Aramaic Taught in Israeli Village

I found this great article last month --

The Israeli village where Christian children are learning Aramaic in bid to revive ancient language that Jesus spoke

By Julian Gavaghan

A Christian village in Israel is teaching Aramaic in an effort to revive the ancient language that Jesus spoke - centuries after it all but disappeared from the Middle East.

Maronite children from Jish, who speak Arabic as their first language, are learning the tongue of their forefathers after their elementary school became the only one in the country to teach the subject.

The language, which was the region's dominant language 2,000 years ago, is still chanted in the church – although few understand it beyond prayers.

But, rather than rebel against learning an idiom that has little practical use, the 80 youngsters aged five to ten are embracing learning phrases such as ‘ah chop’ – or ‘how are you?’

Many Muslim children are even happy to learn it because, according to the school’s head teacher, it is part of the Arab community’s ‘collective heritage’.

In the Arab village of Jish, nestled in the Galilean hills where Jesus lived and preached, about 80 children in grades one through five study Aramaic as a voluntary subject for two hours a week. 

Israel's education ministry provided funds to add classes until the eighth grade, said principal Reem Khatieb-Zuabi.

Several Jish residents lobbied for Aramaic studies several years ago, he explained, but the idea faced resistance.

Jish's Muslims worried it was a covert attempt to entice their children to Christianity. 

And some Christians objected, saying the emphasis on their ancestral language was being used to strip them of their Arab identity. 

Passion: Atif Zarka, 64, a volunteer Aramaic teacher's assistant, plays the violin to forth grade students studying Aramaic in Jish

The issue is sensitive to many Arab Muslims and Christians in Israel, who prefer to be identified by their ethnicity, not their faith.

Ultimately, Mr Khatieb-Zuabi, a secular Muslim from an outside village, overruled them.

‘This is our collective heritage and culture. We should celebrate and study it,’ he said.

Carla Hadad, 10, who frequently waved her arms to answer questions in Aramaic from school teacher Mona Issa during a recent lesson, said: ‘We want to speak the language that Jesus spoke.’

‘We used to speak it a long time ago,’ she added, referring to her ancestors.

During the lesson, a dozen children lisped out a Christian prayer in Aramaic. They learned the words for ‘elephant,’ and ‘mountain.’ 

Some children carefully drew sharp-angled Aramaic letters. Others fiddled with their pencil cases, which sported images of popular soccer teams.

The children are helped in their studies by an Aramaic-speaking television channel from Sweden, of all places, where a vibrant immigrant community has kept the ancient tongue alive.

The only other filmed production to use the language is Mel Gibson’s biopic The Passion of The Christ.

The language is also being taught in the Palestinian-administered West Bank at a special school for Syrian Orthodox Christians.

In the village of Beit Jala, near Jesus’ birthplace in Bethlehem,  priests have taught the language to their 320 students for the past five years.

Some 360 families in the area descend from Aramaic-speaking refugees who in the 1920s fled the Tur Abdin region of what is now Turkey.

Priest Butros Nimeh said elders still speak the language but that it vanished among younger generations. 

He said they hoped teaching the language would help the children appreciate their roots.

Although both the Syrian Orthodox and Maronite church worship in Aramaic, they are distinctly different sects.

Ancient language: A copy of the Gospel of Luke in Aramaic script

The Maronites are the dominant Christian church in neighboring Lebanon but make up only a few thousand of the Holy Land's 210,000 Christians. 

Likewise, Syrian Orthodox Christians number no more than 2,000 in the Holy Land, said Nimeh. Overall, some 150,000 Christians live in Israel and another 60,000 live in the West Bank.

They are helped by Swedish Aramaic-speaking communities who descended from the Middle East have sought to keep their language alive.

They publish a newspaper, ‘Bahro Suryoyo,’ pamphlets and children's books, including ‘The Little Prince,’ and maintain a satellite television station, ‘Soryoyosat,’ said Arzu Alan, chairwoman of the Syriac Aramaic Federation of Sweden.

There's also an Aramaic soccer team, ‘Syrianska FC’ in the Swedish top division from the town of Sodertalje. Officials estimate the Aramaic-speaking population at anywhere from 30,000 to 80,000 people.

For many Maronites and Syrian Orthodox Christians in the Holy Land, the television station, in particular, was the first time they heard the language outside church in decades. Hearing it in a modern context inspired them to try revive the language among their communities.

‘When you hear (the language), you can speak it,’ said Issa, the teacher.

Aramaic dialects were the region's vernacular from 2,500 years ago until the sixth century, when Arabic, the language of conquering Muslims from the Arabian Peninsula, became dominant, according to Fassberg.

Linguistic islands survived: Maronites clung to Aramaic liturgy and so did the Syrian Orthodox church. Kurdish Jews on the river island of Zakho spoke an Aramaic dialect called ‘Targum’ until fleeing to Israel in the 1950s. Three Christian villages in Syria still speak an Aramaic dialect, Fassberg said.

With few opportunities to practice the ancient tongue, teachers in Jish have tempered expectations. They hope they can at least revive an understanding of the language.

The steep challenges are seen in the Jish school, where the fourth-grade Aramaic class has just a dozen students. The number used to be twice that until they introduced an art class during the same time slot - and lost half their students.

