Language of Jesus


There exists a consensus among scholars that Jesus spoke Aramaic. Aramaic was the common language of Roman Judaea, and was thus also spoken by at least some of Jesus' disciples.
The villages of Nazareth and Capernaum in Galilee, where Matthew, Mark, Luke and John|the Gospels] record him as having been raised, were populated by Aramaic-speaking communities. Jesus probably spoke the Galilean dialect, distinguishable from that which was spoken in Roman-era Jerusalem. Galilee was known for its trade routes and for its interface with the wider spectrum of Hellenism; Matthew 4:15 references "Galilee of the Gentiles". As such, the Gospels understand Jesus' youth in Nazareth to be in a highly cosmopolitan area in which Greek was used frequently, from the meeting of several major trade routes in Sepphoris. It is thus likely that Jesus was able to work in Koine Greek.
Additionally, given that Hebrew had continued to be used by Judeans who were left behind during the Babylonian captivity and is understood to be the language of composition for several canonical texts composed in the Second Temple period, Jesus was conversant in the Hebrew spoken among the Samaritans, according to John 4. Jesus was thus well versed in Biblical Hebrew, beyond its use as the liturgical language of Second Temple Judaism.

Cultural and linguistic background

Aramaic was the common language of the Eastern Mediterranean during and after the Neo-Assyrian, Neo-Babylonian, and Achaemenid empires and remained a common language of the region in the first century AD. In spite of the increasing importance of Greek, the use of Aramaic was also expanding, and it would eventually be dominant among Jews both in the Holy Land and elsewhere in the Middle East around 200 AD and would remain so until the Islamic conquests in the seventh century.

Dead Sea Scrolls

According to Dead Sea Scrolls archaeologist Yigael Yadin, Aramaic was the language of Hebrews until Simon Bar Kokhba's revolt. Yadin noticed the shift from Aramaic to Hebrew in the documents he studied, which had been written during the time of the Bar Kokhba revolt. In his book, Bar Kokhba: The rediscovery of the legendary hero of the last Jewish Revolt Against Imperial Rome, Yigael Yadin notes, "It is interesting that the earlier documents are written in Aramaic while the later ones are in Hebrew. Possibly the change was made by a special decree of Bar Kokhba who wanted to restore Hebrew as the official language of the state".
In another book by Sigalit Ben-Zion, Yadin said: "it seems that this change came as a result of the order that was given by Bar Kokhba, who wanted to revive the Hebrew language and make it the official language of the state." Yadin points out that Aramaic was the regional lingua franca at the time.

Josephus

Hebrew historian Josephus comments on learning Greek in first century Judea:
In the first century AD, the Aramaic language was widespread throughout the Middle East, as is supported by the testimony of Josephus's The Jewish War.
Josephus chose to inform people from what are now Iran, Iraq, and remote parts of the Arabian Peninsula about the war of the Jews against the Romans through books he wrote "in the language of our country", prior to translating into Greek for the benefit of the Greeks and Romans:
H. St. J. Thackeray also points out, "We learn from the proem that the Greek text was not the first draft of the work. It had been preceded by a narrative written in Aramaic and addressed to "the barbarians in the interior", who are more precisely defined lower down as the natives of Parthia, Babylonia, and Arabia, the Jewish dispersion in Mesopotamia, and the inhabitants of Adiabene, a principality of which the reigning house, as was proudly remembered, were converts to Judaism. Of this Aramaic work the Greek is described as a "version" made for the benefit of the subjects of the Roman Empire, i.e. the Graeco-Roman world at large.
In, the "Field of Blood" was known to all the inhabitants of Jerusalem in their own language as Akeldama, which is the transliteration of the Aramaic words "Haqal Dama".
Josephus differentiated Hebrew from his language and that of first-century Israel. Josephus refers to Hebrew words as belonging to "the Hebrew tongue" but refers to Aramaic words as belonging to "our tongue" or "our language" or "the language of our country".
Josephus refers to a Hebrew word with the phrase "the Hebrew tongue": "But the affairs of the Canaanites were at this time in a flourishing condition, and they expected the Israelites with a great army at the city Bezek, having put the government into the hands of Adonibezek, which name denotes the Lord of Bezek, for Adoni in the Hebrew tongue signifies Lord."
In this example, Josephus refers to an Aramaic word as belonging to "our language": "This new-built part of the city was called 'Bezetha,' in our language, which, if interpreted in the Grecian language, may be called 'the New City.'"
On several occasions in the New Testament, Aramaic words are called Hebrew. For example, in, the gospel-writer narrates that Jesus, "bearing his cross went forth into a place called the place of a skull, which is called in the Hebrew Golgotha." The last word is, in fact, Aramaic. The word "Golgotha" is a transliteration of an Aramaic word, because -tha in Golgotha is the Aramaic definite article on a feminine noun in an emphatic state.

