Ben-Yehuda, Eliezer, 1858-1922
Variant namesEliezer Ben‑Yehuda was born Eliezer Isaac Perlman in Luzhki in the Vilna Governorate of the Russian Empire. In 1877 Ben-Yehuda went to Paris for four years and studied at the Sorbonne University. It was in Paris that he met a Jew from Jerusalem, who spoke Hebrew with him. It was this conversation that convinced him that the revival of Hebrew as the language of a nation was feasible.
In 1881 Ben-Yehuda joined the First Aliyah and immigrated to Palestine and settled in Jerusalem. Motivated by the surrounding ideals of renovation and rejection of the diaspora lifestyle, Ben-Yehuda set out to develop a new language that could replace Yiddish and other regional dialects as a means of everyday communication between Jews who moved to the Land of Israel from various regions of the world.
In December 1922, Ben-Yehuda, 64, died of tuberculosis, from which he suffered most of his life.
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Birth 1858-01-07
Death 1922-12-16
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