Tuesday, January 11, 2011

Parshat Beshalach

I've been known to read the parsha online when between assignments at the office. Here's another parsha comment that I sent to my husband after an online reading:

כא וַתַּעַן לָהֶם, מִרְיָם: שִׁירוּ לַיהוָה כִּי-גָאֹה גָּאָה, סוּס וְרֹכְבוֹ רָמָה בַיָּם. {ס}
21 And Miriam sang unto them: Sing ye to the LORD, for He is highly exalted: the horse and his rider hath He thrown into the sea. {S}


Note the grammatical construction of the Hebrew:  "lahem"
Last I heard, that would be the masculine form of the third person plural.  In other words, Miriam sang to the entire camp, not just to the women.  So much for Kol Isha.*
[ ¶ ]
Update: DovBear chimes in. I recommend that you follow his links.

  • *Kol Isha (literally, "a woman's voice): the prohibition against a man hearing a woman sing, observed to varying degrees within the Orthodox community.
  • Mechitzah (too lazy to format this link for the comment section.)

7 Comments:

Blogger BrooklynWolf said...

To be fair, the word "VaTa'an" doesn't mean "and she sang" but rather "and she answered."

The Wolf

Tue Jan 11, 04:36:00 PM 2011  
Blogger Shira Salamone said...

Sigh. BrooklynWolf, you just *had* to go rain on my parade.

:)

Actually, I've always wondered about the various translations of the various forms of the verb "la-anot." It's often translated "sing/sang," yet I thought that "la-anot" meant "to answer," and my pocket Oxford Hebrew-English dictionary confirms this translation. This verb also appears in the siddur/prayer book right before "Mi Chamocha," a quote from this parashah, and it's translated "sang" there, too. Nu, what gives?

Tue Jan 11, 04:46:00 PM 2011  
Anonymous rivkayael said...

You didn't mention the even bigger scandal that those women were dancing without a mechitza. ;)

Tue Jan 11, 05:13:00 PM 2011  
Blogger The Reform Baal Teshuvah said...

Brooklyn Wolf - I have yet to encounter a situation in which any answer that starts with the word "Sing!" is not itself sung.

I can only conclude that Moses and Miriam were precursors to Donny and Marie.

Wed Jan 12, 06:02:00 PM 2011  
Blogger Shira Salamone said...

Another wiseguy heard from. :)

On a serious note, so to speak, er, sing, :), Miriam did answer "Shiru laShem. . . Sing to G-d. . ." So, all kidding aside, you do have a point, Reform BT.

Wed Jan 12, 06:07:00 PM 2011  
Blogger BrooklynWolf said...

Brooklyn Wolf - I have yet to encounter a situation in which any answer that starts with the word "Sing!" is not itself sung.


http://tinyurl.com/6euhu7 :)

The Wolf

Wed Jan 12, 06:08:00 PM 2011  
Blogger Shira Salamone said...

Thanks for the link, Brooklyn Wolf. Just about all video (YouTube, MySpace, etc.) and social-networking sites are blocked at the office, so I watched this at home. I assume that Shatner would have sung this song if he could sing. :)

Thu Jan 13, 01:48:00 PM 2011  

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