Re: The status of the glottal stop in Hebrew

On Jul 8, 2004, at 3:23 AM, Dan Sulani wrote:
> On 8 July, Steg Belsky wrote:
>> In Hebrew, "chumash" (with |ch| = /x/|/X\/ as in most common
>> transliterations), means 'one of the five books of the Torah'.
>
>     Yes, it does. But "Chumash" also refers to
> a single bound volume containing all five books together.
>        Since "chumash" comes from the Hebrew word for
> "five" (/xameS/, or more properly, since it starts with
> the letter "hhet" /HameS/ ), it's likely, IMHO,
> that this was the primary meaning and that the meaning
> of "one of the five books"  was derived by extension.
> Dan Sulani

So you're saying that the basic meaning of "hhumash" is _hhamishiya_
('set of five') and not 'fifth'?


-Stepen (Steg)
  "Nothing that happens is ever forgotten,
   even if you can't remember it."
      ~ zeniba, 'sen to chihiro no kamikakushi'
                       ("spirited away")

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