Aramaic phrases in the Greek New Testament

The Greek New Testament transliterates a few Semitic words. When the text refers to the language of such Semitic glosses, it uses words meaning "Hebrew"/"Jewish" but this term is often applied to unmistakably Aramaic words and phrases; for this reason, it is often interpreted as meaning "the vernacular of the Jews" in recent translations.
A small minority of scholars believe that most or all of the New Testament was originally written in Aramaic. This theory is known as Aramaic primacy.

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In the Gospel of Mark, 5:41:
This verse gives an Aramaic phrase, attributed to Jesus bringing the girl back to life, with a transliteration into Greek, as ταλιθὰ κούμ. A few Greek manuscripts of Mark's Gospel have this form of the text, but others write κοῦμι instead. The latter is in the Textus Receptus and is the version which appears in the KJV.
The Aramaic is ṭlīthā qūm. The word ṭlīthā is the feminine form of the word ṭlē, meaning "young". Qūm is the Aramaic verb 'to rise, stand, get up'. In the feminine singular imperative, it was originally qūmī. However, there is evidence that in speech, the final -ī was dropped so the imperative did not distinguish between masculine and feminine genders. The older manuscripts, therefore, used a Greek spelling that reflected pronunciation, whereas the addition of an 'ι' was perhaps due to a bookish copyist.
In square script Aramaic, it could be טליתא קומי or טליתא קום.

Ephphatha (Ἐφφαθά)

Mark
Once again, the Aramaic word is given with the transliteration, only this time, the word to be transliterated is more complicated. In Greek, the Aramaic is written ἐφφαθά. This could be from the Aramaic ethpthaḥ, the passive imperative of the verb pthaḥ, 'to open', since the th could assimilate in western Aramaic. The pharyngeal ḥ was often omitted in Greek transcriptions in the Septuagint and was also softened in Galilean speech.
In Aramaic, it could be אתפתח or אפתח. This word was adopted as the official motto of Gallaudet University, the United States' most prominent school for the deaf.

Abba (Ἀββάς)

Mark 14:36
Galatians 4:6
Romans 8:15
Abba, an originally Aramaic form borrowed into the Greek Old Testament as a name, common in Mishnaic Hebrew and still used in Modern Hebrew, is immediately followed by the Greek equivalent with no explicit mention of it being a translation. In Aramaic, it would be אבא.
Note, the name Barabbas is a Hellenization of the Aramaic Bar Abba, literally "Son of the Father".

Raca (Ρακά)

Matthew 5:22
Raca, or Raka, in the Aramaic and Hebrew of the Talmud, means empty one, fool, empty head.
In Aramaic, it could be ריקא or ריקה.

Mammon (Μαμωνάς)

Gospel of Matthew 6:24
Luke 16:9–13
2 Clement 6
In Aramaic, it could be ממון. This is usually considered to be an originally Aramaic word borrowed into Rabbinic Hebrew, but its occurrence in late Biblical Hebrew and, reportedly, in 4th century Punic may indicate that it had a more general "common Semitic background".
In the New Testament, the word Μαμωνᾶς Mamōnâs is declined like a Greek word, whereas many of the other Aramaic and Hebrew words are treated as indeclinable foreign words.

