perekh and parochet

The two Hebrew words, פֶּרֶךְ perekh and פָּרֹכֶת parokhet, look like they should be related. But are they?

The word פֶּרֶךְ appears six times in the Tanakh. Twice it describes the enslavement of the Israelites in Egypt, three times in Vayikra in laws prohibiting harsh treatment of Israelite servants, and once in Yechezkel, in the prophet's criticism of the leaders of Israel.

For example, we read:

וַיַּעֲבִדוּ מִצְרַיִם אֶת־בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל בְּפָרֶךְ
"And the Egyptians made the Israelites work with harshness."
(Shemot 1:13)

The word פֶּרֶךְ is an abstract noun, and in every biblical occurrence it is preceded by the preposition ב־. The phrase בְּפָרֶךְ therefore functions adverbially, describing how the work or rule was imposed. It is commonly translated "harshly," "ruthlessly," or "with rigor."

Some translations make the meaning more specific. Robert Alter translates the verse, "And the Egyptians put the Israelites to work at crushing labor," and explains that he understands the word according to a root meaning "to break into pieces" or "to pulverize." Everett Fox similarly has "with crushing-labor," following the early rabbinic interpretation.

These translations capture one important understanding of פֶּרֶךְ, but "labor" is not actually contained in the word פֶּרֶךְ. It is supplied from the context. This becomes particularly clear in Vayikra, where בְּפָרֶךְ modifies the verb רדה, "to rule," rather than עבד, "to work." So a translation such as "with harshness" or "with severity" more closely reflects the grammatical form of the word.

The interpretation reflected by Alter and Fox has a long history. Rashi explains פֶּרֶךְ as עבודה קשה המפרכת את הגוף ומשברתו, hard labor that breaks down the body. And the root פרך is indeed used in later Hebrew with the meaning "break, crush, crumble." Klein defines it as "to break, crush, rub, grind, crumble." Related words include parikh פָּרִיךְ, something brittle or crisp, and hifrikh הִפְרִיךְ, which in modern Hebrew means "to refute," as in the sense of breaking down an argument.

Not all scholars, however, understand פֶּרֶךְ from the idea of crushing. Hayim Tawil compares it with Akkadian pirku and pariktu, words associated with “harm, wrong, injustice.” On that basis, בְּפָרֶךְ may originally have meant something like “with injustice” or “with ruthless oppression,” rather than “with crushing force.” The Encyclopaedia Mikrait likewise discusses Akkadian evidence connected with coercion and oppressive labor. To support this, Tawil quotes Rambam (Hilkhot Avadim 1:6), who writes that perekh indicates labor that is unnecessary, i.e., unjust/unjustified.

Parokhet is built on the same three consonants as perekh.  The פָּרֹכֶת was the curtain in the Mishkan separating the Holy from the Holy of Holies:

וְהִבְדִּילָה הַפָּרֹכֶת לָכֶם בֵּין הַקֹּדֶשׁ וּבֵין קֹדֶשׁ הַקֳּדָשִׁים
"...The parokhet shall separate for you between the Holy and the Holy of Holies."
(Shemot 26:33)

In later Jewish usage, parochet also came to refer to the curtain placed in front of the Torah ark in a synagogue.

The meaning of פָּרֹכֶת seems fairly easy to explain. A number of scholars compare it with Akkadian parāku, meaning "to lay across, block, obstruct, shut off." Akkadian also has pariktu, meaning a barrier, wall, curtain, or obstruction. That fits the function of the parokhet very well: it lay across the sanctuary and blocked both access and view.

Cassuto on Shemot 26:3, for example, writes that פָּרֹכֶת comes from a root פרך whose original meaning was "to close, shut." Kaddari similarly derives it from the root corresponding to Akkadian parāku, "to block a road." The Encyclopaedia Mikrait and TDOT also give this as a major explanation. TDOT notes that the curtain "functioned as a barrier obstructing access and view."

So it's not really a question as to what פָּרֹכֶת means. The debate is whether the פֶּרֶךְ of Egyptian slavery belongs to the same root.

