From the root ayin-bet-resh, 'to cross over' — the Hebrews as 'those who crossed,' perhaps the Euphrates.
A Northwest Semitic language, the liturgical language of Judaism, and the official language of Israel; also used for the Jewish people in historical and biblical contexts.
From Old English 'Ebreas' (the Hebrews), from Latin 'Hebraeus,' from Greek 'Hebraîos' (Ἑβραῖος), from Aramaic 'ʿeḇray,' corresponding to Hebrew 'ʿiḇrî' (עִבְרִי). The traditional biblical etymology connects the name to the patriarch 'Eber' (עֵבֶר), great-grandson of Shem, or to the root 'ʿ-b-r' (ע-ב-ר) meaning 'to cross over' — making the Hebrews 'those who crossed over,' traditionally interpreted as Abraham's crossing of the Euphrates into Canaan. Some scholars connect it to the 'Habiru/ʿApiru' mentioned in second-
Hebrew is the only language in human history to have been successfully revived from liturgical-only use to full daily spoken status. By the nineteenth century, Hebrew had not been anyone's mother tongue for over 1,500 years. Eliezer Ben-Yehuda's campaign to revive it as a spoken language in Ottoman Palestine succeeded so thoroughly that today over 9 million people speak it natively