Saturday, February 26, 2005
More on Lashon HaKodesh
Treading Fences writes:
The answer is, of course, that I don't know. I cannot afford to be a hardliner yet because languages are incredibly complex creatures, and this one (Hebrew) has extra features. And as soon as I take a position, there will be someone with good evidence to the contrary.
I will throw out a few more thoughts à propos in hopes of eventually getting somewhere close to answer these kinds of questions:
One more thought - not all innovations are secular in nature or loazit in origin. How do the writings of HaRav Kook, who created words himself, fit into your "modern hebrew" scheme. The words of HaRav Kook are new, and yet are arguably a lashon of/for kodesh if not lashon kodesh itself (solely tanachik in strict def?)
The answer is, of course, that I don't know. I cannot afford to be a hardliner yet because languages are incredibly complex creatures, and this one (Hebrew) has extra features. And as soon as I take a position, there will be someone with good evidence to the contrary.
I will throw out a few more thoughts à propos in hopes of eventually getting somewhere close to answer these kinds of questions:
- I don't see any problem with secular word inventions per se. Eliezer Ben Yehudah invented a lot of modern Hebrew terminology for the needs of modern society, and presumably the Academia follows in his footsteps. Yes, he is often belittled by the frum crowd for doing his thing, and in fact faced a lot of rabbinical opposition to his championing of the Hebrew language for modern usage. But I have no reason to criticise him as of yet, and the descendants of those rabbanim seem to be using modern Hebrew with no qualms.
- There is a story, maybe aprocryphal, that some persons in the ḥarédi world refused to use the word ḥashmal for "electricity". There was of course no explicit mention of electricity in the Tanakh, so someone (maybe Ben Yehudah) had to come up with a word. The word ḥashmal apparently came from the Navi (Yeḥezkel maybe? I am too lazy to look it up at this moment) and was thus strictly considered Lashon HaKodesh.
- I do not know what the outcome of the above two anecdotes has been, except that modern Hebrew and the word ḥashmal is used widely, even in the ḥarédi population, in Israel. Outside of Israel, the old opinions may be held more strongly because it is possible for those people to go about their daily lives without using Hebrew, except in Torah study.
- Naturally I am highly receptive of whatever Rav Kook did in this regards, since his holy sensibilities were higher than those of Ben Yehudah's.
- I think I just don't like Hebrew speakers using English (French, German, Latin...) words when perfectly good Hebrew words exist for the same ideas.
the return of Adi
Long-time readers may remember Adi Neuman, who was my ḥavruta (Talmudic study partner) in yeshivah something like a year and a half ago, until I was married. Adi introduced me to the modern art of blogging, which I had previously relegated to the back of my mind under "Web Journals -- see amateur, context-free writing that nobody wants to read anyway". Needless to say, I discovered that it could be a more elevated medium, and decided to set out on my own. In fact, some of you may have found my blog from a link on Adi's "Home Beis".
At some point he went on hiatus, leaving us with a cryptic statement about vacation, preceded by a descriptions of his daily life in yeshivah, something of a combination between intense learning, poor nutrition, and sleep deprivation.
Well, he has returned to the keyboard after what seems like a year now, and apparently without having lost his acerbic and highly intelligent sense of humour.
It's Jewspeak. You read it here first, probably. Because I discovered it on my own just an hour after his first posting. How's that for keeping in touch with old yeshivah buddies?
At some point he went on hiatus, leaving us with a cryptic statement about vacation, preceded by a descriptions of his daily life in yeshivah, something of a combination between intense learning, poor nutrition, and sleep deprivation.
Well, he has returned to the keyboard after what seems like a year now, and apparently without having lost his acerbic and highly intelligent sense of humour.
It's Jewspeak. You read it here first, probably. Because I discovered it on my own just an hour after his first posting. How's that for keeping in touch with old yeshivah buddies?
