User talk:Guedalia D'Montenegro

Feel free to leave me messages on this page.Guedalia D'Montenegro 20:54, 7 December 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Vanashuba

Thanks for your message (on my talk page): I wonder what the Pereira/Cardozo "grammatical rule" was. Did it have anything to do with the fact that the shevá of "venashuba" has a meteg (ga'ya) and therefore requires extra emphasis? If so, this might be related to my explanation. The root cause of the whole vocal shevá/hataf patahh confusion is the fact that in Arabic there is no distinction between "a" and "e": so Babylonian Jews (and maybe others) pronounced patahh, segol and vocal shevá as /æ/ (like the a in "cat"), as Yemenite Jews do to this day; and this also explains the Aleppo Codex's convention. So if the S&P pronunciation of vocal shevá oscillates between a and e (it is certainly never the indistinct sound of English "the", as in Ashkenazi and Israeli Hebrew) this is highly significant. Any further thoughts welcome. --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) 17:41, 15 February 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, the sheva = schwa that pervades most modern Hebrew dialects is apparantly of Sephardic origin (A. Dotan, The Diqduqe hatte`amim of Aharon ben Moshe ben Asher, p35).

The Massoretic grammarians ruled that sheva is pronounced like a full vowel before a guttural, similar to the vowel of the concerned guttural; like a hiriq before yod; like a patah elsewhere. Where a metheg/ga`ya preserves emphasis of sheva in the last of these cases, there would indeed be little or no difference with a hatef-patah. The occasional examples of hatef-patah replacing an expected sheva-na` vary between manuscripts, and Dotan suggests that in these instances, hatef-patah was intended to convey to the less knowledgeable reader the same information thar sheva + ga`ya did for the Massoretic scholars.

I assume that our va-nashuba dilemma involves one such occasion of manuscript variation between (1) expected sheva-na` + ga`ya and (2) a foolproofed vocalization with hatef-patah (maintaining the traditional Massoretic proununciation to this day among those using this manuscript version).

— חנינא

Sir Myles: Perhaps you can help me with a particular S&P pronunciation. One of the Piyutim read over Kippur is the Adir veNaor. In the S&P of New York, the first line is pronounced as follows - Adir veNaor/Bore Dok vaChAled. The Hebrew word Chaled is actually written with two segol's. One would expect it to be pronounced vaCheled. Most other Sephardic rites pronounce "cheled" not "chaled". Any insight? Guedalia D'Montenegro 06:02, 1 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Interesting, I'd never heard of this, as I've never been in New York over Kippur (and in London it is indeed "cheled"). "Chaled" would be a valid pausal form (like "tif'aret" in the last haftarah blessing, or "ha-gafen" as we are careful NOT to say over wine). I think the reason is that Mishnaic Hebrew had forgotten about pausal forms altogether and this was reflected in the liturgy; then, from the Renaissance on, there was an attempt to make prayer-book Hebrew conform with the rules of the Masoretes, which led to an inconsistently carried out reinstatement of pausal forms, more prevalent in some rites than in others. The various homiletic explanations of why we do or do not do this (such as that "ha-gefen" is really in the middle of a sentence, as it is concluded with "Amen", or that it is a quotation from the longer blessing "al ha-gefen ve-al-peri ha-gefen") are of course completely ridiculous. So I can only suppose that in New York there was once a cantor who decided to "correct" the line in question. I wonder what they do in Amsterdam?

Another marginally relevant factor is that in Arab Jewish pronunciation (Yemenite, and the older Babylonian though not current Iraqi) "patach" and "segol" were completely assimilated, as in Arabic there is no distinction between the two. This vowel was normally æ as in "cat", but after emphatics and gutturals became like the vowel in "cup". From that point of view, "cheled" would be simply impossible to say. But I doubt very much that this is the explanation, as it would take a very convoluted route for this quirk to reach New York. --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) 09:03, 1 October 2007 (UTC)[reply]

