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Hatikvah or Hatikva (Hebrew: התקווה, The Hope) is the national anthem of Israel. The Hatikvah text was written by the Galician poet Naphtali Herz Imber in Zloczow (Ukraine) in 1878 as a nine-stanza poem named Tikvatenu ("Our Hope"). In 1897, at the First Zionist Congress, it was adopted as the anthem of Zionism; later it was arranged by the composer Paul Ben-Haim, who based the composition partly on Ukrainian Jewish folk tunes. Later the text was edited by the settlers of Rishon LeZion and it underwent a number of other changes until 1948, when the state of Israel was created, and it was proclaimed as the national anthem of Israel. In its modern version, the anthem text only has the first stanza and chorus of the original poem. The most important addition in those parts is that the hope is no longer to return to Zion, but to be a free nation in it. It is an interesting, but not widely known fact, that Hatikvah was never officially declared as or chosen to be the national anthem of Israel, until November 2004 when it was sanctioned by the Knesset in an amendment to the "Flag and Coat-of-Arms Law" (which is now called: "The Flag, Coat-of-Arm and National Anthem Law").
The music for Hatikva is based on a folk song of unknown origin. The earliest known appearance in print was early 17th century Italy as "The Dance of Mantua". It has also been recognized in Spanish religious music as the Catholic song "Virgen de la Cueva" ("Virgin of the Cave") and the Jewish song "Prayer for the Dew". It's also recognizable as the Polish folk song "Pod Krakowem". The folk song was also used by an English-Jewish cantor named Meier Leon, who used the stage name Michael Leoni to perform secular and Christian music such as Handel's Messiah. Leon adapted the song into the Jewish hymn Yigdal for his synagogue. This hymn was later adapted by Welselyan minister Thomas Oliver into the hymn To The God of Abraham Praise. Bedrich Smetana likely adapted the melody from a Swedish version of the melody, "Ack, Värmeland" and used it for his symphonic poem "The Moldau", part of Má Vlast. This later became a Czech folk song, "Kočka leze dírou". The modern adaptation of the music for Hatikvah was probably composed by Samuel Cohen in 1888. It's possible that he took the melody from Smetana's work, that he got the melody from a Romanian version of the folk song, "Carul cu boi" ("Carriage with Oxen"), or from the Hungarian arrangement "Tüzed, Uram Jézus" ("Your fire, my Lord Jesus").
Lyrics
Hebrew
כל עוד בלבב פנימה
נפש יהודי הומיה,
ולפאתי מזרח קדימה
עין לציון צופיה -
עוד לא אבדה תקותנו,
התקוה בת שנות אלפים,
להיות עם חופשי בארצנו
ארץ ציון וירושלים.
Transliteration
Kol 'od balevav P'nimah -
Nefesh Yehudi homiyah
Ulfa'atey mizrach kadimah
Ayin le'tzion tzofiyah --
'Od lo avdah tikvatenu
Hatikvah bat shnot alpayim:
Lihyot am chofshi be'artzenu -
Eretz Tziyon vi'rushalayim.
Translation
As long as in the heart, within,
A Jewish soul still yearns,
And onward toward the East,
An eye still watches toward Zion --
Our hope has not yet been lost,
The two thousand year old hope,
To be a free nation in our own homeland,
The land of Zion and Jerusalem.
