Hebrews

However, in some instances, the designation "Hebrew" may also be used historically in a wider sense, referring to the Phoenicians or other ancient Semitic-speaking civilizations, such as the Shasu on the eve of the Late Bronze Age collapse.

[2][3] Some scholars regard "Hebrews" as an ethnonym,[4] while others do not,[5][6] and others still hold that the multiple modern connotations of ethnicity may not all map well onto the sociology of ancient Near Eastern groups.

[7] By the time of the Roman Empire, the term Hebraios (Greek: Ἑβραῖος) could refer to the Jews in general (as Strong's Hebrew Dictionary puts it: "any of the Jewish Nation")[8] or, at other times, specifically to those Jews who lived in Judea, which was a Roman province from 6 CE to 135 CE.

[16] It is also supported by the 3rd century BCE Septuagint, which translates ivri to perates (περατής),[17] a Greek word meaning "one who came across, a migrant",[18] from perao (περάω) "to cross, to traverse",[19] as well as some early traditional commentary.

Some authors such as Radak and R. Nehemiah[31] argue that Ibri denotes the descendants of the biblical patriarch Eber (Hebrew עבר), son of Shelah, a great-grandson of Noah and an ancestor of Abraham,[32] hence the occasional anglicization Eberites.

Alternatively, some argue that Habiru refers to a social class found in every ancient Near Eastern society, which Hebrews could be part of.

[citation needed] A friend of mine in Warsaw told me about a Polish journalist who visited Israel for the first time.

[50][51] Among certain left-wing or liberal circles of Judaic cultural lineage, the word "Hebrew" is used as an alternatively secular description of the Jewish people (e.g., Bernard Avishai's The Hebrew Republic or left-wing wishes for a "Hebrew-Arab" joint cultural republican state).

It is also used in some circles as a secular description of people of Judaic cultural lineage who practice other religions or none, including Hebrew Catholics.

[52] David Ben-Gurion, the first Prime Minister of Israel, believed that the Hebrews were the indigenous inhabitants of Canaan that joined Abraham's religion, after he settled in the region.