Tuesday, February 08, 2005
MiniUlpan: don't say rine, say rain
Those who have seen the musical comedy My Fair Lady, or those who are unfortunate to know only this version of the Pygmalion story, may remember the song "The Rain in Spain", which contained this line:
This was sung by the virtual Greek Chorus of Professor Higgins' cleaning staff to the low-class Eliza Doolittle, who seemed incapable of adopting his Estuary English in place of her East-Ender poor girl's accent.
"Don't say X; say Y" is a familiar pattern and has served as the format for many a grammarian's table of correct language usage for centuries.
Such lists are written by well-meaning educators who just hope to see some continuity in their little part of the human tradition. As soon as a grammarian starts composing such lists, however, the linguist knows the grammarian's work is doomed, in all likelihood.
From our point of view, they often show at what point in history the a word underwent a change. I first encountered these lists in Latin when studying how that language transformed itself into the Romance Languages. Such lists were written by medieval scholars, often Roman Catholic clergymen, who saw that the integrity of the international language was in peril if people kept using the words incorrectly. One of the most famous is the appendix Probi, compiled in the 3rd or 4th century. Here is an example from Probus' long list of common Latin mistakes.
The first word of each pair is the "correct" Latin word (the way Cicero, for example, would have written it) and the second is the "incorrect", or dialectal form of the word that had crept into common usage.
Guess which form survived?
Sigh.
You see, I tend to think Probus was right. He knew the correct spelling of words; he just wanted to prevent people from making further mistakes.
Unfortunately some of his readers were as receptive as Jewish high-school students. (In a private school that their parents are paying a lot of money to send them to. Especially if it is an elite, pluralistic high school that prides itself in the quality of its academics.) By that, I mean, not receptive at all. Tell them what the correct word is: they laugh. "Nobody says that." Since they have such a grasp of world affairs, they are sure they must be right.
Truth be told, it was not always the second, incorrect form that survived. Linguists would have us believe that was the case. But sometimes scribes took the lesson seriously. And sometimes purists at a later date rectified the mistakes (such as in the case of the humanists of the fifteenth century, criticised by Desiderius Erasmus in his Dialogus Ciceronianus). But that was indeed true often enough to convince linguists that once a change has taken hold in the popular usage of the language enough to be noted, it is probably irreversible.
Having said that, I would like to consider the effectiveness of attempts by grammarians to curb the incorrect use of Hebrew by Israelis. Whether the definition of what is correct comes from Tanakh, Mishnayot, or the modern Academia LeLashon HaIvrit, I am talking about any rule that has been established and taught, but from which the popular usage of the language is diverging.
I quote from the Orthodox Union Center's Torah Tidbits, issue 652:
The obvious purpose of the OU Center publishing this list, and vocabulary reminders that come up in other issues, is to remind Hebrew speakers to try to use the accepted rules of the language rather than allowing the pernicious elements of other languages to come in and replace them. This is also a lively polemic in other languages, such as French, which has the Académie Française to set and promote rules of correct usage. As often as not it is the invasion of English words and grammar that causes problems, but sometimes it is just evolution of the language following its natural course as speakers mangle the spelling and pronunciation.
There is a small but important difference in this case. The OU's Torah Tidbits is addressed specifically to those who speak English and have in all likelihood learned Hebrew as a second language. Such persons may be more likely to consider themselves ongoing learners of Hebrew, continually improving it. Furthermore, it is my conviction that the Jewish world in general may pay more heed to such rules than other nationalities.
Am Yisrael has a vested interest in preserving both our religious and linguistic heritage. We may even consider it worthwhile to pay attention to "picky" details such as the use of gershayim instead of the period used in other languages for abbreviations. In such an idealistic, education-oriented environment, such reminders may actually stand a chance.
"Ay" not "I", "O" not "Ow", Don't say "Rine," say "Rain".
This was sung by the virtual Greek Chorus of Professor Higgins' cleaning staff to the low-class Eliza Doolittle, who seemed incapable of adopting his Estuary English in place of her East-Ender poor girl's accent.
