determined to finally speak this language that had tormented me so as a student. And I got a very good tip from someone. He said, "When someone tries to speak to you in English, feign confusion and reply, "Ani lo medeberet anglit, ani medebaret afghani. Atah medaber afghani?" Translation: "I don't speak English, I speak Afghani. Do you speak Afghani?"

I think it was a joke but I took him seriously, choosing instead to feign being from Russia. In under six months I was fooling people into thinking I spoke the language fluently. And I've been fooling people ever since.

But what this feat of language has given me more than anything else is access. Access to a world understood in Biblical language. To prayer, sacred texts, modern Hebrew poetry, and music. But above all else, my command of Hebrew gave me access to something else: native Israelis.

And there was a sexy one in particular who rode a motorcycle. A physics student at the Technion (the MIT of Israel), he was fairly bright, but suffice it to say, he didn't have a gift for learning languages. Luckily it didn't matter, for I had mastered his.

We dated for the better part of my first year of graduate school in Israel, and in addition to taking me all over the country on his motorcycle (a fact I still deny to my mother, so please don't email her this article!), he introduced me to his Yeminte family, his score of Tel Aviv friends, and a bunch of really interesting words I won't mention here.

Today, the Hebrew language is very much a part of me. I have Hebrew magnetic poetry on my fridge. I'm an avid fan of the Israeli music scene. I consider Israel my home, counting friends and family there. And the part of me that is religious is enriched by the agility I have with our people's sacred texts.

My Jewish identity--like the Hebrew language I speak--is a mix of the sacred and the profane. In my more spiritual moments I can appreciate the poetry of prayer, and in my less spiritual ones I can sit in synagogue taking in the week's Hebrew Torah reading in one ear, and the week's gossip in the other.

And of course, speaking Hebrew always gives me plenty of motivation to return for another stay in Israel. For there I can speak my language again.

Jill Suzanne Jacobs holds a Master of Arts in Jewish Education from Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, and lived for three years in Israel, mostly in Jerusalem. She now lives in Massachusetts and works at Jewish Family & Life!

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