Some dictionaries say no. BDB distinguishes two roots פרך. One is behind פֶּרֶךְ, "harshness, severity." The other is related to Akkadian parāku, "bar, shut off," and is the source of פָּרֹכֶת. Klein appears to make a similar distinction. He lists פֶּרֶךְ among the derivatives of the root meaning "break, crush, rub, grind, crumble," while his entry for פָּרֹכֶת instead compares Akkadian parāku, "to go across, bar."

In this approach, the resemblance between פֶּרֶךְ and פָּרֹכֶת is a coincidence. They represent two different roots that just happen to have the same consonants.

Other scholars are more willing to connect them. HALOT places both פֶּרֶךְ and פָּרֹכֶת under the same presumed, reconstructed root *פרך. The comparative evidence includes a surprisingly broad group of meanings: crushing and rubbing on the one hand, but also blocking, obstructing, violence, and injustice on the other. The word פָּרֹכֶת is explained as something that "blocks off, separates," while פֶּרֶךְ is associated with violence and oppressive servitude.

Kaddari likewise brings Akkadian parāku, "to block a road," into his discussion of both words, while also citing related forms meaning cruelty, rubbing, and pressing.

The Ben-Yehuda dictionary offers perhaps the most interesting attempt to connect them. It takes the older meaning of פרך to be "close, lock, confine." It then suggests that עֲבוֹדַת פֶּרֶךְ originally referred specifically to the labor of slaves who were confined or imprisoned. It describes them as עבדים כלואים, imprisoned slaves.

According to this interpretation, the connection of פרך with פָּרֹכֶת becomes quite solid The parokhet is something that shuts off a space; perekh may originally have described the forced labor of people who themselves were shut in.

So this leaves us with three main explanations of פֶּרֶךְ.

One sees it as deriving from "break, crush," the interpretation found in traditional Jewish commentary and reflected in modern translations such as Alter's and Fox's.

Another connects it with "block, shut off, confine," which would make פֶּרֶךְ and פָּרֹכֶת two derivatives of the same root. The Ben-Yehuda dictionary's suggestion that perekh referred to the labor of imprisoned slaves is the clearest version of this view.

A third understands it primarily in terms of injustice, violence, or ruthless treatment, based particularly on the Akkadian evidence emphasized by Tawil.

These meanings may seem far apart, but the Akkadian evidence itself makes the picture less tidy. Forms in this group can refer to obstruction and barriers, but also to violence and injustice. That may explain why HALOT is comfortable treating them as one broad etymological family, while BDB and Klein prefer to separate them.

So while פָּרֹכֶת is very likely connected with the idea of blocking or shutting off, the origin of פֶּרֶךְ remains less certain. It may refer to labor that crushes, labor imposed with ruthless injustice, or, as the Ben-Yehuda dictionary suggests, labor carried out under confinement.

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tovel

The verb טָבַל taval appears 16 times in the Tanakh. In almost all of them, it means "to dip, to immerse" (something in a liquid). In one verse, however, it means to immerse oneself:

וַיֵּרֶד וַיִּטְבֹּל בַּיַּרְדֵּן שֶׁבַע פְּעָמִים כִּדְבַר אִישׁ הָאֱלֹהִים וַיָּשׇׁב בְּשָׂרוֹ כִּבְשַׂר נַעַר קָטֹן וַיִּטְהָר׃

"So he [Naaman] went down and immersed himself in the Jordan seven times, as the man of God had bidden; and his flesh became like a little boy’s, and he was pure." (Melachim II 5:14)

The use of the kal form taval to describe ritual dipping in water is familiar from Talmudic and later Hebrew (along with the gerund tevila טְבִילָה - "immersion.") But in rest of Tanakh, the verb rachatz רחץ is used for such bathing. In fact, in the same story of Naaman, we find use of rachatz in the previous verse: רְחַץ וּטְהָר - "bathe and be pure."

Since in Rabbinic Hebrew taval generally referred to ritual immersion of a person in a mikveh, the other forms of the verb (absent in biblical Hebrew) were added for the dipping of things like food in liquids. Perhaps most famous of them is the dipping done at the Pesach seder. One of the four questions refers to it, and it also appears in the Mishna (Pesachim 10:4). The two most common versions of the question read today ask:

 שֶׁבְּכָל הַלֵּילוֹת אָנוּ מַטְבִּילִין פַּעַם אַחַת, הַלַּיְלָה הַזֶּה שְׁתֵּי פְעָמִים

"On all other nights we dip [our food] once; [however] on this night we dip twice."

