NEILL THE NOTORIOUS wrote:I had always thought, that Yiddish was a Central European dialect of Hebrew, mixed with German (Cf. Dutch and Afrikaans)
I do not imagine that Yiddish is the national language of Israel ---- perhaps some OB of Jewish origin, will enlighten me ?
Hebrew is indeed the national language of Israel, but it had to be revived and reinvented for the purpose. Before the state of Israel existed, Hebrew was for liturgical purposes and religious study. Jews used the language of whatever country they lived in. In central Europe and Russia, Jews also used Yiddish (which is more German than Hebrew). Other Jewish communities had languages like Ladino (mediaeval Spanish, to all appearances) or Judaeo-Arabic. Yiddish is apparently considered very inferior in modern Israel, and is at risk of extinction. Perhaps that's why ...
sejintenej wrote:Not being Jewish but having worked for an Israeli outfit I had thought that Yiddish was solely a spoken language but that Hebrew is written and spoken; perhaps I'm wrong.
when there is in fact a long history of written Yiddish literature. London and New York used to have active Yiddish theatre and Yiddish newspapers.
Anyway, I can't see any reason why a Yiddish translation would be needed for this year's census. There might have been lots of households that would have needed it for the 1891 or 1901 census, but surely not now. The census in Scotland isn't offering a Yiddish option.