I've found it! In 'Hochmat Shelomoh Martin Rodrigues Pereira explains that, in the Torah, in the Amsterdam tradition, vocal sheva is pronounced "a" when written with a ga'ya. In other words, the "e" pronunciation represents the neutral sound. When there is a special emphasis, making a neutral sound impossible, it reverts to the etymologically correct rendering as patach. (This ga'ya must not be confused with the meteg in the syllable before the sheva, which simply makes the sheva vocal rather than silent). Ve-nashubah is a quotation from a Biblical verse (Lamentations I think), so the ga'ya question is relevant. Still can't help on chaled I'm afraid. --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) (talk) 12:17, 23 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Frahang-i Pahlavig

Thanks for your input at Frahang-i Pahlavig. I've tried to work it (and other words) in as an example, could you please check if I've done it right? Thanks -- Fullstop 09:35, 11 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you for your encouragement. I am not an Aramaic scholar, I was just trying to help in a small way. I think your chart was a nice addition. Where did you get the "Malik" pronunciation? In keeping with the other examples - it should be Malkah. (God is sometimes referred to in Aramaic as "Malka d'Alma" or King of the World.) I imagine that if the Aramaic word for king is prounouced "Malik" by some, then the same dialect would pronounce "dog" as "Kalib." My suggested pronunciation is basically from "Jewish Babylonian Aramaic," There are many other dialects and pronunciations - See, Aramaic for more. Good luck with your edits! Guedalia D'Montenegro

Quite right. malik was a mistake (its Arabic/Perso-Arabic), malka(h) is correct. I'm not sure about the -ah termination though. That would imply a long /a/ (ā), which in turn suggests a trailing aleph. Is that how it is written in Aramaic? -- Fullstop 11:31, 14 May 2007 (UTC)[reply]

In earlier versions of Aramaic, the -a termination is the definite article: thus "malkh" is a king, and "malka" is the king. Admittedly by Talmudic times the definite form had become almost universal, and the indefinite form survives only in semikhut. The question is which stage of Aramaic was the formative influence on Pahlavi. --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) 08:33, 13 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Dor Daim

The paragraph in question was written by me, to counteract the somewhat simplistic impression given on Dor Dai websites such as www.chayas.com that the S&P are "the other Rambam Jews" in every respect: I was saying that there is no official line and the reality is more complicated. I'd be interested to know where you think it is inaccurate. (I'm not saying this rhetorically: perhaps it really does contain inaccuracies, and if so I would like to learn about them.) The external link is not spam: it goes to Hakham Oliveira's site (also linked to from the S&P article), and the point was that he comes a little nearer the Dor Daim perspective but still not all the way. Admittedly it takes some searching in his site to find relevant material, and the link is there mainly to show who he is. --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) 08:33, 13 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Sources:

"Spanish and Portuguese Jews admire Maimonides and identify with the Golden age of Jewish culture in Spain." Gubbay and Levy "The Sephardim", passim

"However, they cannot be classified as "Rambamists" in the sense required," i.e. as claimed by www.chayas.com

"as their religious law is based squarely on the Bet Yosef of Joseph Caro." Gaguine, Keter Shem Tob, passim

"It could even be argued that they follow Caro more closely than any other group," Deduction from what precedes and follows

"as many other Sephardim regard Isaac Luria as having equal or even greater authority than Caro." I imagine this is the part you are querying. This is largely a matter of impression; but I remember an essay by a rabbi on the web, since removed or archived, justifying the Ben Ish Hai for ruling that the blessing on Shabbat candles should be said after lighting, instead of before as required by the Shulchan Aruch, and citing several sources with this clear implication. (Other common Mizrahi practices, such as the hazan saying "Yebarechecha" before the kohanim, also reflect this assumption.) It has since been rebutted by one of Ovadia Yosef's acolytes (I haven't got the reference to hand, but it is footnoted in the Sephardic Judaism article), but it remains true that the precise balance between Caro on the one hand and Luria/Ben Ish Hai on the other is one of the hot issues dividing different Sephardi/Mizrahi communities and traditions.