"Don't say X; say Y" is a familiar pattern and has served as the format for many a grammarian's table of correct language usage for centuries.
Such lists are written by well-meaning educators who just hope to see some continuity in their little part of the human tradition. As soon as a grammarian starts composing such lists, however, the linguist knows the grammarian's work is doomed, in all likelihood.
From our point of view, they often show at what point in history the a word underwent a change. I first encountered these lists in Latin when studying how that language transformed itself into the Romance Languages. Such lists were written by medieval scholars, often Roman Catholic clergymen, who saw that the integrity of the international language was in peril if people kept using the words incorrectly. One of the most famous is the appendix Probi, compiled in the 3rd or 4th century. Here is an example from Probus' long list of common Latin mistakes.
masculus non mascel
lanius non laneo
iuvencus non iuvenclus
barbarus non barbar
equs non ecus
coqus non cocus
The first word of each pair is the "correct" Latin word (the way Cicero, for example, would have written it) and the second is the "incorrect", or dialectal form of the word that had crept into common usage.
Guess which form survived?
Sigh.
You see, I tend to think Probus was right. He knew the correct spelling of words; he just wanted to prevent people from making further mistakes.
Unfortunately some of his readers were as receptive as Jewish high-school students. (In a private school that their parents are paying a lot of money to send them to. Especially if it is an elite, pluralistic high school that prides itself in the quality of its academics.) By that, I mean, not receptive at all. Tell them what the correct word is: they laugh. "Nobody says that." Since they have such a grasp of world affairs, they are sure they must be right.
Truth be told, it was not always the second, incorrect form that survived. Linguists would have us believe that was the case. But sometimes scribes took the lesson seriously. And sometimes purists at a later date rectified the mistakes (such as in the case of the humanists of the fifteenth century, criticised by Desiderius Erasmus in his Dialogus Ciceronianus). But that was indeed true often enough to convince linguists that once a change has taken hold in the popular usage of the language enough to be noted, it is probably irreversible.
Having said that, I would like to consider the effectiveness of attempts by grammarians to curb the incorrect use of Hebrew by Israelis. Whether the definition of what is correct comes from Tanakh, Mishnayot, or the modern Academia LeLashon HaIvrit, I am talking about any rule that has been established and taught, but from which the popular usage of the language is diverging.
I quote from the Orthodox Union Center's Torah Tidbits, issue 652:
Rather than a word or two this week, we're presenting some rules of HaAcademiya. Abbreviations in Hebrew are marked with a GERESH (or GERSHAYIM), apostrophe or double quote, not a period. E.g.
'טל, not .טל (telephone)
רח' קרן היסד not .רח
אישור מס' 1300 not .מס
ת"ד 37015 not .ת.ד (P.O.B.)
ת"ז not .ת.ז
The obvious purpose of the OU Center publishing this list, and vocabulary reminders that come up in other issues, is to remind Hebrew speakers to try to use the accepted rules of the language rather than allowing the pernicious elements of other languages to come in and replace them. This is also a lively polemic in other languages, such as French, which has the Académie Française to set and promote rules of correct usage. As often as not it is the invasion of English words and grammar that causes problems, but sometimes it is just evolution of the language following its natural course as speakers mangle the spelling and pronunciation.
There is a small but important difference in this case. The OU's Torah Tidbits is addressed specifically to those who speak English and have in all likelihood learned Hebrew as a second language. Such persons may be more likely to consider themselves ongoing learners of Hebrew, continually improving it. Furthermore, it is my conviction that the Jewish world in general may pay more heed to such rules than other nationalities.
Am Yisrael has a vested interest in preserving both our religious and linguistic heritage. We may even consider it worthwhile to pay attention to "picky" details such as the use of gershayim instead of the period used in other languages for abbreviations. In such an idealistic, education-oriented environment, such reminders may actually stand a chance.