Re: Pronunciations (was Re: Jews for Jesus)

On 2008-01-03, Eliyahu <lrooff@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Jan 3, 9:27 am, Tim Meushaw <meus...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

I've been wondering about pronunciation a lot lately. Being still
relatively new, I lack some of the "background" for how it's changed
over the years. Is it pretty much confirmed that an undotted tav used
to be pronounced thav? I only say "used to be" since all the Israelis
and Sefardim I know pronounce it as "tav" (even those natively from
Arabic countries), and Ashkenazim apparently changed it to "sav" when
they couldn't say a "th" (my mother-in-law was born in Romania, left
when she was a toddler, and to this day still can't say "th" easily).

So I was wondering a couple of things, really:

1) Is this pronounciation different one that "everyone knows" but the
majority ignores? Since I have no background, every once in a while I
get surprised when someone, for example, knows exactly how to pronounce
an ayin, but then they never actually do so.

2) Can arguments be made for reverting to an original pronunciation,
rather than using one that's evolved over the centuries to what's used
in different communities now?

At what point would we decide that the pronunciation was "original"?
To use English as an example, since more of us are familiar with its
evolution, would we revert to the English of George Washington, of
Shakespeare, of Chaucer, or of the early Middle Ages?

Are those really different pronunciations? In those cases, it's
almost an entirely different vocabulary, like Aramaic reverting to
Hebrew or something. But the spellings are still the same, aren't
they? (my Chaucer is a bit rusty; I thought the difference there
was vocabulary, but I could be wrong)

3) If such arguments can be made, and if it's confirmed that this WAS
the way everyone always used to pronounce these letters, why isn't more
effort made to have everyone revert? Does it simply boil down to
family or community minhag that some say shouldn't be changed?

More essentially, how could anyone confirm with certainty that the
people of a particular era pronounced everything in a particular way?

True, we don't have recordings. That's partly what I mean by my
questions on arguments that can be made. Take anectodal evidence, for
example (which may not be the right term): there's a Mishnah that says
to extend the dalet in Shema Yisrael ... Hashem echaD. That's taken
as evidence that that dalet couldn't be a simple "d" because one can't
extend a "d", and so we (in general) extend the a in echad to
compensate.

The one that really struck me was how many times Hebrew words, when
translated to English, end in "th" instead of "t" or "s," such as the
organization B'nei Brith. I've also seen it used in shuls or
yeshivot, such as Tifereth Torah. The non-Jews, in their translation
of the bible, is littered with "th"s that the majority of Jews don't
pronounce as such today. Another example is the city Gomorra, which
starts with ayin; why spell it in English with a g rather than start
it with o?

(These are all examples that have come up here in the past, I think,
so apologies if I'm rehashing old history for anyone, but it's still a
concern of mine so I thought I'd broach the topic again)

Tav/Thav/Sav is the most common example of this type of change, but
the loss of Ayin amongst Ashkenazim, and other dotted letters such as
Daleth, are other examples I was wondering about.

If we're all able to understand each other and the meanings of the
words don't change, what difference does it make? Language is not a
museum exhibit. Rather, it's a tool for communication. Either it
works or it doesn't work. If it's working, why try to "fix" it?

For communication between people, that's true. But Hebrew is also
regarding communicating with Hashem. Sure, He'll understand whichever
pronounciation, or language, but if we're not trying to pray in the holy
tongue, presumably with a holy pronunciation, why do some of us make an
effort to pray in Hebrew instead of a common translation?

Tim

--
Timothy A. Meushaw
meushaw@xxxxxxxxx

.

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