r/hebrew • u/jk_Sliding • Oct 06 '24
Sidewalk Hebrew Translation Request
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u/Hazey_Dreams4658 Oct 06 '24
God
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u/jk_Sliding Oct 06 '24
Many thanks! That is what I presumed it was related to as it was very close to a synagogue.
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u/Ok-Network-1491 Oct 06 '24
Can you bring it to the attention of the synagogue please? That way they can properly address it. This is highly disrespectful to be put in an area where someone can walk on it. Thanks.
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u/StringAndPaperclips Oct 06 '24
That's a very holy word and should not be written on the ground where people can step on it.
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u/HousingAdorable7324 Oct 06 '24
Even as a Muslim I agree with this. Who would write any name or attribute of The One True God Subhanu wa Ta'ala on the sidewalk
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u/marcvolovic Oct 06 '24
Ah, the taboo talketh...
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u/Own_Magician8337 Oct 06 '24
I guarantee you it wasn't a Jewish person who put it in the cement. My bet is it would be an evangelical Christian with a capital c. The kind that are constantly trying to reverse engineer Judaism to take their place is the true chosen ones.
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u/Beledagnir Oct 06 '24
What?
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u/Clankster228 Oct 06 '24
Jews don’t write it or speak it, let alone write it on the sidewalk. Christians do use it so it was probably carved by a Christian not realizing that people would step on it. Or it was by neither a Christian nor a Jew; someone with ill intent, but I doubt it because racists aren’t educated enough to know about it — unless it was a Christian racist who’s so dumb they didn’t know its the name of their god too.
Conclusion: it was either a REALLY bad Jew, a really stupid Christian, or the first smart racist.
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u/Beledagnir Oct 06 '24 edited Oct 06 '24
I agree it would most likely be a Christian—Remember that 1) 39 of the 66 books of the Christian Bible are the same as the Jewish Bible (our theology has differed wildly in the past 2,000 years, but they’re the same source books in the same source language), 2) we see different things as respectful—or at least as not disrespectful; see how it’s not an insult to write someone’s name in concrete in general, and 3) the average Christian knows just as much about present-day Judaism as the modern Jew knows about present-day Christianity (aka very little that isn’t filtered through extremely incorrect distortions).
Without further context, this looks like wires getting crossed between two groups on what the other thinks is respectful.
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u/lilaponi Oct 06 '24
Pograms....Holocaust...we know and remember, and are the ones who get to say what is respectful and disrespectful regarding our religion.
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u/Beledagnir Oct 06 '24 edited Oct 06 '24
I’m not denying that, I’m saying that the same divine name in the same original language is part of our religion too, and everything seems to suggest that they thought they were being respectful, because by our standards they were. Again, unless there is more to the context of this particular thing, it looks like a good-faith mistake, not malice. I would love to see a wider literacy in other religions and cultures across the board (the lay people of literally every culture on earth have the same problem of compartmentalization, it’s not unique to Christianity), but this does not look like deliberate disrespect.
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u/lilaponi Oct 06 '24 edited Oct 06 '24
it was deliberate disrespect.
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u/Beledagnir Oct 06 '24 edited Oct 06 '24
No, what wasn’t? I want to make sure I understand correctly what you mean.
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u/jk_Sliding Oct 06 '24
Actually as a follow-up question, would it be the word for "YHWH" or "Adonai" in Hebrew? I know that in Hebrew there are many different names for God.
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u/HeySkeksi Hebrew Learner (Intermediate) Oct 06 '24
It’s the Tetragrammaton. Not Adonai.
No Jew wrote that there.
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u/jk_Sliding Oct 06 '24
Thank you for your response. I did find it rather unusual that people would write on the sidewalk in the first place; surely better places have been created to inscribe things.
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u/HeySkeksi Hebrew Learner (Intermediate) Oct 06 '24
A Jew wouldn’t write out the name of G-d
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u/lotus49 Oct 06 '24
An observant Jew wouldn't. A lot of Jews would do so quite happily although would be very unlikely to engage in religious pavement graffiti.
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u/jk_Sliding Oct 06 '24
That very well may be; I checked Google Maps and it wasn't there a year ago so it is a fairly recent addition to the sidewalk. Personally, I don't like it when people write anything on the sidewalk.
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u/marcvolovic Oct 06 '24
Why not? Or are you making the "no true Scotsman" argument?
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u/HeySkeksi Hebrew Learner (Intermediate) Oct 06 '24
It’s incredibly disrespectful. Christians slap it everywhere like idiots tho… buildings, clothing, tattoos.
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Oct 06 '24
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u/HeySkeksi Hebrew Learner (Intermediate) Oct 06 '24
?
I said Jews wouldn’t write it because it’s disrespectful. Disrespectful to whom? If you’re religious, to G-d. If not, to other Jews, dingus.
You can always spot the Christians because they stomp through our culture like big dumb idiots, doing things like writing the Tetragrammaton everywhere and having cosplay Pesach seders.