Or alternatively:

שֶׁבְּכָל הַלֵּילוֹת אֵין אָנוּ מַטְבִּילִין אֲפִילוּ פַּעַם אֶחָת – הַלַּיְלָה הַזֶּה שְׁתֵּי פְעָמִים.

"On all other nights we do not dip [our food] at all; [however] on this night we dip twice."

I won't get into the question about which account of normal dipping is accurate (see Safrai's commentary for a discussion). But I do want to point out that the verb for dipping here is מַטְבִּילִין matbilin - in the hifil form. However, in many manuscripts of the Haggadah and Mishna we find the verb in the piel form: מְטַבְּלִים mitablim. Both piel and hifil here are transitive verbs - describing dipping something else. I haven't seen evidence that there was a distinction between them in Talmudic usage. Yet, they are clearly distinct from the common meaning of tovel: ritual immersion of a person in the mikveh.

These distinctions continued throughout Medieval Hebrew, but in Modern Hebrew, there is a return to the biblical usage. While taval in a religious sense can still refer to ritual immersion, it is also used for dipping of food in liquids or sauces. The hifil verb, הִטְבִּיל hitbil, is generally reserved for the transitive act of ritually immersing someone else in water - i.e., baptism. 

And what about the piel form טִבֵּל tibel? While it does mean "to dip," it seems that it fell out of favor due to the similar sounding תִּבֵּל tibel - "to spice, flavor, season." While Hebrew can handle homonyms, in this case both words not only refer to food, but specifically to adding something else to food, which would be confusing. So by returning to the biblical taval, the distinction between dipping and seasoning remained clear.

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shaka, shkiah, and sheka

The Hebrew root שקע shaka means "to sink [down], submerge, depress." It only appears six times as a verb in the Tanakh, and once more as the noun מִשְׁקָע mishka in the phrase מִשְׁקַע־מַיִם, meaning "settled [literally 'settling/sinking of'] water" in Yechezkel 34:18.

However, the uses, forms, and derivatives expanded in Rabbinic, Medieval, and Modern Hebrew. Let's take a look some of them.

While the primary meaning of the kal form of the verb שָׁקַע is physical sinking, we already find in the Torah a more figurative sense. Bamidbar 11:2 says וַתִּשְׁקַע הָאֵשׁ - that the fire subsided, died down.

In Rabbinic Hebrew we find the verb used to describe the setting of the sun - שקע השמש (or שקע החמה). From here we find in Medieval Hebrew the familiar term שְׁקִיעָה skkiah - "sunset" (an abbreviated form  of the longer term שְׁקִיעַת־הַחַמָּה, which is found in earlier Talmudic literature). 

This is also the origin of the modern word שֶׁקַע sheka. It originally could mean depression, indentation, or hollow recess, but today it means electrical socket or outlet, presumably because of the recession it's formed by.

The piel form of the verb, שִׁקַּע, isn't used frequently today. It can mean submerge, but I think הִטְבִּיעַ is more common. However שִׁקַּע does have a scientific use - "to precipitate" and the noun form שִׁקּוּעַ means "precipitation", in the chemical sense of the "sedimentation of a solid material from a liquid solution". But the meteorological version of precipitation - "water that forms in the atmosphere and falls back to the Earth's surface" - is rendered into Hebrew as מִשְׁקָעִים miska'im. That's a form of the biblical word miskha we saw earlier, which in Modern Hebrew now means "sediment, residue, deposit."

The hifil form, הִשְׁקִיעַ, originally was the transitive form of שָׁקַע, and meant "to cause to sink [lower]".  Today, however, it means "to invest." That sense appears in the piel form in Rabbinic Hebrew, for example, in Yerushalmi Shekalim 3:4  כַּמָּה מָמוֹן שִׁיקְּעוּ אֲבוֹתַיי כָאן - "How much money did my forefathers invest here?". This extension of the meaning can be understood by thinking about how "deposit" can mean both "to put down" and "to invest." (You can also "sink your money" into something.) At some point in the Modern period, this usage moved to the hifil form, as noted. The noun, הַשְׁקָעָה hashka'ah - means "investment." In colloquial Hebrew, the adjective מֻשְׁקָע mushka means "well-made", something that someone clearly "invested" a lot of effort in.