Rabbuni (Ραββουνί)

Also in Mark 10:51. Hebrew form rabbi used as title of Jesus in Matthew 26:25,49; Mark 9:5, 11:21, 14:45; John 1:38, 1:49, 4:31, 6:25, 9:2, 11:8.
In Aramaic, it would have been רבוני.

Maranatha (Μαραναθά)

Didache 10:6
1 Corinthians 16:22
Depending on how one selects to split the single Greek expression of the early manuscripts into Aramaic, it could be variously one of the following:
  • מרנא תא
  • מרא נא תא
  • מרן אתא

Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani (Ἠλί, Ἠλί, λεμὰ σαβαχθανί)

This phrase, one of the seven sayings of Jesus on the cross, is given in two versions: in the Gospel of Matthew, it is transliterated in Greek as Ἠλί, Ἠλί, λεμὰ σαβαχθανί; in the Gospel of Mark, it is given as Ἐλωΐ, Ἐλωΐ, λαμὰ σαβαχθανί. The differences between the two are the use, in Mark, of elōi rather than ēli, and of lama rather than lema.
Overall, both versions can be said to be in Aramaic, rather than in Hebrew, because of the verb "abandon", which exists only in Aramaic. The Biblical Hebrew counterpart to this word, is seen in the second verse of the Old Testament's Psalm 22, which the saying appears to quote. Thus, Jesus is not quoting the canonical Hebrew version, which the psalm claims was of King David, but rather the version in an Aramaic Targum. Surviving Aramaic Targums do use the verb šbq in their translations of the Psalm 22.
The word used in the Gospel of Mark for "my god", Ἐλωΐ, corresponds to the Aramaic form אלהי, elāhī. The one used in Matthew, Ἠλί, fits in better with the אלי of the original Hebrew Psalm, as has been pointed out in the literature; however, it may also be Aramaic because this form is attested abundantly in Aramaic as well.
In the next verse, in both accounts, some who hear Jesus' cry imagine that he is calling for help from Elijah.
Almost all ancient Greek manuscripts show signs of trying to normalize the two slightly different versions of Jesus's saying, presented in Mark and Matthew. For instance, the peculiar Codex Bezae renders both versions with ηλι ηλι λαμα ζαφθανι. The Alexandrian, Western and Caesarean textual families all reflect harmonization of the texts between Matthew and Mark. Only the Byzantine textual tradition preserves a distinction.
The Aramaic word form šəḇaqtanī is based on the verb šǝḇaq/''šāḇaq, 'to allow, to permit, to forgive, and to forsake', with the perfect aspect ending -t, and the object suffix -anī.
The most likely rendition of the phrase in its original Aramaic, as said by Jesus, would have been "אלי, אלי, למה שבקתני", transliterated as Eli, Eli, ləmā šəḇaqtanī.''
In Hebrew, the saying would be "", while the Syriac-Aramaic phrase according to the Peshitta would be or .
This saying is taken by some as an abandonment of the Son by the Father. Another interpretation holds that at the moment when Jesus took upon himself the sins of humanity, the Father had to turn away from the Son because the Father is "of purer eyes than to see evil and cannot look at wrong". Other theologians understand the cry as that of one who was truly human and who felt forsaken. Put to death by his foes, very largely deserted by his friends, he may have also felt deserted by God.
Others see these words in the context of Psalm 22 and suggest that Jesus recited these words, perhaps even the whole psalm, "that he might show himself to be the very Being to whom the words refer; so that the Jewish scribes and people might examine and see the cause why he would not descend from the cross; namely, because this very psalm showed that it was appointed that he should suffer these things."

Jot and tittle ()

Matthew 5:18
The quotation uses them as an example of extremely minor details. In the Greek text translated as English jot and tittle is found iota and keraia. Iota is the smallest letter of the Greek alphabet, but since only capitals were used at the time the Greek New Testament was written and because the Torah was written in Hebrew, it probably represents the Hebrew yodh which is the smallest letter of the Hebrew alphabet. Keraia is a hook or serif.

