Recently a major study analyzing more than 500 languages was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences supporting the theory. The study, co-authored by Dr. Quentin Atkinson, of Auckland University, and Dr. Mark Pagel, of the University of Reading, U.K., concludes that there is evidence for a single origin of language.
This chance event set off in Mozeson a train of thought that would consume him for the next 35 years as he came to believe—and set out to prove—that Hebrew was the root of all languages. The lack of approval from the linguistics establishment did not dampen Mozeson’s enthusiasm for his theory, and he went on to publish two books on the subject. The Word: The Dictionary That Reveals the Hebrew Roots of English (1989), a 300-page book with some 20,000 English-Hebrew linked words, and The Origin of Speeches (2006), in which words from multiple languages are connected to Hebrew.
Mozeson has stated that “New evidences forces new perceptions,” and that Edenics data is very new, it’s the tip of a large iceberg. He has put out three CDs and a website, a blog, and all sorts of social media. The whole operation runs on a shoe-string budget, some part of which Mozeson claims is provided by co-founder of Skype and Kazaa, Kevin Bermeister, who is listed as a supporter of Edenics—which is the tracing of English and world words to the Semitic Mother Tongue attested in Biblical Hebrew.
Ironically, for a man who seeks to revolutionize our understanding of language, Mozeson himself has a severe speech impediment. This incurred during a five-day coma and massive organ failure that he suffered following severe heat stroke in 1996. Yet Mozeson has succeeded in gathering a cadre of dozens of like-minded individuals, from all over the world and from a wide variety of languages and traditions. All of them believe in the Edenics theory and spend time searching out and publicizing what they believe are the Hebrew roots of their native tongues. Overall he and his team claim to have mapped out the Hebrew roots to more than 60,000 words from dozens of languages.
Whether or not Edenics is accurate or just another view of a simple concept, we should keep in mind that the Lord told us through Moses that: “And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech,” (Genesis 11:1), and also, “And the Lord said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language” (Genesis 11:60). Obviously, there was a time in the beginning where everyone had just one language, and the Lord confounded that language (Genesis 11:7) and Moses tells us: the Lord did there confound the language of all the earth” (Genesis 11:9).
“Edenics,” he added, “works via word roots that are found over and over again in different words with similar connotations. For instance, the Hebrew word for counting is MoNeh. The Mem-Nun (M-N) sub-root found here makes up a large word family, from every language, dealing with a MouNts. This includes MaMoN: MoNey; HaMoN: MaNy; the Hebrew word MiNyan and the English words MiNus; DiMiNish; NuMber and MiNi.”
Mozeson also expands his theory into other languages. “The Hebrew word DeRech (way/road),” he said, “with its DR root, is also found in DaRoga (Russian), DeRecho (Spanish), DuRch (German) and DoRo (Japanese). By the way, if you take the DR root of DeRech and reverse its order you get the English word RoaD. Can you see the Hebrew root from ShoMeR (guardian) in the Japanese word SaMuRai (the emperor’s royal guard)?”
According to Hezy Laing, a journalist in Jerusalem, “Finding relationships between similarly sounding words seems to be too easy for Mozeson. The real challenge for him is proving connectivity between words that at first glance appear to be completely different. He does this via some common phonetic techniques, despite his lack of official linguistic training.”
(See the next post, “Jaredites and their Language-Part III,” for more information on the language of the Jaredites and its possible connection to the language of the Hebrews)
The Rabbis of Judah know that Hebrew was the language of creation. It was also the language of Adam. Hebrew was the language of the Jaredites. The language became a dead language for several thousand years but has been resurrected and is now the official language of Israel. It Hasn't been corrupted yet since it has been brought back to life so to speak.
ReplyDeleteThe language of Adam has survived through all the ages of man which is remarkable given how fast languages change.
Great posting.
finding common ground between Hebrew and English does not guarantee that English came from Hebrew. Another possibility is that both Hebrew and English came from another now lost language.
