Tuesday, November 28, 2006

Download Dickdook Leshon Gnebreet - דקדוק לשון עברית

All the explanation is at On the Main Line but in this clean post you can download Judah Monis' Dickdook Leshon Gnebreet: A Grammar of the Hebrew Tongue (Boston, 1735) (דקדוק לשון עברית).
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Saturday, November 04, 2006

...and the Rogachever [sic]

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Once we're on the topic--Rav Kook's NY Times obituary




(click to enlarge, or download as a PDF)

Hat tip: Aishdos
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Tuesday, October 31, 2006

Chafetz Chaim obit in NY Times: a Tale of Research and Results

A couple of people forwarded me the following email, and I think it bears posting:

I wanted to share the following with you:

About a year ago I heard a shiur in which reference was made to the Chofetz Chaim and Shmiras Halashon. The Baal Darshin mentioned the well-known fact that the Chofetz Chaim lost his hearing later in life and said "And he lived a very long life! According to the New York Times, he lived until 105!" The reference to this newspaper intrigued me - I was unsure if he was simply using the newspaper's name in jest or if the New York Times actually published an obituary for the Chofetz Chaim.

It crossed my mind again this Elul with the Chofetz Chaim's 73rd yohrtzeit. (The Chofetz Chaim Heritage Foundation hosted a brilliant nation-wide conference-call evening of shiurim. The participating rabbonim ranged in subject from Hilchos Shmiras Halashon to Inyonei D'Yoma to aprapos Elul mussar.)

My interest was piqued and I decided to visit the New York Public Library at 42nd Street, known for its vast research facilities: I wanted to see this obituary.

The search began with an alphabetical index of the NYT Obituaries in the Reference Department. I thought to look under "K" for Kagan. According to Artscroll and other American-based publications, The Chofetz Chaim is always refered to as Rabbi Yisroel Mayer Kagan. ('Kagan' being a derivative of 'Kohen' often used by Lithuanian and/or Polish jews). There was nothing under Kagan in the indicies, so I went to the Microfiche department in the back corner of the library's ground floor. I knew the civil date of death was Friday, September 15, 1933 (corresponding to the yiddish date: Elul 24, 5693) and searched the drawers of NYT microfiche for this date and the week that followed - how soon would a New York newspaper report on the death of a jewish rabbi in Radin?

Attached you will see my findings.

In addition to the feeling of accomplishment one feels in achieving a 'goal,' I was very inspired when reading the small article. I think it speaks volumes to see how a non-jewish publication in 1933 America reported in such a dignified fashion on the life of a eminent tzaddik and gadol ha'dor.

Enjoy!


I don't know who this originates from, but I like the idea; discovering the problem and doing the research and uncovering gold.

(click below to enlarge and read or download as a PDF)





EDIT: I am pleased to be able to attribute this to Avigayil Meyer who notes that this research was hers and the email begun by her.

The research and letter above was done by ME! I sent the e-mail out to a couple of friends and now I see it all over the Internet without credit. Please post THIS response and spread worldwide. Credit should be given where credit is due!

Well done, Ms Meyer!
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Tuesday, September 26, 2006

Bible cantillation news to Albert Schweitzer

(I shudder to think what sort of googling will turn up a post with this title!)

I know, why don't I just rename the blog English Hebraism already. ;)

I found this interesting letter by theologian, musician and philosopher Albert Schweitzer.
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Tuesday, September 05, 2006

Hebrew influencing Nathan Bailey's 18th century English dictionary

English is a very dynamic language. It expands at a rate no other language can (or wants to) match. By the 17th century literally thousands of words were being added yearly and people were very conscious of this fact. The language was in a state of ferment, England's power was on the rise and the French and Italians had already established language committees to keep their respective tongues pure (this, 300 years before there was a nation called Italy).

In England it was believed by many that the English tongue had reached a stage of sufficient maturation and magnificence that it now needed to be protected, for its fate would be degradation without some way of fixing it in place. While we now know that this is essentially impossible to do with a dynamic language, at that time, the scientific method was ascending and the necessity of defining and fixing all sorts of things was agreed. Exactly how long was a yard? What exactly is the color red? All those questions and more were being considered and the move was in the direction of precision. So although one might think Jonathan Swift stuffy for objecting to the contraction "couldn't" (*gasp*), few among us would think the idea of a uniform orthography (spelling) is stuffy. In fact, most people can't really understand how there could not have been one. Bear in mind also that at the time the flux and ferment in English was far more extensive, and more importantly, visible than it is for us.