If you really think this unsubstantiated, the sentence could be changed to read something like: "It could even be argued that they follow Caro more closely than any other group, given that other Sephardim sometimes follow usages derived from Isaac Luria in preference to those in the Shulchan Aruch". Shabbat shalom. --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) 15:37, 13 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your last message. I agree totally. My point could even be put negatively: "given the almost total absence of halachic scholarly activity in S&P communities, on the rare occasions when questions of religious law crop up they end up following Bet Yosef by default!" Obviously the liturgy is a special case, as it is a matter of local custom in all communities, and no liturgy in use today follows simply the written sources of halachah and nothing more. --Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) 08:31, 16 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Spain tag

Did you know that the last time this tag was added to the S&P article, it was done so by a bot? One function of the SatyrBot is to add the Spain and Basque tags to the talkpages of "selected" categories! —חנינא

Check it

Leo Jung is credited with steering shuls "back to Orthodox Judaism" from "Conservative" Judaism! Sounds a bit circular, no? —חנינא

Critical method in Talmud

I re-edited the critical method section and left several comments on the Talk Page. I'm uncertain which areas are appropriate to expand on in the article under discussion?Wolf2191 03:22, 22 July 2007 (UTC)[reply]

BCE

Congrats son, you're a polemicist. —חנינא

Dr. Joe Kaminetsky

must've been sleight-of-hand, as there probably were just as many Ivy PhD's with semicha then as there are now, that is, a mere handful. But soooo what? —חנינא —Preceding comment was added at 16:26, 7 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Talmud

Hello! We might make a seperate article on Burning of the Talmud (EJ has one) or something to that effect to focus on the medieval period.

As far as contemporary attacks, Neither of the two quotations really serve the purpose. I would imagine Hermann Stracks book (He would carry more weight since he wasn't Jewish) would have good material. Given the sort of comments we've had, It might be better to go through each accusation seperately (Yeshu, Gezel Akum,etc.) together with refutations showing the distortions. What do you have in mind?Wolf2191 15:44, 9 November 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Tania Nami Hakhi, En Hakhi Nami

What you say about the halakhic midrashim is true, Rebbe. But this is what made me do it:

For many months I have been reading or even editing that section, and never noticed until now that it implicitly denied the existence of other collections of baraitot, e.g. mesekhtot ketanot, Melekhet ha-Mishkan, Heikhalot Rabati and Zutarti, and perhaps even Sefer Yetzira. The section said that other than the halakhic midrashim and tosefta, "other baraitot are known only in the form of quotations within the talmud."

The reason none of us noticed this is because the focus of the section is (appropriately) on baraita as relevant to the talmud itself, and we intuitively felt that this suspect clause was correct when applied to the average non-tosefta baraita contained in the talmud. I still feel that most such non-tosefta talmudic baraitot are of the "tosefta style," i.e. parralel to the mishna, as opposed to the other types I've listed above. To my knowledge, no collection of such non-tostefta "tosefta-style" baraitot remain.

Note that I have not removed reference to the halakhic midrashim in the section, so a major objection to my changes is somwhat limited. But I did refrain from adding discussion of the other collections of baraitot I mentioned here and in the Edit Summaries, as I believe it would overburden a point that is already tangential.

Loaremos a muestro Dió donde guardamos su fiesta —חנינא

Sure, I got your meaning, as I indicated in my Edit Summary by noting the applicability of your wording to many cases, esp. the "mesiv" form (e.g. mesiv Abaye [le-Rava] etc.). But in the interest of better generalization, I thought better to omit the word "Amoraic." Lav davqa B?

—חנינא

Why is it that Jewish-related articles that were once halfway decent always turn out just unreadable, like this (oral law)? —חנינא (talk)

Odessa, Ukraine/Russian Empire

You wrote: Dear Sir, In the article about Waldemar Haffkine you reverted an edit changing Ukraine to Russian Empire. You called the change "vandalism". Why? The person who changed Ukraine to Russian Empire was correct. Hafkine was born at a time when Odessa (and the Ukraine) was a part of the Russian Empire. It would not have political independence until later. I am not particularly interested in which link is used in this article, but, I am concerned at the ease of which you labeled the earlier change as "vandalism". There is plenty of vandalism in Wikipedia but this was not such an example.Guedalia D'Montenegro (talk) 03:00, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