The hitpael form, which is usually more intensive, is הִשְׁתַּקֵּעַ hishtakea. It has a few different meanings. According to Morfix, they include: 

to settle, to put down roots, to establish a permanent residence ; to immerse oneself (in an activity)

Klein adds the post-biblical sense of "sank into oblivion, was forgotten."

This form might be most familiar from the Pesach Haggadah:

וַיָּגָר שָׁם. מְלַמֵּד שֶׁלֹא יָרַד יַעֲקֹב אָבִינוּ לְהִשְׁתַּקֵּעַ בְּמִצְרַיִם אֶלָּא לָגוּר שָׁם

"And resided there: From this, learn that our father Yaakov went down not to permanently settle [לְהִשְׁתַּקֵּעַ] in Egypt, but only to reside there [for a time]."

I was curious as to why the verb לְהִשְׁתַּקֵּעַ was used here. It's rather uncommon in Rabbinic Hebrew, and I might have expected the more familiar הִתְיַשֵּׁב, with a similar meaning. I couldn't find a commentary on the Haggadah (or the parallel midrash to it), but I have a theory.

In three of the six biblical verses where the root שקע appears (Yechezkel 32:14, Amos 8:8, Amos 9:5), there is a reference to Egypt, particularly the waters of the Nile. 

The same root also appears elsewhere in the Haggadah, in the Dayenu song:

אִלּוּ הֶעֱבִירָנוּ בְתוֹכוֹ בֶּחָרָבָה וְלֹא שִׁקַּע צָרֵנוּ בְתוֹכוֹ דַּיֵּנוּ.

"Had He brought us through [the sea] dry without drowning [שִׁקַּע] our enemies in it, that would have been enough for us."

So perhaps the verb לְהִשְׁתַּקֵּעַ was chosen here because of its association with Egypt and the Egyptians. And the midrash on the verse might be hinting that had Yaakov intended to settle there permanently, his descendants might have ended up just like those Egyptians. 

That might explain why Rambam (Hilchot Melachim 5:8) chose the same verb when describing the halakhic prohibition to settle in Egypt. He first mentions that it is permissible to return to Egypt for trade and commerce, but then notes:

וְאֵין אָסוּר אֶלָּא לְהִשְׁתַּקֵעַ שָׁם.

"It is only prohibited to settle [לְהִשְׁתַּקֵעַ] there."

Later [5:9], when referring to living in other lands, Rambam does not use that verb, rather:

אֲבָל לִשְׁכֹּן בְּחוּצָה לָאָרֶץ אָסוּר

"It is forbidden to reside [לִשְׁכֹּן] outside the Land of Israel."

It seems that Rambam, like the author of the Haggadah, understood the ancient connection between שקע and Egypt.

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tzfardea

The Hebrew word for "frog", צְפַרְדֵּעַ tzfardea, appears 13 times in the Tanakh. All of them are related to the plague in Egypt. Eleven of them are in the book of Shemot during the narrative of that plague, and two are from separate chapters of Tehillim recounting the plagues - Tehillim 78:45 and Tehillim 105:30.

Klein provides the following etymology:

Related to JAram. אוּרְדּעָא, עוּרדְּעָא, Syr. אוּרְדְּעָא, Arab. ḍafda‘, ḍifdi‘ (= frog).

He also points to his entry for the verb ערדע:

to croak; lit.: ‘to make the sound of the frog’. [From Aram. עֻרדּעָא (= frog), which is related to Heb. צְפַרְדֵּע.]

While Klein doesn't say it explicitly, many scholars claim that the origin of tzfardea is ultimately onomatopoeic - it sounds like the sound of a frog croaking (for example, see Encyclopedia Mikrait, entry צפרדע). This is more clearly seen in the Aramaic form urda or the Arabic form dafda, which both sound like a frog. The assumption is that Hebrew might have added a consonant to the Semitic root - either a resh to the version expressed in the Arabic form or a tzade to the one in the Aramaic form, creating a longer word which doesn't immediately carry the association of a frog's croak. The five letters of tzfardea are rare in Hebrew words, which led some scholars to propose that it was borrowed from Egyptian or another non-Semitic language. But since no evidence has been found in those languages for such a word, the onomatopoeia theory is the most convincing.

