Hatikvah: full lyrics, transliteration and what every line means

The lyrics with transliteration and translation

Read the transliteration aloud line by line, then listen for the same words in the recording. The anthem is slow, which makes it one of the easiest Hebrew texts to follow by ear.

• כָּל עוֹד בַּלֵּבָב פְּנִימָה — kol od balevav penimah — As long as deep in the heart
• נֶפֶשׁ יְהוּדִי הוֹמִיָּה — nefesh yehudi homiyah — a Jewish soul still yearns
• וּלְפַאֲתֵי מִזְרָח קָדִימָה — ulfa'atei mizrach kadimah — and onward, toward the ends of the east
• עַיִן לְצִיּוֹן צוֹפִיָּה — ayin l'tziyon tzofiyah — an eye still gazes toward Zion
• עוֹד לֹא אָבְדָה תִּקְוָתֵנוּ — od lo avdah tikvateinu — our hope is not yet lost
• הַתִּקְוָה בַּת שְׁנוֹת אַלְפַּיִם — hatikvah bat shnot alpayim — the hope of two thousand years
• לִהְיוֹת עַם חָפְשִׁי בְּאַרְצֵנוּ — lihyot am chofshi b'artzenu — to be a free people in our land
• אֶרֶץ צִיּוֹן וִירוּשָׁלַיִם — eretz tziyon virushalayim — the land of Zion and Jerusalem

What the images mean

The first half is one long conditional: as long as a heart still yearns and an eye still looks east, the hope survives. Hebrew builds it with כָּל עוֹד (kol od, 'as long as') and no main verb until the fifth line — the sentence deliberately hangs.

מִזְרָח (mizrach) means east, the direction of Jerusalem from Europe; בַּת שְׁנוֹת אַלְפַּיִם literally reads 'daughter of two thousand years', an ordinary Hebrew way of saying 'two thousand years old'. חָפְשִׁי (chofshi) is the same everyday word Israeli kids use for 'free' and 'day off'.

Where the poem and the tune came from

Naftali Herz Imber wrote the nine-stanza poem Tikvatenu ('Our Hope') around 1878; only the first stanza and refrain became the anthem, with 'to return to the land of our fathers' later revised to 'to be a free people in our land'.

The melody is a reworking of a European folk tune, best known in Bedřich Smetana's Vltava, adapted by Samuel Cohen among the farmers of Rishon LeZion. Hatikvah served as the Zionist movement's anthem for decades and was formally enshrined as Israel's national anthem in 2004.

Ten words from the anthem worth keeping

These recur across Israeli music and speech, so learning them here pays off in every other song.

• לֵב / לֵבָב — lev / levav — heart
• נֶפֶשׁ — nefesh — soul
• עַיִן — ayin — eye
• מִזְרָח — mizrach — east
• תִּקְוָה — tikvah — hope
• אֶרֶץ — eretz — land
• עַם — am — people
• חָפְשִׁי — chofshi — free
• שָׁנָה / שְׁנוֹת — shanah / shnot — year / years of
• יְרוּשָׁלַיִם — Yerushalayim — Jerusalem

Frequently asked questions