Korban (Κορβάν)

Matthew 27:6
In Aramaic it refers to the treasury in the Temple in Jerusalem, derived from the Hebrew Korban, found in Mark 7:11 and the Septuagint, meaning religious gift or offering.
The Greek κορβανᾶς is declined as a Greek noun, much like other examples.

Sikera (Σίκερα)

Luke 1:15

Hosanna ()

Mark 11:9
This word is derived from הושע נא. It is generally considered to be a quote from Psalms 118:25 "O, save ", but the original Biblical Hebrew form was הושיעה נא. The shortened form הושע could be either Aramaic or Hebrew.

Aramaic personal names in the New Testament

Personal names in the New Testament come from a number of languages; Hebrew and Greek are most common. However, there are a few Aramaic names as well. The most prominent feature in Aramaic names is bar, meaning 'son of', a common patronym prefix. Its Hebrew equivalent, ben, is conspicuous by its absence. Some examples are:

Boanerges (Βοανηργές)

Mark 3:17
Jesus surnames the brothers James and John to reflect their impetuosity. The Greek rendition of their name is Βοανηργές.
The name has given rise to much speculation. Given the Greek translation provided by the Biblical text, it seems that the first element of the name is bnē, 'sons of', Aramaic. This is represented by βοάνη, giving two vowels in the first syllable where one would be sufficient. It could be inferred from this that the Greek transliteration may not be a good one. The second part of the name is often reckoned to be rḡaš Aramaic, or rḡaz Aramaic. Maurice Casey, however, argues that rḡaš is a simple misreading of the word for thunder, rḡam.
This is supported by one Syriac translation of the name as bnay ra‘mâ. The Peshitta reads ܒܢܝ ܪܓܫܝ bnay rḡešy, which would fit with a later composition for it, based on a Byzantine reading of the original Greek.

Cephas (Κηφᾶς)

John 1:42
1 Corinthians 1:12
Galatians 1:18 NRSV
In these passages, 'Cephas' is given as the nickname of the apostle better known as Simon Peter. The Greek word is transliterated Κηφᾶς.
The apostle's given name appears to be Simon, and he is given the Aramaic nickname, kēpā, meaning 'rock' or 'stone'. The final sigma is added in Greek to make the name masculine rather than feminine. That the meaning of the name was more important than the name itself is evidenced by the universal acceptance of the Greek translation, Πέτρος. It is not known why Paul uses the Aramaic name rather than the Greek name for Simon Peter when he writes to the churches in Galatia and Corinth. He may have been writing at a time before Cephas came to be popularly known as Peter.
According to Clement of Alexandria, there were two people named Cephas: one was Apostle Simon Peter, and the other was one of Jesus' Seventy Apostles. Clement goes further to say it was Cephas of the Seventy who was condemned by Paul in Galatians 2 for not eating with the Gentiles, though this is perhaps Clement's way of deflecting the condemnation from Simon Peter. In 1708, a French Jesuit, Jean Hardouin, wrote a dissertation that argues "Peter" was actually "another Peter", thus the emphasis of using the name Cephas. In 1990 Bart D. Ehrman wrote an article on the Journal of Biblical Literature, similarly arguing that Peter and Cephas should be understood as different people, citing the writing of Clement of Alexandria and the Epistula Apostolorum and in support of his theory; Ehrman's article received a detailed critique by Dale Allison, who argued that Peter and Cephas are the same person. Ehrman later retracted his proposal, deeming it "highly unlikely".
In Aramaic, it could be כיפא.

Thomas (Θωμᾶς)

John 11:16
Thomas is listed among the disciples of Jesus in all four gospels and the Acts of the Apostles. However, it is only in John's Gospel that more information is given. In three places, he is given the name Didymus, the Greek word for a twin. In fact, "the Twin" is not just a surname, it is a translation of "Thomas". The Greek Θωμᾶς—Thōmâs—comes from the Aramaic tōmā, "twin". Therefore, rather than two personal names, Thomas Didymus, there is a single nickname, the Twin. Christian tradition gives him the personal name Judas, and he was perhaps named Thomas to distinguish him from others of the same name.
In Aramaic, it could be ܬܐܘܡܐ.

