In the previous chapter 1 alluded to the role of the hebrew language in the construction and preservation of a Jewish national identity. Here I shall address this subject in detail. The connection between language and identity was recognized in antiquity. As seen earlier, Herodotus included common language as one of the components of “Greekness.” Indeed, common language appeared right after common blood, the first item listed. Sharing in that common language resulted in “grecization” according to Thucydides (II.68.5). He distinguished between those Amphilocians who “hellenized” by adopting the Greek language from their Ambraciot neighbors and the rest of the Amphilocians who remained “barbarians.” Half a millennium later, Tacitus included study of Latin as a factor in the Romanization of the Britons during the governorship of Agricola (Agricola 21). For these authors, use of the appropriate language seems to be a necessary condition for membership in, or adoption into, a national group. Other ancient authors, though, added that language by itself was not a sufficient condition for belonging. According to a report in Livy, for example, Achaean ambassadors dismissed the Aetolians as people who merely speak Greek without really being Hellenes. The reservations of the ambassadors have their modern counterpart in theoretical discussions of the components of ethnicity. Contemporary scholars recognize that the relation between language and identity is not always simple. The complexity of that relation can be illustrated with an example from the Jewish experience.