ReplyDeleteOnce you understand what the Hebrew language actually is all about you realize that this is the Adamic language. There is no hidden secret language that existed before. God protected the language of Hebrew down through the many ages unlike any other language. English indeed is a later construct but as Del says it had ancient origins. I've listened to Rabbis that showed how the languages were scrambled at the time of the tower of Babel by using the same word but mixing up the consonants.
DeleteHere is a little puzzle for you. If you understand what I've just written below in Hebrew (I hope it comes through) then it might sound familiar to you that you've heard it somewhere before. In the setting that these words were used they are called the Adamic language. If you can't understand it then look it up. You might find this interesting.
פה לאל
Very interesting. Thanks Del.
ReplyDeleteerichard: It appears that the Rabbis can trace Hebrew back to Noah. Beyond that, we know nothing about it, and you are right, it could have been a different language than that spoken by Adam. It is something we will probably never know. However, from a linguistic viewpoint, the correlation of the Biblical where we find everyone had one language at the time of Babel, and that Hebrew being Noah's language, does suggest that all of today's languages emanated from a common, original language, since Noah. If that is true, then we have another confirmation of Noah's writings, which then suggests, at least to me, that the Biblical time frame of creation Moses gives us is also correct.
ReplyDeleteDel, think about this for a minute. Noah spoke Hebrew. He got that language from the patriarchs. It wasn't until the tower that the language was scrambled. There was no scrambling of language until the tower.
ReplyDeleteI put a little note at the end of the last post. In Hebrew it means mouth to God. Sound it out - pa (pay) la (lay) el. Sound familiar? You are told these words are the Adamic language. It is Hebrew and the holy language.
Look a little deeper Del this is good stuff. Thanks for all your great work. You do a great job. Ira
Ira,
ReplyDeleteFascinating connection between Hebrew and the Adamic language. Thanks for sharing.
One thing to remember is that Joseph Smith referred to the Adamic language as the pure language of Adam. This leads me to conclude that Hebrew is not the pure language of Adam, but a changed or corrupted version. If there was no difference whatsoever then I would expect that Joseph Smith would have stated this at some point since he was acquainted with Hebrew and the Adamic language.
One would expect the pure language of Adam to have undergone some changes in the 2000 years before the flood.
There may very well have been several different dialects spoken before the flood. The written Hebrew Noah spoke may have remained pretty pure, but even that likely underwent some changes from the written language of Adam. It's also likely that the Hebrew Noah spoke changed some by the time the Hebrew scriptures were compiled. Perhaps the written language remained relatively pure, but it's hard to say. Especially since the original written Hebrew did not include consonants.
We read in the Book of Mormon that they changed the Hebrew language as time went on, too.
Just some thoughts.
Sure and what you've said is likely true that there was some alteration. But you should know that Adam was living at the time of Enos,Cainan,Mahalaleel, Jared,Methuselah, and Lamach. Noah was contemporary with all of them too. Shem lived at the time of Lamach, Methuselah, Noah, Abraham, and Isaac.
ReplyDeleteSo with all of that overlap how much corruption of the language was there? I was guess not all that much. The Jaredites spoke Hebrew as well as the Nephites. But the difference is there were many generations between the founders and when the nations were destroyed. Lots of time to alter the language. The early patriarchs that wasn't the case. So with that I would argue the language of Noah was very close to the language of Adam. As I mentioned even today pay lay el is the same in today's Hebrew as it was at the time of Adam.
Great point about Adam and Noah being contemporaries and Shem and Abraham being contemporaries. You're right their probably wasn't too much corruption of their language then.
ReplyDeleteThere may have been some corruption during the time Israel was in bondage to the Egyptians. As far as I'm aware there aren't any known writings in Hebrew during that time period. The books of Zenos and Zenoch may have been from that time period, but we only have a few excerpts from them in the Book of Mormon. There was obviously some corruption of the language at some point, since Joseph Smith didn't ever say that Hebrew and the Adamic language are the exact same thing.
