ARAMAIC ăr’ ə mā’ ĭk (אֲרָמִ֔ית)

1. Classification. Aramaic is a language belonging to the NW branch of the Sem. languages and is, therefore, different from E Sem. (Akkad. dialects) and S Sem. (Ethiopic and Arab. dialects); and within the NW branch it is distinguished from Canaanite (Heb., Phoen., Ugaritic). It is distinguished from Heb. by vocabulary and such grammatical peculiarities as the use of certain dentals which correspond to Heb. sibilants and also by suffixing the definite article to the end of nouns instead of prefixing it as in Heb.

2. History. Although the Aramaeans never possessed a mighty empire, they enjoyed the privilege of imposing their language on the whole Near E. This was undoubtedly partly due to the fact that they used the alphabetic system of writing in contrast to the cumbersome cuneiform (syllabic) system used in writing Akkad. As early as the 8th cent. b.c., the Aram. language competed with Akkad. and thereafter gradually spread throughout the Near E. About the middle of the first millenniun b.c., when the Achaemenian monarchs looked for a tongue which could be understood by all their subjects, they chose Aram. which became the lingua franca of their vast empire. Aramaic attained its maximum diplomatic prestige in the Achaemenian Empire of Persia, where it was used as the interprovincial language from India to Egypt between the 6th and 4th centuries b.c.

The civilization of the Arameans was basically nothing more than a clearing house for the cultural productivity of the stronger states about them, and their language was the instrument of a work of cultural assimilation and dissemination, which went far beyond the limits of their local history, and became an element of Near Eastern civilization. The Greeks and Romans were familiar with the Near E. to a great extent through the Aram. sources, and it was to a significant degree that Babylonian, Persian and Hebrew elements were transmitted to Christianity via Aram., and through Christianity to the W. At the same time Aram. was instrumental in transmitting Gr. culture to the E, esp. philosophy, which became known to many Arabs through the medium of Aram. It was during the Hel. period that the differences between the various popular Aram. dialects became more pronounced, and some of these later became distinct literary languages.

After the Exile, the Jews used the Aram. script in the writing of their Heb. language and also used the Aram. language itself more than previously. Eventually Aram. replaced Heb. to such an extent that tr. of the Heb. Bible into Aram. became necessary. These trs. into Aram. were made orally in the synagogues, and their oral preservation led in due course to the written Targumim. Aramaic then soon became the common language of post-Biblical Judaism, as reflected in the Mishnah, Midrash, and Talmud.

Christianity arose in an Aram. milieu, a fact reflected even in the language of NT Gr. The churches of Asia, such as the Nestorian, produced a vast lit. in Syr., a form of Aram. Paganism also survived in an Aram. environment; thus the Mandaeans of Babylonia preserved their holy books in their own Aram. dialect.

Finally, the Islamic Conquest in the 7th cent. a.d. doomed Aram. Since then Arab. has generally displaced the Syr.-Aram. dialects, which are now spoken by only a few thousand persons, mostly in Kurdistan and Syria.

3. Inscriptions and texts. The oldest inscrs. in Aram. are from N and middle Syria and date from the 9th and 8th centuries b.c. Some of these are by Kilamuwa, king of Sam’al (Zenjirli), Zakir, king of Hamath, and Bar-Rekub, king of Sam’al. The script of these, the oldest Aram. inscrs., is the same as the script used by the Phoenicians (and other Canaanites, e.g., the Moabites). However, Aram. eventually developed a distinct “square” script of its own and this later type of Aram. script is that used in the oldest extant Biblical MSS.

Aramaic texts have been found in widely scattered places from the 7th and 6th centuries b.c. Undoubtedly Aram. was more widely used at this period than the extant evidence would imply, but since perishable materials were primarily used, most of this lit. has perished. Aramaic inscrs. dating from the reign of Esarhaddon (681-669 b.c.) have been found in Egypt. The old Aram. dialects continued in use throughout the Neo-Babylonian period (605-538 b.c.), and when the Persians became the dominant power, Aram. became the official language of their empire.

During the Pers. period (538-330 b.c.) Aram. was widely used and there are many dockets, ostraca, and seals from throughout Mesopotamia written in the Aram. of this period. Probably the most significant Aram. records from this period are those found at Elephantine in Egypt. These documents were written by a colony of Jews living on the island of Elephantine, located at the first cataract in the Nile, about 583 m. S of Cairo.

4. Dialects. Briefly, the various Aram. dialects which evolved can be set forth as follows: Western—Palestinian, used during the time of Christ and preserved in the Aram. of the Palestinian Talmud, the older Midrashim, and the Targum of Pseudo-Jonathan. Jesus and His disciples apparently used a Galilean dialect which was easily detected (Matt 26:73, 74); Judaean (some scholars would classify this separately from Galilean Aram. and find it preserved in the Targum Onkelos and Targum Jonathan); Samaritan (the Samaritans have a Targum to the Pentateuch in their own dialect which is close to Galilean); Christian (this is based upon the Palestinian Lectionaries of the 5th to 7th centuries a.d. and contrasted to the Syr. of Edessa); Nabataean (the Nabataean Aram. preserved in their inscrs. dating from the 1st cent. b.c. until the 1st cent. a.d.); Palmyrene (Palmyrene Aram. preserved in their inscrs., from about the 1st to 3rd centuries a.d.); Modern Western Aram. (used as the house language of a few Christian villages in the Anti-Lebanon area). Eastern—Babylonian (the Aram. dialect preserved in the Babylonian Talmud, 4th to 6th centuries a.d.); Mandaean (used by Mandaeans from the 4th cent. and later, but influenced by Arab.); Syrian (the Christian dialect of Eastern Aram.). It was the language of the scholarly center at Edessa and developed into the two dialects of “W” (used by the Jacobites) and “E” (used by the Nestorians); modern Eastern Syr. (living dialects surviving in a few small centers in the mountains of Kurdistan and other nearby areas, near Lake Urmia. Strongly influenced by Arabian, as well as Turkish).

The various forms of Old Aram. (or Phoen.) script influenced the script of many languages and Aram., in one form or another, was used in the Near E from a very early period; and since Aram. is still used in some places today, it has one of the longest continuous traditions of any language.

Bibliography G. Dalman, Grammatik des jüdish-palästinischen Aramaisch (1905); M. Margolis, Lehrbuch der aramäischen Sprache des babylonischen Talmud (1910); W. B. Stevenson, Grammar of the Palestinian Jewish Aramaic (1924); H. Bauer and P. Leander, Grammatik des Biblisch-Aramäischen (1927); P. Leander, Laut und Formenlehre des Ägyptisch-Aramäischen (1928); F. Rosenthal, Die Aramaistische Forschung (1939); H. L. Ginsberg, “Aramaic Studies Today,” JAOS, 62 (1942), 229-238; R. A. Bowman, “Arameans, Aramaic, and the Bible,” JNES, 7 (1948), 65-90; A. Dammron, Grammaire de L’arameen Biblique (1961); F. Rosenthal, A Grammar of Biblical Aramaic (1961).