Tabitha (Ταβιθά)

Acts 9:36
The disciple's name is given both in Aramaic and Greek. The Aramaic name is a transliteration of Ṭḇīthā, the female form of טביא. Both names mean 'gazelle'.
It may be just coincidence that Peter's words to her in verse 40, "Tabitha, get up!", are similar to the "talitha kum" phrase used by Jesus.
In Aramaic, it could be טביתא.

Aramaic place names in the New Testament

Gethsemane (Γεθσημανῆ)

Matthew 26:36
Mark 14:32
The place where Jesus takes his disciples to pray before his arrest is given the Greek transliteration Γεθσημανῆ. It represents the Aramaic Gath-Šmānē, meaning 'the oil press' or 'oil vat'.
In Aramaic, it could be ܓܕܣܡܢ. This place name is more properly an Aramaized version of an original Hebrew place name. Gath גת is a normal word for press in Hebrew, generally used for a wine press not an olive press though; and shemanei שמני is the Hebrew word shemanim שמנים meaning "oils", the plural form of the word shemen שמן, the primary Hebrew word for oil, just in a construct form. The word in Aramaic for "oil" is more properly mišḥa, as also attested in Jewish writings in Aramaic from the Galilee.

Golgotha (Γολγοθᾶ)

Mark 15:22
John 19:17
Gagūltā Aramaic, means 'skull'. The name appears in all of the gospels except Luke, which calls the place simply Kranion 'the Skull' in Greek, with no Semitic counterpart. The name 'Calvary' is taken from the Latin Vulgate translation, Calvaria.
In Aramaic, it could be ܓܓܘܠܬܐ. Though this word has the Aramaic final form -ta / -tha, it is otherwise also closer to the Hebrew word for skull, gulgolet גולגולת, than to the Aramaic form.

Gabbatha (Γαββαθᾶ)

John 19:13
The place name appears to be Aramaic. According to Josephus, War, V.ii.1, #51, the word Gabath means high place, or elevated place, so perhaps a raised flat area near the temple. The final "א" could then represent the emphatic state of the noun.
In Aramaic, it could be גבהתא.

Akeldama (Ἀκελδαμά)

Acts 1:19
The place of Judas Iscariot's death is clearly named Field of Blood in Greek. However, the manuscript tradition gives a number of different spellings of the Aramaic. The Majority Text reads Ἀκελδαμά ; other manuscript versions give Ἀχελδαμάχ, Ἁκελδαμά, Ἁχελδαμά and Ἁκελδαμάχ. Despite these variant spellings the Aramaic is most probably ḥqēl dmā, 'field of blood'. While the seemingly gratuitous Greek sound of kh at the end of the word is difficult to explain, the Septuagint similarly adds this sound to the end of the Semitic name Ben Sira to form the Greek name for the Book of Sirakh. The sound may be a dialectic feature of either the Greek speakers or the original Semitic language speakers.
In Aramaic, it could be חקל דמא.

Pool of Bethesda (Βηθεσδά)

John 5:2
Bethesda was originally the name of a pool in Jerusalem, on the path of the Beth Zeta Valley, and is also known as the Sheep Pool. Its name in Aramaic means "House of Grace". It is associated with healing. In John 5, Jesus was reported healing a man at the pool.
For other Aramaic place names in the New Testament beginning with beth, see Bethabara, Bethany, Bethphage and Bethsaida and Bethlehem.
In Aramaic, "Bethesda" could be spelled בית חסדא.

Other languages

Based on the symbolic renaming or nicknaming of some of his apostles, it is also likely that Jesus or at least one of his apostles knew enough Koine Greek to converse with non-Judaeans. It is reasonable to assume that Jesus was well versed in Hebrew for religious purposes, as it is the liturgical language of Judaism.