From: F66204@BARILVM.BITNET (Shaul Wallach)
Newsgroups: soc.culture.jewish
Subject: Re: Who are the Haredi?
Date: 26 Jul 92 16:09:56 GMT
 <92202.130102F66204@BARILVM.BITNET> <1992Jul23.230228.4743@almserv.uucp>
Organization: Bar-Ilan University Computing Center, Israel

In article <1992Jul23.230228.4743@almserv.uucp>, gaujxl@samhain.fnma.com (Jacob
Lifshitz) writes in his analysis of the word "haredi":

>Let's start with some gramatical definition:
>1.  shem-to'ar - adjective, can be of different types, quantitive, qualitive
>                 an relational.
>                 e.g. quantitative: rav (many)
>                      qualitative: naki (clean)
>                      relational: ivri (of the Hebrew people)
                                                ^^^^^^^^^^^^^
     Notice here that the "relational adjective", as Kobi calls it, is
formed by adding a yud to a *noun* (in this case, a proper noun).

>2.  bei'no'ni - a form that describe the object's action or state. The first
>is
>                bei'no'ni po'el (which erroneously is called present tense)
>and
>                the second is called bei'no'ni pa'ul.
>                e.g. bei'no'ni po'el: ani shomer (I gaurd)
>                     bei'no'ni pa'ul: sha'on sha'vur (broken watch)
>
>As the comment for bei'no'ni indicates, I mayself always considered it
>present,
>tense but as can be seen from the definition, the bei'no'ni is actually is
>a form of an adjective.  So in our discussion, HARED (or the way I would type
>it cha'red) is an qualitative adjective describing the action as in: ani
>cha'red le'go'rali (I fear for my fate)
>
>However there is also a relational adjective which describe an association
>to a group.  While the book I have does not give the rule how to form the
>relational adjective all the examples indicate the addition of the yud for
>the singular bei'no'ni.  That is how we get cha're'di.  Some more examples
     ^^^^^^^^ ^^^^^^^^^
>of the relational adjective are: i'ro'ni (urban, of group of people who live
>in the city), ye'ru'shal'mi, iv'ri a'ra'vi, etc.

     This is precisely the error that was cited in the "derivation" of
"haredi". In all the examples Kobi gives, the yud is being added to a
*noun*, NOT to a singular bei'no'ni or to an adjective:

      i'ro'ni (urban) from ir (city, although we could quibble about
            the extra syllable "on" in the middle)
      ye'ru'shal'mi from Yerushalem
      iv'ri from Ever (great-grandson of Shem, son of Noah)
      a'ra'vi from Arav (Arabia, the place or the country)

The only valid way I know to add a yud to an adjective (or beinoni)
is to put a nun in the middle. For example:

      tordani (annoying) from tored (beinoni of tarad, to annoy)
      hakhmanit (clever, feminine) from hakham (wise)

In the first example all four forms tardan, tardani, tordan and
tordani are found in Alcalay's dictionary. I would guess that
only tardan and tordan are grammatically "correct". In all cases,
the feminine form ends in -it. In the second example, Alcalay
gives only hakhman as the masculine form.

>So in conclusion, cha'red is correct if you refer to the state of fear one is
>in, however you shoud say cha're'di in order to indicate that a man belong to
>the group that makes up the cha're'dim.

     This was one of the proposed derivations of the word, but it
doesn't mean the word is "correct".

>>     It could also be that people did not like the sound of the
>>singular "hared" and therefore added a final yod. We see this
>
>nonsense

     Perhaps; this "derivation" was also a guess just like the
previous one. But if so, how do you explain the obviously
incorrect "sabba`i" which follows?

>>usage in other words as well. For example, "painter" in Hebrew
>>is correctly "sabba`" (s is sadi and ` is `ayin), exactly the
>>same form as "naggar" ("carpenter"), but everyone says today
>>"sabba`i". Similarly,
>
>Although it may be hard for me to convey it in eglish, the above book make a
>clear distinction between chak'lay (the last syl. rymes with the english word
>my) which is the which is the noun: ha'chak'lay o'ved ka'she (the farmer works
>hard), and chak'la'ee (like in employee) which is the adjective: mar cohen
>chak'la'ee (Mr. Cohen is a farmer).

     This paragraph needs correction. First of all, the adjective
"chak'la'ee" (it should really be written haq'la'ee' since it's
spelled with a het-quf at the beginning) means *agricultural*,
not "farmer". Both forms are derived from the Aramaic haqal (field).
The first form has the same kind of suffix as in the word shammai
(appraiser, also the name of the famous Tanna), from the root shum
(to appraise). The mem is doubled just as in the forms naggar and
sabba`, and the final yud is added to make up a trilateral "root".
A better example of this would be bannai (builder) from bana (to
build), where the final yud comes from the final he in the root.
My guess as to the reason why the final -ai appears in haqlai
even though the root already has three letters is that the
form with the doubled second letter (naggar, etc.) doesn't
appear in Aramaic, or perhaps the coiners of the word in Modern
Hebrew wanted to stress the occupational aspect of the term.

     In any case, the first form (haqlai) can in no sense be
construed as a final yud being added to a noun or beinoni. It
is best viewed as a modified "bannai" type where the yud takes
the place of a final root letter and the ql take the place
of the doubled second root letter.

    The second form, haqla'i, can indeed be regarded as a
relational adjective discussed above. I find the extra,
consonantal alef before the final yud hard to explain, but
it looks like a construction of Aramaic origin.

    In any case, however, neither form bears any resemblance
to the erroneous "sabba`i". This word has an `ayin as the
third letter of its root, and unless it is being mispronounced
as an alef, there is no way the form "sabba`i" can be derived
in analogy to "bannai", etc. In the Mishna only "sabba`" is
found.

>I hope that the above lengthy explanation showed that things are not choosen
>by chance but has a real grammer behind it.
>
>kobi

     Very true. But let's abide by the real grammar, not by the
corruptions thereof!

Shalom,

Shaul
Newsgroups: soc.culture.jewish