(Sings lustily from rooftop) Traaaaaaaaaaadition! TRADITION! (tradition!)
The one Holiday tradition I have followed for fifteen years is to throw the Tea Party. Then, last year, the Croup descended on the land and the Tea was delayed. And now I’m just not feeling the Annual Tea this year. Usually the weather changes and I start planning how I can invent Pud-Pie-Flan (a flan stuffed in a pie stuffed in a pudding).
This leaves me with one other Holiday Tradition (tradition!), and that is the yearly Vain Attempt at Memorizing the Hanukkah Prayer for my Friend of the Jewish Persuasion, or Friend#3 for short. Latin was easy. Hebrew is freaking hard.
I’ll probably start with my yearly study of BNL’s Hanukkah Blessings which contains the prayer sung in Hebrew. You would think that would make it easier to memorize, but I think my brain gets hung up on the right-left brain switch. Much like trying to say the alphabet without lapsing into the Alphabet Song.
Hebrew is really really hard. HARD! I’ve failed at this the last three years. I can do the first line, but after that Friend #3 corrects my pronunciation every other word so that I never get through it. By “b’mitzvosav” I start to stutter. I think she’s putting me through her own little shiksa Bat Mitzvah.
8 responses to “Fun With Hebrew”
Go ahead and sing it at her! You can claim to be a cantor.
“Shiksa Bat Mitzvah” — It has a nice beat, Dick, and you can dance to it.
Hebrew IS hard! I studied biblical Hebrew for 2 years at Notre Dame as part of my Theology degree. Just remember: This language is more guttural even than German. There is a LOT of spitting and harsh sounds at the back of your throat. and no consonant can be said without a vowel immediately following it – which is gotten away with because the SH and the TH are both letters by them selves. and. They keep changing their minds as to how things are pronounced. The word for “and,” “vav,” was pronounced “waw” until the 70s. and any word written with that letter thusly changed from W to V. So crazy.
Bring the phlegm, baby!
~~Silk – I can’t sing. That’s why I play the guitar.Christy – I hear Shiksa Bat Mitzvahs may be opening for The Incestuous Pandas on Friday night.Marcia – Whoa – Latin switched from w’s to v’s (not only because “wini widi wici” sounded stupid) in the Middle ages, wasnt it? So Hebrew went from v’s to w’s in the 70s? That is messed up. I’m asking Friend #3 about that. I bet she doesn’t know.Friend #3 -Hey, did you know about that?
Wow. I admire you. I have a hard enough time with English!
I know that s’s went to t’s. Sukkos became Sukkot; Shabbas became Shabbat – WTF? As someone who only learned Hebrew prayers by rote, I can’t speak to the etymology. So I’m not sure what’s up with v’s and the w’s, although I wonder if that has something to do with the first language of the speaker (e.g., my grandmother pronounced w’s as v’s in English–“Welcome” was pronounced “Velcome”–but Yiddish/Russian were the only languages she knew before taking off on foot for America at age 15).Supposedly both pronunciations are valid.
Sue – Well, we’ll see how well or poorly I do next Friday. Friend #3 – Indeed, WTF (or is it VSF?)