Quotes about Language

Any Greek scholar will tell you the word blessed is far too sedate and beatific to carry the percussive force Jesus intended. The Greek word conveys something like a short cry of joy, Oh, you lucky person!

The Hebrew original does not say, 'Do not kill.' It says, 'Do not murder.' Both Hebrew and English have two words for taking a life — one is 'kill' (harag, in Hebrew) and the other is 'murder' (ratzach in Hebrew).

The next time you hear someone cite, 'Do not kill' when quoting the sixth commandment, gently but firmly explain that it actually says, 'Do not murder".

As Abba Eban, Israel's Foreign Minister from 1966 to 1974, expressed it: "Israel is the only nation whose citizens live on the same land, speak the same language and practice the same religion as their ancestors did 3,000 years ago.

The waters below are mayim (the Hebrew word for "water"), and waters above are sham-mayim—which some, but by no means all, scholars believe means "water there" (sham is Hebrew for "there").

This verse uses the Hebrew word milacha to refer to work instead of the more common word avoda. Milacha is not truly translatable; it is best understood as creative work—work that produces something.

The main vehicle of both blessings and curses is words. Such words may be spoken or written or merely uttered inwardly.

the liberals resort constantly to a double use of language.

According to that fundamental principle, language is truthful, not when the meaning attached to the words by the speaker, but when the meaning intended to be produced in the mind of the particular person addressed, is in accordance with the facts.

Fair speech may hide a foul heart.

I was recently on a tour of Latin America, and the only regret I have was that I didn't study Latin harder in school so I could converse with those people.

When language fails, violence becomes a language; I never had that feeling.