Shavua tov and Pope Gregory's shana tova!
Sometimes life gives you a whack, then a few more just to remind you it can. I am glad to have time for this again!
But for the purpose of time management, I'll be addressing the #JWHIA #SchoolLetters in a bit less depth. That said, if I skip something you're curious about, @ me!
onward to the latest #DearParent letter:
QRT https://babka.social/@jewwhohasitall/109602817664790710
#Gveret (also Geveret, G'veret) /'g(ə)veret (Hebrew)/ = lady, madame, Ms
(but see Gever, below!)
1/
Dear Geveret Smith, I am writing to address some concerns that you expressed in your letter about the class #holiday activities held over the past week. First of all, I want to express that our #PublicSchool loves ALL our #students. We have a #diverse #student body, we hold #diversity training every year, and we prioritize being good #allies to our #Christian students. 1/x
#Omer /'ʕomer (Hebrew), 'omɛɚ (Jewish English)/ = 1. (Biblical Hebrew) sheaf (of wheat, grain); 2. with “the” (i.e. Ha’Omer), the 49-day period from the 2nd day of Pesach (=Passover) through Shavuot (Feast of Weeks, =Pentecost); on the 1st & last days of the Omer, Jews traditionally make an offering of a sheaf of barley. Full name is S(e)firat Ha’Omer (=“counting [of] the sheaf [of grain]”)
2/
#FirstChristianOmer = Advent (the 1st waiting period of the Christian liturgical year; as opposed to Lent, the 40-day period before Easter, the Second Christian Omer)
#Gever /'gever (Hebrew), 'gɛvɛɚ (Jewish English)/ = 1. man (i.e. adult male, not "humankind"); 2. strongman; 3. hero. From the Semitic root G-V-R (generates words related to strength, grow, victory, confirm)
The same word with feminine inflection is Gveret, which can be used as a title (i.e. Ms).
3/
It's my understanding that in modern Israeli Hebrew, 1) #Gever and #Gveret aren't actually equivalent: Gveret is a title but Gever isn't, it just means "man," and the titles used instead are Mar (=Mr) or Adon (=Mr, Lord); but also 2) people default to first names in most contexts and don't really use title+surname as a common form of address.
The JWHIA folks do everything intentionally, so what's up? some hypotheses:
4/
1) The language of Medinat America isn't Hebrew, it's English (albeit with even more Hebrew influence than "real-world" Jewish English). Once words are borrowed into a new language, they behave like words of the new language, not the source language. The rules governing the behavior of "Gever" in the English of Medinat America are not the same as the rules in Hebrew.
5/
2) JWHIA (the character) doesn't speak fluent Hebrew. She speaks some Hebrew because in Medinat America it would be a common "foreign" language in schools, not to mention the percentage of families and synagogues that emphasize Hebrew would almost certainly be greater than in our world, given the majority Jewish population. But she's actually pretty likely to make Hebrew errors without realizing it, the same way that many US English speakers make Spanish errors without realizing it...
6/
...e.g. "No comprende" to mean "I don't understand" (it means: he/she/it/you (formal) don't understand).
3) Gever can actually mean Mr even in modern Israeli Hebrew, but my language informant hasn't used it that way
7/
#Moreh /moˈre (Hebrew), ˈmɔreɪ (common alternative pronunciation among US Jews/ = teacher, instructor (male; feminine inflection is "morah")
#Amsalem (also Amsellem, Amshalem, etc) = Sephardic Jewish surname. Etymology is murky (though I have a new resource on the way which may clear this up for me, stay tuned): possibly from Hebrew am + shalem (= "people/nation + whole/complete", i.e. "united people");
8/
...it's also speculated that it's a Berber placename or derived from a Moroccan/Algerian Arabic term for Jews meaning roughly "obedience to G-D" (but I haven't been able to confirm the actual existence of this term or its meaning. If you know Arabic and want to weigh in please do).
#maoz (also ma'oz) /maˈʔoz (Hebrew), ˈmaʔoz (Jewish English)/ = fortress, stronghold, refuge. From Semitic root '-Z-Z (generates words related to vigor, defiance, strength, triumph, courage, refuge, gather)
9/
#tzur /t͡sur (Hebrew), t͡sʊɚ (Jewish English)/ = rock, cliff. Also a boy's name and a surname.
#MaozTzur (also Ma'oz Tzur, Ma-oz-tzur, etc) = "fortress/refuge (of) rock" [roughly Mighty Stronghold/Refuge, or O Fortress, O Rock, depending on the translator]. The name of a Chanukah song whose lyrics originate in (probably) the 12th century CE. The title is taken from part of the first line of the song, "Ma'oz tzur yeshu'ati" which means, roughly, "O Fortress, O Rock of my salvation," i.e. G-D.
10/
lots I could say about this toot, but I'm only going to highlight #Christmat:
Modern Israeli Hebrew uses a /t/ sound for the letter tav (ת) where in some instances Ashkenazi Hebrew (and Yiddish) uses /s/ (e.g. Sukkot vs Sukkos) (= "booths", & a multi-day holiday in the fall) and Sephardic Hebrew (and Biblical Hebrew) uses /θ/ (that's the "th" sound in "think," not in "the," i.e. Succoth).
11/
The name of the holiday is Christmas (/s/ at the end of the word, no standard dialectal variation that I know of where it is pronounced Christmat in the real world). But JWHIA is defaulting to "standard" Israeli Hebrew pronunciation in the formal context of this letter to lend herself authority, but in so doing applies a language pattern to a word where it doesn't actually apply, because she doesn't have enough familiarity with Christmas to know that it wouldn't apply.