This would mean, at the very least, the assembly of a lexicon or word list. Several modest attempts were made in this direction, such as Henry Cockeram's The English Dictionarie: or, an Interpreter of hard English Words (1623). By the eighteenth century English dictionaries were being produced with many tens of thousands of words. Naturally the most celebrated achievement in that century was Samuel Johnson's, but the march towards better dictionaries continued unabated before and since.

To backtrack before Johnson, one such dictionary of English was compiled by Nathan Bailey, whose Dictionarium Britannicum Or, A Compleat Etymological English Dictionary Being Also An Interpeter of Hard and Technical Words (1721) was a monumental work which served as the bedrock for Johnson's.

In it there are some interesting supposed Hebrew etymologies for English words. Some of them are fanciful and some are, of course, derived from Hebrew. Here are some:

1.

The root here, אבך, is meant in the sense of וַיִּתְאַבְּכוּ in Isa. 9:17 (to roll up, " they roll upward in thick clouds of smoke.") OED knows nothing about it.

2.

In modern Hebrew, אויר avir, certainly sounds a lot like air! Is אויר derived from ו?אור

3.

No comment.

Okay, one comment: I've seen some speculation that ערב is the same root as עבר with some natural letter transposition. In other words, think of Arabs as Herbews. Maybe.

4.

This word seemed interesting in its own right. Before the OED (Oxford English Dictionary) no serious attempt to catlogue every word in the English language was made. The task was too herculean to contemplate (see Simon Winchester's The Meaning of Everything for the ingenious solution the OED used to achieve the feat it did; which even then did not literally catalogue every word, and besides took almost 70 years to do it) . Bailey's dictionary, as others, were generally one-man attempts to catalogue as much as one could. Since they were not exhaustive, the words chosen do reveal some window into the worldview of the lexicographer as well as in some sense into the culture of the time. Words like this are included, as well as many, many other biblical allusions, Hebrew weights, ancient Near Eastern gods etc.

5.

This word is pretty archaic, but according to the OED an athanor is "a digesting furnace used by the alchemists[...]" and made its way into English through Arabic (hence the "a-" prefix) but a tannur תנור should be pretty recognizable to anyone who learns Talmud, or a six year old who learns Mishna (e.g, Akhnai's Oven (תנורו של עכנאי).

6.

Fun archaic word. I doubt that "cock-loft" is from גג. Call me a cynic.

7.

This one is a bit predictable, and interesting also because as far as I can tell a ד should be able to switch to a צ (shouldn't it?). But, alas, the English word "earth" didn't form fully from a Hebrew womb, but comes from a common Old German word. Biblical influences on English are very plausible. Biblical influences on ancient Teutons are less so. Edenics aren't my cup of ch'a.

8.

This one was chiefly interesting to me because I learned that the word comes from the coin it cost to read the newspaper. It would be as if many newspapers were called dimes or whatever they originally cost. The Daily Dime sounds nice.

9.

I think this etymology is a Bailey original. OED and the Online Etymology Dictionary basically have no clue where this one comes from, except that it shows up around 1300. Hebraism in England had already begun by that date, so I leave open the window about a millimeter on this one. If no one knows, then who knows?

10.

One of the many words which are English but are actually Hebrew, thanks to the Bible. Of interest is that its meaning reflects some of the debates in biblical scholarship of the day.

11.

Outsider perception is always interesting.


12.

This reflects the debate which raged for a couple of centuries on the origin and authority of the nekkudot (see here and here). Bailey seems to favor the view that they were originated by Ezra (and in so doing indicates his more traditionalist bent), but is gracious enough to mention the other view.

13.

I have no idea if there is any relationship between the Greek and Semitic סתר, but I suppose its possible. After all, those two regions were only a sea away, and the two language groups did influence each other.

14.

This one is great!

To clarify, Nisan is the first month of the Jewish calendar and correlates, roughly, with April. However, the Jewish New Year is in the seventh month, Tishrei (don't ask! ;) ). Presumably Bailey knew that Nisan is the first month and knew of Rosh Hashanah in the seventh month. As there is no entry for Tishrei, he must have figured that Nisan is the seventh month in which the New Year occurs.

