I don't think it is. It just think it largely replaces an internal domain-specific language (the DOM) with an better, more convenient one abstracted on top of i

I don't think it is. It just think it largely replaces an internal domain-specific language (the DOM) with an better, more convenient one abstracted on top of it (jQuery). Using jQuery for the DOM feels much more natural and more like JavaScript than the ugly W3C interface. I honestly don't think jQuery differs too far from writing ordinary JavaScript. Yes, it has a nice design, but it ultimately works because it plays to JavaScript's strengths rather than its weaknesses, and many of its other design decisions are forced by the limitations of the language and good practice. In fact, one of the reasons jQuery is so popular is because it doesn't use one of JavaScript's most powerful and most misused tools by playing with the core language, whereas Prototype and Mootools make much more sweeping changes, blurring the line of where the library end and the language starts.