In his book "Wordplay" in Ancient Near Eastern Texts, Scott B. Noegel describes the use of this onomatopoeia as a literary device in the story of the plague (page 61):

The narrative depicting the plague of frogs offers an extraordinary display of onomatopoeia. Not only do we hear croaking in the very word ְצַפְרְדִּעים ṣǝp̄ardǝʿīm “frogs,” itself an onomatopoeia, we hear it eleven times in only sixteen verses, far more often than the story demands. Three of the consonants in the noun “frog” (p, r, ʿ ) repeat eight times in the title ַפְּרֹעה parʿōh “pharaoh.” Four times we also hear the sounds /r/ and /ṣ/ repeated in ִמְצָרִים miṣrāyīm “Egypt” (Exod 8:2) and ֶאֶרץִ מְצָרִים ʾɛrɛṣ miṣrāyīm “the land of Egypt” (Exod 8:1, 2, 3). In Exod 8:5, Moses asks pharaoh, “do you glorify yourself ( ִהְתָפֵּאר hiṯpāʾēr)?,” using a verb that reverberates the consonants p and r. 

Perhaps surprisingly (considering the parallels in the other Semitic languages), not all scholars identify the tzfardea as "frog", instead proposing the more threatening "crocodile." This is suggested by the description of the tzfardea in Tehillim 78:45:

יְשַׁלַּח בָּהֶם עָרֹב וַיֹּאכְלֵם וּצְפַרְדֵּעַ וַתַּשְׁחִיתֵם׃

He sent against them [Egypt] the horde [arov] to consume them and the tzfardea to destroy them.

A plague of frogs might be disturbing, but they wouldn't fit the word "destroy" here. Saadia Gaon in his Arabic translation to Tehillim therefore identifies the tzfardea with "crocodile" (although not in his commentary and translation of Shemot), and Ibn Ezra in his commentary on Shemot 7:27 cites this opinion before rejecting it in favor of the more common identification with "frog." Other commentaries who mention this approach include Rabbeinu Chananel, Ramban, Abarbanel, and Rabbeinu Bachye.

Frogs seem like a more likely candidate than crocodiles particularly due to the description in Shemot 7:28, where Moshe warns Pharoah that the tzfardea will "enter your palace, your bedchamber and your bed, the houses of your courtiers and your people, and your ovens and your kneading bowls." Frogs could easily swarm into ovens and kneading bowls, but crocodiles obviously could not. Similar imagery is found in Tehillim 105, which says the tzfardea were "swarming" (more appropriate for smaller animals like frogs) in the room of the king:

שָׁרַץ אַרְצָם צְפַרְדְּעִים בְּחַדְרֵי מַלְכֵיהֶם׃ 

R. Samson Raphael Hirsch adds that had the tzfardea been crocodiles, no Egyptians would have survived that plague.

So how should the phrase "destroy them" in Tehillim 78 be understood? Daat Mikra on the verse suggests that "destroy them" applies to the arov [perhaps wild animals] and the tzfardea together. This is supported by the fact that the verb for destroy, שחת, appears in Shemot 8:20 in association with the arov. 

In the description of the plague, sometimes we find tzfardea in the singular, and other times in the plural - צְפַרְדְּעִים. In his commentary on Shemot 8:2, where the singular tzfardea is used, Rashi provides two explanations for this:

There was only one frog, but when they struck at it, it was split into many swarms. This is a Midrashic explanation. But as a literal explanation one must say that the swarm of the frogs is denoted by the singular form. 

He goes on to cite Shemot 8:14, which refers to lice in the singular, also meaning a swarm of lice. Chizkuni adds that we also find a group of snakes referred to in the singular in Bamidbar 21:7.

Further reading:

• "The Frog was a Crocodile" by Prof. Daniel Sperber
• TZEFARDE’A: FROGS OR CROCODILES? by by Rabbi Dr. Natan Slifkin (republished more recently here)
• צפרדע וקרפדה by the Academy of the Hebrew Language

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geula

When we think of the word גְּאֻלָּה geula - we typically think of a divine redemption or salvation, perhaps with a messianic bent. It could be spiritual or it could be physical, but God is the one doing the redeeming.