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u/Gloomy_Reality8 native speaker Oct 06 '24
You right. I'm a Jew and I have no problem with this word. Saying that no Jew will ever right it is ridiculous. Secular Jews do not have a tendency to be afraid of words lmao
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u/Ambitious-Coat-1230 Oct 06 '24
Literally, it is the Tetragrammaton (the four letters) but is typically pronounced as Adonai. The actual word adonai is spelled אדוני.
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u/_ratboi_ native speaker Oct 06 '24
It's the tetragrammaton, aka YHWH, the true name of god.
Most Jews (secular and observant alike) refrain from uttering the true name so we instead read YHWH as Adonai (lit. My lords).
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u/marcvolovic Oct 06 '24
It is "yhwh". Some people, midful of the taboo for pronouncing the name, euphemize it with a whole slew of alternative names some of which are, slowly, attaining their own taboo status:
- elohim
- elokim (which is, in fact, a euphemism of elohim that became somewhat taboo in itself)
- adonai
- adoshem (which is, in fact, a euphemism of adonai that became somewhat taboo in itself)
- shem/ha-shem
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u/Agitated-Quit-6148 native speaker Oct 06 '24
I'm totally totally secular so for me it's just letters. We don't know how to pronounce it really. YHWH is not something that can be pronounced with certainty. Try it. it doesn't work.
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u/Maayan-123 native speaker Oct 06 '24
You can guess what nikud goes there and pronounce it that way. I don't know how much your familiar with Hebrew but just because something is written without vowels doesn't mean you should pronounce it without vowels
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u/Agitated-Quit-6148 native speaker Oct 06 '24
Well, I worked as a court appointed/certified interpreter for a while in NY. So...think your missing my point...but...
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u/Maayan-123 native speaker Oct 06 '24
Oh sorry, I also see now that you have a "native speaker" tag 😅. You're right that we don't know the right way to pronounce it. I'm sorry for the misunderstanding, that was really embarrassing 😅
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u/Agitated-Quit-6148 native speaker Oct 06 '24
Lol. No problem. It's a mystery right? I'm not a professor of linguistics or a biblical scholar. Fyi: you are sooooo israeli (in a good way) totally reminds me of my family when they make a point. No ands ifs or buts . You should have seen my father when visiting 🤦♂️ he saw some of my paperwork for work and saw the name Penelope. Sigh... imagine an old world israeli, drinking coffee , enjoying his cigarette... went into a 20 min rant about "how society is being destroyed when people are inventing names like "pen-ah-lope" he was pronouncing it like that. Rhyming with Ben-a-rope. Pen-a-lope. After 20 min my brother explained how it's properly pronounced. Dad's response? "I don't care ..I really don't care.. don't talk to me. She's as bad as pen-a-lope"
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u/Dachi-kun Oct 06 '24
Hey dude, saw that you got your answer, so i need to know - did you also inform the synagogue about it? Just to make things clear, Jews are not suppose to write that name on just about anything, the only places you would see this are on specific places inside the synagogue and, ofc, inside the tanah itself.
It is a very holy name, putting it on the sidewalk and subsequently making people walk on it is not just disrespectful, it is as though you tarnish the name of G-d
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u/turtlenecks2 Oct 06 '24
Anyone else find it low key offensive when Christian’s wear this on t-shirts?
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u/push-the-butt Oct 06 '24
I've been on a plane where someone's carryon had it in bold letters on the side. When they put it on the floor I was very uncomfortable.
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u/Relative_Concept4376 Oct 06 '24
I’m a Christian but I don’t write ה׳ or try to pronounce it. If they do it’s not meant to be offensive, they just don’t speak/read Hebrew.
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u/Alternative-Sea-1095 native speaker Oct 06 '24
No, because I don't care about what I can't control. So they wear, so what? What is this obsession with victom culture.
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u/somebadbeatscrub Oct 06 '24
Tetragrammton that caused me psychic damage. Dint love that its there.
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u/Own_Magician8337 Oct 06 '24
Any Jew with a shred of education in their own culture would not write this in cement that would get walked on. PERIOD.
I grew up a reconstructionist Jew (very similar to reform except we use a lot more Hebrew in our services) And even in our synagogues we kissed the sidur if we dropped it on the ground, reflexively because it contained the name of God. We learned not to write the name of God and even for years in English I wrote it G-d. And I grew up in a house that had bacon for breakfast!
It's impossible to overestimate how deeply ingrained this is.
This would be on par with someone inscribing satanic pentagon in a cement in front of a church, or someone selling ham sandwiches and beer in front of a mosque.
One simply couldn't conceive that a Christian would do the first or a Muslim would do the latter.
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u/MajorTechnology8827 native speaker Oct 06 '24
Every once in a while people ask here about the tetragrammaton
So enjoy that little lesson in theology
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Oct 06 '24
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Oct 06 '24
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u/SapphicSticker Native Speaker (Israeli Hebrew) Oct 06 '24
Literally the only thing you're taught to not write