Re: Abbreviation systems (was Re: Hello everybody)

On Tue, 26 Mar 2002 11:49:09 -0600 Danny Wier <dawier@...>
writes:
> | Steg Belsky scripsit:
> | > ST"M "Stam" [stam], short for (if i remember correctly) Seifer
> (Torah)
> | > Tefillin Mezuza.
> | Is this connected with the "stam" that means "Just because" or
> "That's
> | the way things are"?
> No, this is a form of Hebrew script reserved for sacred writings,
> i.e. Torah
> scrolls, and the _tefillin_, small scrolls with a particular passage
> written and
> encased in a mezuzah, which is commonly affixed to doorposts of
> Jewish homes (in
> lieu of the lamb's blood from the story of the Exodus and
> Psach/Passover).
> It's a bold script with small decorations (forgot the name) on the
> tops of
> letters that resemble flames, and there are metrical rules about how
> each letter is written.
> ~Danny~
-

just a bit more information for the others reading this...
Tefillin are small leather boxes with little scrolls inside them of
certain biblical passages, that are placed on the head and arm generally
during morning weekday prayers.  the English word for tefillin is
"phylacteries", which is a pretty useless word since because as far as i
know phylacteries means just 'tefillin' you might as well just say
'tefillin'.
A Mezuzah contains i think either all of the same or some of the same
passages as the tefillin do.  I don't remember ever hearing of a
connection between them and the blood on the doorposts-and-doorroof from
the Exodus;  as far as i know the blood was what's called a "commandment
of the moment", while the mezuzah is a "commandment for [all]
generations", which comes from places in the Torah where it says "put
these words on your gates".

the passages put in the tefillin and mezuzah are those that refer to
those specific commandments.

i think the little smitchiks on top of the letters are called _tagin_ or
_tagim_, but i'm not sure.  certain letters have them, and certain ones
don't.

Hmm... Ob[ligatory]Conlang ~  does anyone have a conlang script with
specific variants used for different uses, for instance secular/holy,
business/personal, etc.?  or like Japanese, which uses its two
syllabaries for different uses?  If i remember correctly, Hiragana is for
grammatical affixes, and Katakana is for names and foreign borrowings.


-Stephen (Steg)
 "i'm only happy when it rains!"
 (well, not really... it's just a song, you see...)

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