I believe one controversial hypothesis goes that, because of the makeup of settler communities which gave re-birth to Hebrew as a spoken language in the 20th century, modern spoken Hebrew is really a development from extensive influence from Yiddish (a slavic creole) and Ashkenazi Hebrew (a religious language, which, if pronounced out loud, would have phonologized as Yiddish). It would make for an interesting creole because, unlike any creole I know, it would stem not just from the 'nativization' (re-structuring, re-lexicalization) of a pidgin, but also the use of textual material, written Hebrew.
Some online material if you are interested:
1. http://www.linguistlist.org/issues/13/13-2349.html
>>Paul Wexler
TWO-TIERED RELEXIFICATION IN YIDDISH
Jews, Sorbs, Khazars, and the Kiev-Polessian Dialect
2002. 23 x 15,5 cm. xi, 713 pages. Cloth. Euro 128.00 / sFr 205 / approx. USD 128.00 ISBN 3-11-017258-5 (Trends in Linguistics: Studies and Monographs 136) This study applies the relexification hypothesis to the genesis of Yiddish. The author believes Yiddish began as a Sorbian dialect relexified to High German between the 9th-12th centuries. The present study, rich in data (much of it presented as entries to a projected etymological dictionary), also suggests new diagnostic tests for identifying relexification. The presence in Yiddish of East Slavic features (e.g. pseudo-dual, gender and plural suffix assignment) suggests that the descendants of the Judaized Khazars also relexified Kiev-Polessian (northern Ukrainian and southern Belarussian) in the 15th century to Yiddish and German. Yiddish is thus a mixed West-East Slavic language and the best proof that Khazar Jews were a major component in the ethnogenesis of the Ashkenazic Jews.>>
2. http://www.tau.ac.il/humanities/lingui/people/wexler.html
>>1991a. The schizoid nature of Modern Hebrew. A Slavic language in search of a Semitic past. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz
1993. The Ashkenazic Jews. A Slavo-Turkic people in search of a Jewish identity. Columbus: Slavica.
For example, I have developed the hypothesis that Yiddish is a Slavic rather than Germanic languages, and that Modern Israeli Hebrew is a relexified form of Yiddish (differing from the latter originally only in its predominantly Old Hebrew vocabulary) and is thus also a Slavic language. Furthermore, the Ashkenazic Jews are predominantly of Slavo-Turkic stock (the descendants of converts to Judaism) rather than Palestinian Jewish emigres, and that the Sephardic Jews are mainly of Berber and Arab descent.>>
3. http://jewish-languages.org/pwexler.html
>>Paul Wexler
Academic Affiliation
Tel Aviv University, Israel
Wexler, P. In preparation. A Historical Phonology of the Russian Language. Heidelberg: Carl Winter. Horvath, J. & Wexler, P. (eds.). 1997. Relexification in Creole and Non-Creole Languages. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz. Wexler, P. 1977. A Historical Phonology of the Belorussian Language. Heidelberg: Carl Winter. Wexler, P. 1967. Purism and Language: A Study in Modern Belorussian and Ukrainian Nationalism (1840-1967). Bloomington: Indiana University. Jewish Languages (Including Modern Hebrew) [Only books are listed here.]
Wexler, P. 2002. Two-Tiered Relexification in Yiddish: Jews, Sorbs, Khazars, and the Kiev-Polessian Dialect. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Wexler, P. 1996. The Non-Jewish Origins of the Sephardic Jews. Albany: State University of New York. Wexler, P. 1993. The Ashkenazic Jews: A Slavo-Turkic People in Search of a Jewish Identity. Columbus: Slavica. Wexler, P. 1992. The Balkan Substratum of Yiddish: A Reassessment of the Unique Romance and Greek Components. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz. Wexler, P. 1991. The Schizoid Nature of Modern Hebrew: A Slavic Language in Search of a Semitic Past. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz. Wexler, P. 1991. Yiddish - The Fifteenth Slavic Language. International Journal of the Sociology of Language 91. Wexler, P. (ed.). 1990. Studies in Yiddish Linguistics. Tubingen: Max Niemeyer. Wexler, P. 1989. Judeo-Romance Linguistics: A Bibliography (Latin, Italo-, Gallo-, Ibero- and Rhaeto- Romance, (except Castilian). New York: Garland. Wexler, P. 1988. Three Heirs to a Judeo-Latin Legacy: Judeo-Ibero-Romance, Yiddish and Rotwelsch. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz. Welxer, P. 1987. Explorations in Judeo-Slavic Linguistics. Leiden: Brill >>
These three works--
Wexler, P. 1996. The Non-Jewish Origins of the Sephardic Jews. Albany: State University of New York.
Wexler, P. 1993. The Ashkenazic Jews: A Slavo-Turkic People in Search of a Jewish Identity. Columbus: Slavica.
Wexler, P. 1991. The Schizoid Nature of Modern Hebrew: A Slavic Language in Search of a Semitic Past. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz.
would have to make Wexler quite the controversial linguist in Israel.
F
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