Vandalism was my initial reaction, but on reflection that was probably not the correct word. I do believe, though, that it it is geographically inaccurate to refer to someone born in Odessa in the late 19th Century as having been born in Odessa, Russian Empire rather than Odessa, Ukraine. Over the centuries, Odessa has passed from a Nogay tribal city to being occupied by the Ottoman Empire (for about 250 years), the Russian Empire (for about 125 years), and the Soviet Empire (for about 80 years), before finally becoming a city in independent Ukraine. Where a city has repeatedly been subject to conquest or passed from one empire to another, are we to change its geographical name based on its passage from one empire to the next? If so, Warsaw was the fourth leading city in the Russian Empire during the same period when Odessa was the third leading city in the empire. Are we to refer to those born in Warsaw in the late 19th Century as being from Warsaw, Russian Empire? Similarly, Prague was politically incorporated into Nazi Germany during the Third Reich, but it would be an insult of the highest order to refer to a Czech born in 1939 Prague as being from Prague, Germany, or Prague, Sudetenland. The same with the names of cities that have temporarily changed for reasons having to do with conquest or imperial transitions. Should we refer to someone born in St. Petersburg, Russia in 1975 as having been born in Leningrad or St. Petersburg? The same with Stalingrad/Volgograd. Accordingly, vandalism may have been the wrong term, but I believe Odessa, Ukraine is the correct nomenclature to be applied here. Cbl62 (talk)

Hyam Maccoby

Take a look here. To tie it all in, he's responsible for contributions to other good work. —חנינא (talk) —Preceding comment was added at 06:58, 2 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Trope Trainer

Yes, I believe the cantillation signs are Tiberian. They may well be even older than the Tiberian pointing. חנינא (talk) 00:28, 2 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Spanish and Portuguese Jews

Where's that discography then? ... Sir Myles na Gopaleen (the da) (talk) 15:35, 8 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Amen

Oh snap, here we go again. חנינא (talk) 21:09, 31 July 2008 (UTC)[reply]

On your Halachic Rules posting in the "Amen" article, I agree with you, but with reservations. The halachic minuitae you pointed out are cluttered (randomly it appears) around the article and need to be dealt with. However, I believe that is the right page to put those minutiae. Perhaps someone should arrange them in one part of the article, or even create their own place within the article if necessary. 75.49.9.225 (talk) 04:41, 7 November 2008 (UTC) 32Lex22[reply]

I hope you don't mind me interjecting that I thoroughly disagree that the halachic rules are cluttered, and certainly that they are done so randomly. Effort was taken to layout the halachot in a comprehensive and flowing manner, beginning with basics and extending to minuitae. DRosenbach ^{(Talk | Contribs)} 05:37, 25 February 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Torah she-be-`al peh

Good luck, that's a less than mediocre article you're up against, and the Defenders of the Faith haven't even returned yet to the scene. But your work has improved the readability markedly. חנינא (talk) 04:42, 23 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

LXX is a version

Conspiracy theory rears its head once more. חנינא (talk) 00:01, 27 October 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The golden age of hazzanut

Did you know that Abraham Lopes Cardozo was one of the famous cantors of the 20th Century's postwar period? חנינא (talk) 14:48, 13 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Well he was a famous Hazan, and he was from the Post WWII era. However, somehow, I don't think that his type of Hazzanut is what is being referred to in the Golden Age article. Strange - I wonder who put him in there?Guedalia D'Montenegro (talk)

I haven't gone through the history of that article, but I assume it was put there by Cardozo, who initiated the Rev. Cardozo article. חנינא (talk) 17:54, 15 March 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Rashash

Please have a look when you have a moment at the Rashash disambig page. Your expertise in both Sefardic and Ashkenazic studies and your confirmed impartiality in all matters Judaic and Hebraic can only help to inform a discussion that has grown all too acrimonious.חנינא (talk) 16:04, 10 May 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Talk:Amen

I make no attempt whatsoever at refuting every single one of Manson's points (which would be an Augean task), but the way he tossed off the word "plagerism" definitely rubbed me the wrong way, sorry... AnonMoos (talk) 18:55, 15 February 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Early JTS

There's some evidence that JTS in its early days was really quite close to normative Orthodox yeshivoth. Someone did a previous version of the OU and JTS articles that overdid the JTS traditionalism, even into the Schechter era. I thought that was blatant revisionism, so I nipped that. Dovid (talk) 00:35, 23 March 2010 (UTC)[reply]

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