Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Yigal Levin <leviny1 AT mail.biu.ac.il>]

Isaac Fried wrote:

> I looked up TWOT and saw that he suggests that XALAH [of the famous
> rhyme: I baked a little xalah, I baked it by myself, I put it in the
> oven, I put it on the shelf,...] is some kind of bagel or pretzel
> since its name implies that it is 'pierced'.
>
> Isaac Fried, Boston University


Shavua Tov Isaac,

The fact that the what we call Xallah today is a sweet braided loaf does not 
mean that the Xallah used in the Temple looked the same. While there are 
other theories about the original meaning of the word Xallah (the Arabic 
cognate, for example, means "sweet"), this one is certainly possible.

Do you know that our Matzah, with its rows of holes and its cardboard-like 
hardness, is a fairly modern invention? Have you ever seen a traditional 
Yemenite or Samaritan matzah? They look much more like what is now called an 
Iraqi Pita (the big soft kind without the "pocket".

Yigal Levin