15.

Fanciful, but fun.

16.

This one is really something. I think there are parallels for such etymologies in rabbinic literature, although I can't offer an example at the moment.

17.

Sign of the times. Deism and free-thinking enjoyed a particularly good reputation in the 18th century, thus projecting themselves onto the ancient Sadducees.
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Sunday, August 06, 2006

Did the NY Times ever say Jews shave with a ram's horn?

There is a discussion in an email list about an urban legend that the New York Times once reported that Orthodox Jews shave with a ram's horn. (Need I say they don't?) Someone conjectured that this happened because a reporter asked an Orthodox Jew with an accent how he shaved and he answer "Wit ah shafer." The reporter, not realizing that he was told "with a shaver" asked someone else "Do you have any idea what a Jewish ritual item that sounds something like "shafer" is?" and of course the person told him that it's a ram's horn. (Get it? Shafer = shofer. Who knows, maybe the reporter asked a Litvak.)

Anyway, this is an urban legend since no one seems to have actually seen the ram's horn story. But there is the following from December 24, 1922 which might have been the source of it. Note "removed with bone knife":



Here is the entire article.
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Thursday, July 20, 2006

On Chabad, 1826

Quite by accident I came across this interesting reference to Chabad Chassidim in an 1834 article. The publication was called The Biblical Repository, founded by Edward Robinson.

The article, from the October 1834 issue, is called The Karaites, and other Jewish sects and contains material from a book called Biblical Researches and Travels in Russia (London, 1826) by Ebenezer Henderson.

He informs the reader that
"The most popular sect among the Jews, is that known by the name of Rabbinists, or Talmudists, i.e. such as yielf implicit obedience to the doctrines and institutions of the Rabbins, as delivered in, or deducible from the Talmud, and who, according to the general acceptation of the term, may be accounted the orthodox....They are precisely, in the present day, what the Pharisees were in the time of our Lord....But although the Rabbinists compose the great body of Jews in Poland, there exist other denominations, the numbers and pecularities of which are too considerable not to strike the inqisitive traveller.

These are the Karaites, the Chasidism, and the Zoharites, or followers of Sabbathai Tzevi."
After describing a version of the history of Chasiddus, he writes



I think it would be interesting to trace the earliest English language reference to Chassidus that there is. I'm on it.
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Tuesday, June 27, 2006

They don't make tombstones like they used to: Judah Monis

At On the Main Line I once posted about Judah Monis's Hebrew text book which he titled 'Dickdook Leshon Gnebreet,' using an interesting variation of the Italian pronunciation of the Hebrew 'ayin.

I can't resist the opportunity to post his tombstone. They sure don't make 'em like they used to!


You can click it to enlarge, but here is what it says:

Here lies buried the Remains of RABBI JUDAH MONIS, MA late Hebrew Instructor at HARVARD College in Cambridge in which Office Hecontinued 40 years. He was by Birth and Religion a jew but embraced the Christian Faith ? was publiclly baptized at Cambridge AD 1722 and departed this Life April 25 1764 Aged 81 years, 2 months and 21 days.

A native branch of Jacob see
Which once from off its olive brok
Regrafted from the living tree
Of the reviving sap partook Rom xi 17 24


and then followed quotes from Isaiah, Psalms and Iohn.
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A Sabbath Among Orthodox Jews in NYC in 1872

I came across this interesting article called 'A Sabbath Among The Orthodox Jews' by a W.M.R. which appeared in a periodical called The Galaxy in 1872 (Volume 14, Issue 3, September 1872). The Galaxy was the precursor to the Atlantic Monthly, which began where it left off in 1878.

W.M.R. is Jewish--he got an aliyah, giving his name as Moses bar Samuel, although he declined to daven mussaph, having "to confess, humiliating though it was, that to do this second thing was utterly beyond my powers". Unfortunately he doesn't share his background, and it isn't even clear that he is Jewish until well into the article. It is obvious that this synagogue experience among Orthodox Russian immigrants was as foreign to him as a Friday morning in a mosque would be for me. He also said that he understood Hebrew--better, he thought, than probably most of the people in the shul.

