The
Israeli national anthem. The title means 'The
Hope'; the lyrics, written by Naftali Herz Imber, a
Galician Jew, are as follows:
Kol od balevav p'nimah
Nefesh Yehudi homiyah
Ulfa'atey mizrach kadimah
Ayin l'tzion tzofiyah
Od lo avdah tikvatenu
Hatikvah bat shnot alpayim
L'hiyot am chofshi b'artzenu
Eretz Tzion v'Yerushalayim
English translation:
As long as deep in the heart,
The soul of a Jew yearns,
And forward to the East
To Zion, an eye looks
Our hope will not be lost,
The hope of two thousand years,
To be a free nation in our land,
The land of Zion and Jerusalem.
Set to music in the 1880s, the melody is directly derived from Smetana's Die Moldau (Má Vlast), a musical work of 19th century Czech nationalism. Smetana's piece depicts Czech life as seen from the banks of the Vltava river, which starts in the Bohemian woods, flows through the countryside and through the city of Prague. Smetana took as his main theme for his piece a German children's song, and transposed it into the minor key. Thus, the melody of the Israeli national anthem is directly connected to....
Alle meine Entchen
schwimmen auf dem See...
schwimmen auf dem See,
Köpfchen in das Wasser,
Schwänze in die Höh'.
English translation:
All my little duckies
swim on the lake
heads in the water
tails in the air.