Mail from Jesus

[Thanks, R!]

If you never  felt pain, then how would you know that I am a Healer?


If you never had  to pray, How would you know that I am a Deliverer?



If you never had  a trial, how could you call yourself an overcomer?



If you never  felt sadness, How would you know that I am a Comforter?



If you never  made a mistake, How would you know that I am a forgiver?


If you knew all,  How would you know that I will answer your questions?



If you never  were in trouble, How would you know that I will come to  your rescue



If you never  were broken, Then how would you know that I can make you  whole?



If you never had  a problem,How would you know that I can solve them?




If you never had  any suffering, Then how would you know what I went  through?



If you never  went through the fire, Then how would you become pure?

If  I gave you all things, How would you appreciate them?



If I never  corrected you, How would you know that I love you?



If you had all  power, Then how would you learn to depend on  me?



If your life was  perfect, Then what would you need me for?


Love,
Jesus

The Carpenter

My life has been rather hectic lately as my home goes through many much needed renovations: wood floors, paint, siding, windows, fixing a leaky roof and a leaking basement ... lots of things.  The wood floors, though, have been the most exciting!  They are now covered in a lovely bamboo flooring that turned out to be far more beautiful than anticipated.  As the carpenter Joe worked, I couldn't help but reflect on The Carpenter ...

The house was a mile marker: the start of a new venture in my life.  I had gotten divorced the year before I bought the house and was proud to be "making it on my own."  The house was physical proof that I was moving on, leaving a bad marriage behind me, starting anew.  But, during the past years as I struggled to pay for graduate school, I had let things go around the house.  Now, my home was in need of major changes.

In preparation for the carpenter, I had a lot of basement and closet junk to rummage through and throw out.  I had rented a dumpster into which many of my old things went, along with construction-related refuse.  There was one evening that I found myself in tears, as I relived some old memories and made some self-discoveries.  "This is going to be more than just a house renovation," I thought.

In preparation for The Carpenter, we likewise must go through an inventory process: taking account of what we have done, tossing out what clutters our lives and obscures our vision, and keeping those things that are of true help.   We need to reflect on where we have been -- where we have come from, what we have done and accomplished in our lives, and where are next steps will lead us.  Of course, we must be mindful of what true value is and not substitute what is truly important for what only momentarily entertains and distracts us from the real journey before us.

My neighbor the carpenter appears bright and early at my door, greeting me with a big smile and an energy of excitement for a new job.  He meticulously carries in the various tools he will need for the job, placing them strategically about the house and even putting a power saw out on the back deck. 

First, there is the removal of the old carpet: a nasty, dusty job.  I'm so glad to be rid of the 15-year-old berber, having had it installed when I first bought the house.  Then, there was the pounding down of loose nails and the laying down of roofing tar paper all over the floors.  It was a dusty, dirty, noisy environment with all my appliances piled in the middle of the living room.  But, knowing nothing about carpentry and hardwood floors, I found it interesting.

One evening, I watched as Joe the carpenter and his assistant struggled to keep the flooring in straight lines as the wood went down the hall into a guest room.  It turns out that the original carpenter of the house had done a lousy job.  Rooms were not square due to an apparent slap dash job to get the house up and on the market as quickly as possible.  The new carpenter used a red chalk line to help see what I would call "true straight" in spite of the crooked walls deceptively indicating otherwise.  Kneeling closely to the floor with his tools, he would pull and let snap the chalk line,  leaving a bright red line that seemed to glow against the background of the black tar paper.  This was his guide as he finished the stretch of flooring out to the end of the guest room wall.

It made me think of The Carpenter: the color of the red chalk calling to mind the red color of Christ's blood as He hung on the Cross as a sacrifice for our sins -- for my sins.  We humans are incapable of keeping the Law, running crooked against its true and straight lines.  It was in kneeling down close to the red line that Joe could better make out the direction he was to follow.  We, likewise, must kneel down and follow closely, ignoring lines poorly laid down by others and, instead, seek true direction that will lead us to walk in straight lines with God.

And, yet, despite our best efforts, our lives become a crooked mess.  Looking at the sharp red chalk line against the black tar paper, I envisioned Christ's blood dripping down his arms as He hung on the Cross.  We cannot keep the Law and are, therefore, condemned by it.  But, because of Christ's Great Sacrifice, the true, straight line of God's law gives way to drops snaking down and around our imperfections, swirling around our failings, covering over our sins and bringing us back into alignment with God.

How wonderful to ponder that God chose to send His son to earth in human form to be adopted by a carpenter -- Joseph -- who passed on the trade to the Son.  Carpenters create, refine, repair, reshape, strengthen -- and, yes, sometimes tear down and start anew.  It is a skill of creation and recreation, repairing and renewing.  How appropriate for Jesus, our Redeemer.

^"Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!"  (2 Cor. 5:17 NIV)

I reflect on the glaring mistakes made during the construction of my house -- glaring to Joe, but not to me with my untrained eyes.  I think about my "mistakes" and "shoddy construction" -- some glaringly obvious to me, some embarrassingly glaring to others, and some to which I am sadly (mercifully?) oblivious.  Oblivious, that is, until pointed out to me by an Expert.  And I give thanks that His blood covers over and fills in my transgressions ... my sins.