Here is the first page (click to enlarge):

You can download the entire article as a PDF here.
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Thursday, May 18, 2006

An 18th century English language witness to "ribbi"

Not that witnesses are needed given that centuries old Hebrew mss vocalize r-b-y as ribbi, but appropos this post, here is an interesting thing from the "Minute Book of the Spanish and Portuguese Congregation Shearith Israel in New York, 1760-1786" published by American Jewish Historical Society, Publications, 21 (1913) p.83.

This particular bit is dated The fourth day of the month of Adar, year 5528 [February 22, 1768]. The occasion was "a Meeting of the Parnassim, and Mr Daniel Gomez, Joseph Simson, Hayman Levy, assistants."


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Wednesday, May 03, 2006

Sabato Morais on the unity of biblical books

One of the very interesting figures in the 19th century American scene was the hazzan* of the Spanish-Portugese synagogue in Philadelphia, Mikveh Israel, the Rev. Sabato Morais (1823-1897). Born in Leghorn, Italy, a follower and lifelong devotee to the legacy and teachings of Shadal.

He was one of the original founders of the JTS, which as many know was originally an Orthodox institution, primarily until Solomon Schechter was brought in--although Orthodox by 19th century American standards, which is not the same thing as 20th century American Orthodox.

After his death an article in the Orthodox newspaper Yudishe Gazeten wrote that he was "der grester fun ale ortodoksishe rabonim in amerike . . . on sofek" ("without doubt . . . the greatest of all orthodox rabbis in the United States").**

And no, I cannot say for sure if he is or isn't wearing a kippah in this photo.

I'm sure Menachem Butler can say a lot about him.

H*. Morais was a prolific writer of popular articles and essays. Here is an interesting excerpt from one article published in The American Hebrew on "Adar 5, 5642." The article was a rejoinder to an article called "Doubts" which had appeared in another newspaper, the Jewish South, concerning Bible criticism. Apparently that article was itself written about a lecture H. Morais delivered refuting Scottish Bible scholar William Robertson Smith's book "The Old Testament in the Jewish Church" (title tells you something about the biases of the age!) By the way, W. R. Smith is cited as a source in the commentary in the Hertz Chumash! But I digress.

This excerpt offers a fascinating window into 19th century American Orthodoxy, from one of its most capable leaders. Note especially the third line, which notes why he believes as he does.



*A Hazzan (or, should I say, Hhazan as an Italian would write it) on the American scene in the 19th century actually fulfilled the role of rabbi, which was why they were usually title Reverend, but not Rabbi, although hhazzanim like Sabato Morais, or Isaac Leeser, who he replaced were certainly rabbis in every sense but name.

**Courtesy of Kiron, Arthur ""Dust and Ashes": The Funeral and Forgetting of Sabato Morais"American Jewish History - Volume 84, Number 3, September 1996, pp. 155-188
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Monday, April 10, 2006

1893 review of the Hirsch Chumash

Here is a review of the Genesis volume of the original Hirsch Chumash by W. Taylor Smith which appeared in The Biblical World in October 1893.



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Thursday, April 06, 2006

Aleph-bet soup



Readers of On the Main Line will know how much I love alphabets. This one is from a book of fonts called A compendium of the usuall hands of England, Netherlands, France, Spaine, and Italie with the Hebrew, Samaritan, Caldaean, Syrian, AEgyptian, Arabic, Greek, Saxon, Gotick, Croatian, Slavonian, Muscouian, Armenian, Roman, Florentine, Venetian, Saracen, AEthiopian and Indian characters : with sundry figures of men, beasts and birds. Published in London in 1663, the fonts were devised by Richard Daniel and engraved by Edward Cocker, "philomath."

The script on the left is called 'The letters of the running hands of the Jewes of Germany,' by which is meant the cursive script, and the one on the right is 'The letters of the running hands of the Jewes of Spaine.'

Compare with some of the forms from these images from the Jewish Encyclopedia, taken from actual Sephardic and Ashkenazic manuscripts:





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Monday, April 03, 2006

Rabbins and rabbis

In my research for this blog I noticed something that I hadn't previously known: in English the prevalent tendency, by far, was to write "rabbins" as plural for "rabbi" up to, and including, well on into the 19th century.

Why is that? I knew that in German a rabbi is a rabbiner. English is Germanic &c. But that hardly seems a satisfactory explanation. Given that, when did rabbins become rabbis? And why?