12/
lots to say here as well but I'll stick to the names.
#Shemtov (also Shem-Tov, Shem Tob, etc) /ʃemˈtov (Hebrew), ˈʃɛmtav (Jewish English)/ = Jewish (Ashkenazi and Sephardic) surname literally meaning "good name" (shem=name + tov=good); also sometimes a given name, usually transliterated as 2 words or with a hyphen
13/
Tzaddik (tzadik, etc) /t͡saˈdik (Hebrew), ˈt͡sadək (Jewish English)/ = 1. righteous person (masc); 2. righteous (adjective, masc)
ha (also ha') /hə/ (Hebrew prefix) = 1. the; 2. that, who; 3. question marker
Tzaddik Ha'Nation = Righteous person [of] the nation
I think (?) this is a reference to Righteous Among the Nations, an honorific bestowed by the State of Israel on gentiles who risked their lives to help Jews during the Holocaust, but the honorific uses a different word than Tzaddik:
14/
Chasidei Ummot Ha'Olam (righteous/pious/observant [of] nations [of] the world)
/end, but fun extra coming in a bit with more on the s/t/th variation
fun extra: tet/tav
Hebrew has two letters that represent the /t/ sound, tet (ט) and tav (ת). Sometimes tav gets a dagesh (the dot in תּ). In Modern Israeli Hebrew, they are all always pronounced the same, as /t/, so why the different spellings?
It's related to the Sukkot/Sukkos/Sukkoth variation.
a PHONEME is a sound of a language (e.g. the /b/ sound).
sometimes a phoneme can be pronounced in multiple ways (e.g. in English the sound we spell with the letter L can be [l] or [ɬ])...
a)
those variations are called ALLOPHONES and usually there are rules determining when to use each one ([l] at the beginning of a syllable before a vowel, [ɬ] at the end of a syllable after a vowel). Most speakers aren't even aware of the difference, because the variation isn't related to the meaning of words or sentences.
Ancient Hebrew had 2 phonemes and 3 allophones which were represented by 2 letters:
tet = tˤ (t, but add in a forceful push from the back of the throat). Always spelled ט.
b/
tav = t (before a vowel)
θ (th) (after a vowel)
(leaving out some additional context here but for genera purposes this explanation works)
--always spelled ת, no dagesh needed, because pronunciation was determined by its position relative to vowels.
But language changes over time.
In Modern Hebrew, all 3 sounds from Ancient Hebrew have collapsed into a single sound, /t/, which is represented by both tet and tav.
c/
In Ashkenazi Hebrew, especially through influence from Yiddish which has /s/ but not /θ/, the 3 sounds collapsed into 2 sounds: tav and tet-t are /t/, while tet-th is /s/ (which of course overlaps with shin and samech; there's a similar story there). tav-with-dagesh = /t/, and tav-on-its-own = /s/.
Yemenite Hebrew (and some regions of Sephardic Hebrew) preserved the 3-way distinction: throaty-t, t, and th. The 2 letters and the dagesh are important to distinguish the 3 sounds in writing.
d/
For those speakers, tet=throaty-t, tav-with-dagesh = t, and tav-on-its-own=th.
which is how you get the Sukkot (Modern Hebrew) / Sukkos (Ashkenazi) / Sukkoth (Yemenite/Sephardic) variation. An Ancient Hebrew phonological pattern changed in different ways in different dialects over time.
In Modern Hebrew, where 3 sounds collapsed into 1 sound, the 3-way spelling distinction indicates historical sound patterns but has no bearing on modern pronunciation.
/end
mistake where it matters: Shemtov is "good name," not "good day" (which is yom tov). (I'll edit this when I'm back at my computer.) "shem" means "name", which exists in lots of contexts but includes Hashem (=the name), a name for G-D.
ETA: fixed in the original toot up above! Thanks to the folks who noticed the error.
Thought of an additional fun extra re: Christmas/Christmat and spelling standards:
The island nation of Kiribati includes an atoll named Kiritimati, which is pronounced (kee-riss-mahss) in Gilbertese (the native language of Kiribati). This is the spelling and pronunciation of "Christmas" in Gilbertese, were /kr/ is not a possible consonant cluster (thus the extra vowel) and the /s/ sound is spelled <ti>. (The island itself is kee-ree-bahss.)
@erikavaris This is a great question. It would make so much sense, right? But no.
"sabbath" entered English through Latin and Old French, both of which had a /t/ in that position:
Ancient Hebrew SHABBATH > Greek SABBATON > Latin SABBATUM > Old French SABAT > Middle English (many spellings including SABAT, SABAZ, SABADT, SABOT, SABOTH).
There was minimal codified spelling in the Middle English period so texts are actually helpful in deciphering different dialectal pronunciations. +
@jewterpretor I think you are right about the reference but the concept of the righteous of the nations (ie righteous non-Jews) is much older than the State of Israel. According to the Talmud, the righteous of the nations of the world shall have a place in the world to come.
I've always seen this as a logical basis for why Judaism does not evangelise - what is required of non-Jews is righteousness rather than conversion.
thanks for additional context!
@jewterpretor are you sure? I've always understood Shem Tov (eg as in the Baal Shem Tov) as meaning Good Name.
I guess it's possible that Yom (day) might get pronounced as Shem (name) in some accents but I doubt that's where it comes from.
Yes! Thank you! you are right! This is what happens when you speed edit your own work. I'll fix that when I'm back at my computer.
Jewterpretor
Erika Varis Doggett
Hilary