However, the root גאל - "to redeem" - doesn't have that meaning exclusively. In the Tanakh, we find it frequently referring to redemption by humans: redemption of land, or redemption of other humans (for example, slaves).

For example, in Vayikra 25:25, if an Israelite becomes poor and sells part of his ancestral property, the Torah says:

וּבָא גֹאֲלוֹ הַקָּרֹב אֵלָיו וְגָאַל אֵת מִמְכַּר אָחִיו
“His nearest goel shall come and redeem what his relative sold.”

The goel here is the close relative who has the right, and in some cases the responsibility, to recover property that has left the family.

The same chapter extends this role to a relative who has sold himself into servitude. A brother, uncle, cousin, or other close relative can redeem him.

This is also the background to the role of the goel in the book of Ruth. Boaz is a goel because he belongs to Naomi's family circle. There is an even closer relative who has the first claim, and when he declines, Boaz steps in.

In Ruth 4:6, the nearer relative tells Boaz:

גְּאַל־לְךָ אַתָּה אֶת־גְּאֻלָּתִי כִּי לֹא אוּכַל לִגְאֹל

 "You redeem my geula, for I cannot redeem."

Here גְּאֻלָּתִי does not mean “my salvation.” It means something like “my right [or obligation] of redemption,” the claim that belongs to him as the closer relative.

This helps explain another Biblical expression that otherwise seems quite far removed from “redemption”:  goel hadam גּוֹאֵל הַדָּם.

This is usually translated “the avenger of blood,” the relative who acts in response to the killing of a family member.

Why call such a person a goel?

The answer seems to lie in the role rather than in one specific action. The goel is the relative who represents the family's interests and is authorized to act when something has been lost, violated, or taken away.

Some linguists claimed that this legal sense of restoring family property was the original meaning of the root גאל, and it only later expanded to the divine one we're more familiar with today. However, there are early examples of supernatural redemption. For example, Yaakov says in Bereishit 48:16:

הַמַּלְאָךְ הַגֹּאֵל אֹתִי מִכָּל־רָע

“the angel who redeems me from all evil.”

In addition to the angel mentioned (as opposed to human intervention), there is no land transaction here, no purchase price, and no family property. The meaning is clearly “rescue” or “deliver” in the broader sense.

Sometimes both meanings can overlap. Take Shemot 6:6, where God says:

וְגָאַלְתִּי אֶתְכֶם בִּזְרוֹעַ נְטוּיָה

“I will redeem you with an outstretched arm.”

On the one hand, God is redeeming Israel from Egyptian slavery, in the same way a family member would redeem an enslaved relative. But on the other hand, God is redeeming His people, so this is a case of divine salvation. 

In modern times, we find the same dual meaning. The Zionist project talked about גְּאֻלַּת הָאָרֶץ geulat ha'aretz - literally, "redemption of the land." It describes both a practical project of acquiring and settling parcels of land while at the same time evoking a much larger historical and religious vision.

There is also a second Biblical root spelled גאל, traditionally understood as meaning “defile” or “pollute.” It only appears in 11 verses, as opposed to the 105 verses with the meaning "redeem."

Some scholars try to connect the two meanings (see here), but the widespread approach (for example cited by Klein) is that this second meaning is related to the root געל, also meaning to "defile." (See my post here about how the root געל came to mean "defile" and  "rinse, clean, purify,")

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derech eretz

The phrase דֶּרֶךְ אֶרֶץ derekh eretz appears hundreds of times in rabbinic literature. Literally meaning "the way of the world," it has multiple meanings. Generally, they are divided into these three categories:

• accepted manners, etiquette, and customs
• work, occupation, livelihood
• a euphemism for sexual relations

Shmuel Safrai in his essay The Term Derekh Ereẕ / מובנו של המונח 'דרך-ארץ' and David Flusser in his 'Which is the Right Way that a Man Should Choose for Himself?' (Sayings of the Fathers, 2:1) / 'איזוהי דרך ישרה שיבור לו האדם?' (אבות ב, א) (both in Tarbiz 60, 1991), add another meaning: morally right behavior, not merely "good manners." 

