Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Richard" <aaa AT endlyss.com>]

Yes, had pita dipped humus for lunch. Again for the Jewish Shavuot in a few 
minutes.

Richard Conaway



----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Yitzhak Sapir" <yitzhaksapir AT gmail.com>
To: <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Tuesday, May 18, 2010 6:14 PM
Subject: [b-hebrew] Shavuoth, Cheese, and Humus


> 2010/5/18 Yigal Levin wrote:
> > The festival of Shavu'ot begins tonight at sundown and ends in Israel
> > tomorrow night. The custom of many Jewish communities outside of Israel 
> > is
> > to add an extra day. Besides the usual holiday prayers and meals, many
> > communities hold all-night Torah study sessions, "Torah" in the wider
> > meaning of the study of any Jewish texts, from the Bible to modern. One
> > traditional reason for these all-night sessions is that according to one
> > legend, on the morning of the original Sinai event the Israelites were 
> > all
> > asleep in their tents and Moses had to go from tent to tent pulling them 
> > out
> > of bed. So we don't want to miss out this time around. In many 
> > communities
> > it is also customary to read and to study the book of Ruth, the main 
> > action
> > of which occurred during the harvest-time. Since Ruth is the
> > great-grandmother of David (and thus also the ancestress of the Messiah),
> > Shavu'ot is also considered the anniversary of David's birth and of his
> > death. I'll actually be giving a talk on Joab at our synagogue. Also, 
> > since
> > the Torah is likened to milk and honey, Shavu'ot is also a festival of
> > cheesecakes and other milk dishes. There's a cheesecake in the oven as I
> > write.
>
> In addition to cheese, you might want to consider Humus as well.  Ruth 
> 2:14
> is taken -- at least by various Humus afficionados on the web -- to relate 
> to
> the Humus dip:
> http://humus101.com/EN/2006/10/10/6/ (English)
> http://humus101.com/?p=99 (Hebrew)
>
> What Meir Shalev and the Humus blog haven't noticed is that Homets is
> used as a name for a plant alongside sumac and coriander in Damai 1:1.
> I personally think that "chickpea" is much better suited than vinegar in
> such a context.  (Note, the Aruch of the 11th century comments on this
> Mishnah that it is the small hard sour grapes - ענבים קטנים הקשים החמוצים,
> so it too chooses to read here a plant rather than vinegar, and perhaps
> he is even trying to describe chickpeas).
>
> Vayyiqra Rabba also quotes R' Simon as saying that this is the way of the
> reapers -- to dip the bread in Homets.  Again, IMO, more likely that humus
> is at stake.  (http://www.daat.ac.il/daat/tanach/raba3/34.htm - Hebrew)
>
> But then, you probably have your Humus already prepared.
>
> Happy Shavuot.
>
> Yitzhak Sapir
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