The Roots of English

The English Language

Because China has a population of over one billion, it is possible that Chinese is the most often spoken language. However, Chinese is limited to China, while English is spoken all over the world. This came about because English people settled in numerous places in every continent and allover Asia. In addition , English is the language of science and higher education all over the world, as was once true of French and earlier Latin.

English has more words than any other European language because English consists of two ancient languages, i.e. Anglo- Saxon and Latin. Anglo-Saxon is a Germanic language no longer spoken anywhere, and Latin, a Roman language, is also no longer used except in the Vatican. Yet, fifty percent, one half, of English words are of Latin origin. Latin includes some Greek words such as sympathy or feeling together, synagogue, assembling together, symphony or hearing together, etc.

The Latin language became the language of the Romans because a small nation living next to Rome was using this language and called it Latin while because their king was called Latinus.  The Romans spoke Etruscan when only a few Romans spoke Latin. Then more an more liked Latin better, and therefore Latin became a language used all over Europe.

English is ever changing, so that ancient English is hardly understood by present day Americans. Examples are Chaucer and Shakespeare.

What is true of English is true of all languages. The Bible, except for the New Testament, is written in Hebrew. Nevertheless, modern Hebrew as spoken in Israel differs considerably from ancient Biblical Hebrew.

The word Bible refers to the city of Byblos in Lebanon from where the ancient Greeks imported wide palm leaves which they dried and then wrote on them. When full, these leaves were rolled into a scroll and bound with a string and saved in libraries. Today the Hebrew Bible used in synagogues is a scroll written by hand on parchment.

It is of interest that more  American students fail English than any other subject.  This comes about because so many words are of Latin origin, and some of Greek origin, that these words seem hard to recall. The medical and legal professions use numerous Latin words, so that in some countries all medical students find that Latin is part of their curriculum.

Shalom u'vracha.

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