The handy dandy Babelfish translator tells us that a rabbi in certain other languages is:

rabijn in Dutch
rabbin in French (aha!)
rabbiner in German
ραβίνος (rabinos) in Greek
rabbino in Italian
равин (rabin) (in Russian
rabino in Spanish
rabinus in Latin
ラビ in Japanese (sorry, I get lost here!)

And, of course, רב rav in Hebrew. Presumably every other language got its "rabbi" from references in the Christian scriptures, like Matthew 23. And the original language of said scriptures was Greek. In Greek the instances of "rabbi" were written as ραββι which can be written neatly in English as rabbi. Presumably the Hebrew word the writers of the Christian scriptures had in mind was not רב but רבי rabbee (י"א ribbee).

But what are rabbins in English?

Comes the Oxford English Dictionary to shed a little light:

rabbin The source of the n in th[is] forms is obscure: it may have originated in pl. forms (rabbins, rabbini) on the supposition that the pl. of the Heb. word was *rabbin (cf. assassin, bedouin, etc.).]

Aha! But we had a secret: the word they were looking for was rabbeim or rabbanim.

One more OED "fact":
to designate the chief Jewish authorities on matters of law and doctrine, the most important of whom flourished between the second and thirteenth centuries of the Christian era
It's nice to know that the OED decided how rabbis are ranked!
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The Jew, Being a Defence of Judaism...

I came across an interesting periodical



. The Israel's Advocate in the subtitle refers to a publication called Israel's Advocate; or, The Restoration of the Jews Contemplated and Urged, published also in New York between 1823 and 1827.

Jewish Encyclopedia explains that The Jew was a:
Jewish monthly whose avowed object finds expression in its subtitle as "being a defense of Judaism against all adversaries, and particularly against the insidious attacks of Israel's advocate." It was published in New York city and edited by Solomon H. Jackson from March 1, 1823, to March 1, 1825. "The Jew" was the first Jewish periodical published in the United States, and was aimed against Christian conversionists.
The very first issue begins as follows:


It goes on to continue, saying that just as Christian missionaries to the Jews felt that they had a right to go on the attack, as he puts it, Jews are entitled to a defense. The author appeals to equal rights, as a good American would. The author also seeks to establish, for the benefit of cautious Jews, that this publication is not intemperate, citing examples of "the martyr Isaac Orobio, whose crown of martyrdom proves his victory. Rabbi Isaac, the son of Abraham; Rabbi Lipman; David Levy, and Mr. Nicklesburger; of these five worthies, but one met danger, and that was personal only; two wrote in Hebrew, and the two last in English, in England, without damage or danger either to themselves or our community. It is paying a poor compliment to Americans, to suppose them less enlightened than Englishmen."

A very interesting feature of this publication is the following:



Throughout this publication (which ran for two years) one will only find "......ians" and "......ianity" mentioned.

The Jew printed detailed articles reacting to Israel's Advocate, which featured articles with titles like "Conversion of a Jew" and "Gentiles Praying For the Conversion of the Jews" and "Masonry Tributary to the progress of Christianity among the Jews". It looked like this:


אין חדש תחת השמש

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Friday, March 31, 2006

We got Canada!

The content here is not itself so interesting. What is interesting is what it is.

It is the text of the prayer composed by D.R. Joseph Yesurun Pinto (acting) rabbi of Jews Synagogue in New York City on October 23, 1760 on the occasion of the day being "appointed by proclamation for a general thanksgiving to Almighty God, for the reducing of Canada to His Majesty's dominions."


This is only two of seven pages. It's mostly tehillim and some of it is two tefillos he composed himself, one said by shacharit and one by mincha (or maariv?).
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Thursday, March 30, 2006

Shabbetai Sevi--getting a little more contemporary

Here is an account of the Shabbetai Sevi event published in 1669, only three years after the climactic conversion of Sevi to Islam. The work is called The history of the three late, famous impostors, viz. Padre Ottomano, Mahomed Bei and Sabatai Sevi, by John Evelyn (1620-1706). This piece is from the third section, called "THE HISTORY OF SABATAI SEVI, The Pretended Messiah of the Iewes*, In the Year of our Lord, 1666. The Third Impostor."



and a few more pages:

1, 2, 3, and4.

If you want to read the entire thing, you can. But only in text. Here it is: sabb.txt

*Iewes--that's us.
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