Safrai supports this by the frequent pairing of derech eretz with Torah, and argues that this pairing fits ethical behavior better than the other definitions. Flusser finds parallels to this broader ideal of morality in the ancient Jewish doctrine of "the two ways" that a human must choose - between the way of life and the way of death. This doctrine eventually appeared in the Talmudic tractates Derech Eretz Rabbah and Derech Eretz Zuta.

Take, for example, Avot 2:2. Rabban Gamliel says:

יָפֶה תַלְמוּד תּוֹרָה עִם דֶּרֶךְ אֶרֶץ, שֶׁיְּגִיעַת שְׁנֵיהֶם מְשַׁכַּחַת עָוֹן

"Beautiful is Torah study with derech eretz, for exertion in both of them causes sin to be forgotten."

Rambam and others explain derech eretz here as work or livelihood. Safrai (following the medieval interpretation of Rabbi Yisrael Yisraeli) says it means here good qualities and their realization in action. Among his arguments is the fact that the same mishna continues:

וְכָל תּוֹרָה שֶׁאֵין עִמָּהּ מְלָאכָה, סוֹפָהּ בְּטֵלָה וְגוֹרֶרֶת עָוֹן

"Any Torah without work [melacha] will ultimately cease and lead to sin."

If both derech eretz and melacha here mean work, then there is unnecessary repetition. Safrai gives each clause a distinct function: the first combines Torah with moral action, and the second says that Torah must be accompanied by a livelihood.

However, Safrai accepts the meaning of "livelihood" in other cases, such as Avot 3:5 - עֹל דֶּרֶךְ אֶרֶץ - "the yoke of derech eretz" means a worldly occupation.

Both Safrai and Flusser focus on the phrase דֶּרֶךְ אֶרֶץ קָדְמָה לַתּוֹרָה - "derech eretz preceded the Torah." While later explanations render the phrase in the present tense, "derech eretz precedes the Torah", indicating a sense of derech eretz as a prerequisite for Torah, the original source is a midrash, which emphasizes chronological precedence:

 עֶשְׂרִים וְשִׁשָּׁה דוֹרוֹת קָדְמָה דֶּרֶךְ אֶרֶץ אֶת הַתּוֹרָה

"Derech eretz preceded the Torah by twenty-six generations." (Vayikra Rabbah 9:3)

From this midrash, they learn that all humanity was subject to moral conduct since the days of Adam, long before the Torah was given at Sinai. 

Safrai claims that the original meaning of the phrase was probably "the upright way that all human beings must follow," with work, social manners, marital relations, and morality all becoming aspects of that way.

Flusser proposes that the expression derech eretz was chosen because it described "the way a person must choose on earth." However, he concedes that the word eretz does not appear in the phrases from that early literature. For him, the concept is more of a historical inference than an actual definition.

However, for at least one sense of the phrase, there might be an earlier biblical antecedent. While the actual phrase derech eretz appears in Shemot 13:17 - דֶּרֶךְ אֶרֶץ פְּלִשְׁתִּים - "by way of the land of the Philistines" - that meaning has little to do with our phrase derech eretz. Yet there is a verse where the phrase nearly appears, and is much closer to our understanding. In the aftermath of the destruction of Sedom, Lot's daughters say:

 אָבִינוּ זָקֵן וְאִישׁ אֵין בָּאָרֶץ לָבוֹא עָלֵינוּ כְּדֶרֶךְ כׇּל־הָאָרֶץ

"...Our father is old, and there is not a man on earth to cohabit with us in the way of all the world [ke-derech kol ha-aretz" (Bereshit 19:31)

The daughters are referring to sexual relations with their father, but they are contrasting it with non-incestuous relations - normal human practice, "the way of the world." Euphemistically, derekh eretz was extended to marital relations in general, perhaps most familiar from the Pesach Haggadah:

וַיַּרְא אֶת־עָנְיֵנוּ. זוֹ פְּרִישׁוּת דֶּרֶךְ אֶרֶץ

"And He saw our affliction: this refers to suspension of marital relations."

Rashi and Rashbatz in their Haggadah commentaries tie this midrash to the verse I cited from Lot's daughters.

One last meaning that we haven't yet mentioned is the one suggested by Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch. He identified derech eretz with "culture" and used that sense in his slogan Torah im Derech Eretz, which encouraged integration between Torah and the modern world.