I recall that Brigham Young once spoke in tongues at a meeting Joseph Smith was in. The other brethren in the room asked Joseph to rebuke Brigham, but Joseph said that Brigham was speaking the pure Adamic language. I believe this was in Kirtland, at the time Joseph was studying Hebrew so he must have known there was at least some difference between the pure language of Adam and modern Hebrew.
The fact that pay lay el is the same in today's Hebrew as it was at the time of Adam is incredible. The two languages must still be pretty similar. Good stuff. Makes we want to learn Hebrew.
If you look on Youtube you will find a number of very interesting videos from the Rabbis. Try the search Hebrew, Creation and DNA for example. You'll find some very interesting studies by these Rabbi's about how Hebrew is hard wired into language of creation. It will be very interesting to you. If I was techie enough I would put the link here.
ReplyDeleteI studied Hebrew for about 6 months and found it an incredible language. It is different than the altered languages of today that were altered at the tower. Hebrew is far different then they are. Yes as Del pointed out there are some simularites but Hebrew is absolutely amazing. It is also the language of the scriptures and to really understand scripture you need to understand Hebrew.
I'm entirely convinced 100% that this is the Adamic language. Yes there has been some alteration but God for the most part has protected that language. The fact that it was a lost language for thousands of years actually protected the language. Hebrew today is closer to the ancient language because of that fact. Currently the language is being corrupted however just as it was at the time of the Nephites/Jaredites.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=od-xkRDw6nk&t=2577s
DeleteGreat video. Thanks for sharing.
DeleteThe Bible information actually shows that Noah was born 126 years after Adam died. But all the Patriarchs before him must have met Adam.
ReplyDeleteOne question that I have is this: were all the people on the earth living up to a 1000 years before the flood? What about the animals?
I would doubt that ancient fossils and mummified bodies of animals and people support such an idea. We definitely need further revelation about the flood and the pre-flood world.
Take a look at when the patriarchs started having children. You will notice that it occurred after age 130 years or so. Enoch when he received his first revelation when he said he was a lad at age 60. If you divide the ages by say 8 or 9 you find that the ages matches our ages pretty good. My point is they weren't mature at age 60 or even a hundred years old. If they actually did live until age 900 their teeth would have worn out long before age 100 years.
ReplyDeleteSo what is the solution then. I believe the earth was speeded up in rotation at that time. A year of their time was equal roughly to 2 months or so of our time. So the answer to your question about the animals is certainly they lived long ages.
After the flood the earth rotation was slowed down. An easy way to see this is it was continuing to slow even in Roman times. In Roman times 2 months were added to the calendar named after the Roman emperors Julius Caesar (July) and Augustus Caesar (August). Before them the calendar was 10 months long. September was the 7th month, October 8, Nov 9 and December 10. So this is one proof that the earth was slowing in rotation.
I might mention in the last days it says in the scriptures that the time will be shortened during the tribulation or no man would be alive on earth. Time or I should say the earth rotation will speed up again to shorten that time. The Millennium of 1000 years won't be 1000 years as we know it but it will be the same as the time of Adam.
Ponder that one for a while. There is more on the pre-flood earth I could talk about too like where did all the water come from.
iterry: Your comments are right on. The problem is, in my mind, to pursue this along that line, which is realistic and accurate, takes us into ground I personally do not want to enter in a public blog. But you are spot on.
ReplyDeleteI understand Del. Your contribution to the BOM geography is certainly immense and fantastic. That is where the emphasis should be because that is where the most good will be done. Thanks, Ira
ReplyDeleteMC: As we have pointed out in other articles on this, and what I failed to make clear in this one, is that Adam and Noah did not live at the same time, however, the gap between them was bridged by numerous people of the lineage (fathers and sons) so that Noah had first hand knowledge (through those who knew Adam personally) of Father Adam. On a simple note, it is like my dad telling me about my grandfather (his dad) whom I never met or knew personally, but my dad did, of course, and I would accept his view of his father as being pretty accurate.
ReplyDeleteThanks Del. I should have double checked the patriarchal timeline. For some reason I thought I remembered Noah being there at the great meeting in Adam-ondi-ahman.
ReplyDeleteGreat series as always. Thank you.