Interestingly, I think that of all these meanings, the one that has persevered into Modern Hebrew is the sense of moral conduct. Other than citations from traditional sources, the senses of culture, livelihood, and marital relations are uncommon. Derech eretz can mean proper etiquette and manners, but it more broadly means acting decently. It's best captured by the Yiddish phrase menschlichkeit - to be a mensch. Being a mensch is essentially being a good human, that same requirement that applies to all people since the days of Adam.

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anah

The root (or perhaps better to say roots) ענה anah is generally said to have four meanings in Hebrew. Klein identifies them as follows:: 

• answer

• sing 

• afflict

• occupy 

Let’s look at each of them and the words deriving from them.

Answer

This includes the senses of “answer, reply, respond”. It’s the most popular use of the verb in Hebrew today. A particular type of response is responding as a witness, i.e., to testify. This is the sense found in the ninth commandment:

לֹא־תַעֲנֶה בְרֵעֲךָ עֵד שָׁקֶר

“You shall not testify against your neighbor as a false witness.” (Shemot 20:13)

Derivatives include: הֵעָנוּת he’anut - “response, consent” and מַעֲנֶה  ma’aneh - “answer, reply, solution.” 

Sing

Klein treats this as a distinct root. Others say that it reflects a form of singing - where one sings, and others respond with a refrain. This distinction can be found in translations of the phrase וַתַּעַן לָהֶם מִרְיָם (Shemot 15:21) describing the song Miriam led after the splitting of the Red Sea. Some translations render it as “And Miriam chanted for them” and others have “And Miriam answered them.”

One derivative of the verb is עַנּוֹת anot - “singing”, which only appears in one biblical verse, when Moshe tells Yehoshua what he hears from the activity around the Golden Calf:

וַיֹּאמֶר אֵין קוֹל עֲנוֹת גְּבוּרָה וְאֵין קוֹל עֲנוֹת חֲלוּשָׁה קוֹל עַנּוֹת אָנֹכִי שֹׁמֵעַ׃

“But he said: Not the sound of the song of prevailing, not the sound of the song of failing, it is the sound of choral-song that I hear!” (Shemot 32:18)

Afflict

Klein provides a number of different meanings for this verb sense: to be bowed down, be afflicted, was low, was humbled, or in the transitive sense, to humble, oppress, afflict, or violate (a woman). In Modern Hebrew, the most common meaning is “to torture.”

It has a number of common derivatives:

• עָנָו anav - “humble, modest”

• עֲנָוָה anava - “humility, modesty”

• תַּעֲנִית ta’anit- “self-affliction, fasting” (today used almost always for religious fasts, with צום tzom being a more general term also used for things like medical fasts)

• עָנִי ani - “poor (person)”

• עֹנִי oni - “affliction, oppression, poverty”

This last meaning is familiar from the identification of matza as לֶ֣חֶם עֹ֑נִי lechem oni, or as it appears in the Aramaic translation in the Pesach Haggadah, לַחְמָא עַנְיָא lachma anya.

The Hebrew phrase appears in Devarim 16:3, in the laws of Pesach:

לֹא־תֹאכַל עָלָיו חָמֵץ שִׁבְעַת יָמִים תֹּאכַל־עָלָיו מַצּוֹת לֶחֶם עֹנִי כִּי בְחִפָּזוֹן יָצָאתָ מֵאֶרֶץ מִצְרַיִם לְמַעַן תִּזְכֹּר אֶת־יוֹם צֵאתְךָ מֵאֶרֶץ מִצְרַיִם כֹּל יְמֵי חַיֶּיךָ׃

JPS translates it as follows:

“You shall not eat anything leavened with it; for seven days thereafter you shall eat unleavened bread [matzot], bread of distress—for you departed from the land of Egypt hurriedly—so that you may remember the day of your departure from the land of Egypt as long as you live.”

Lechem oni is translated here as “bread of distress.” Similar translations by others include the popular “bread of affliction” and “bread of anguish.” These renderings reflect an understanding of the phrase as referring to the distress the Israelites suffered in Egypt (this is Rashi’s approach in his commentary on the verse). Support for this reading can be found in the occurrence of oni, describing the oppression they suffered found in Shemot 3:7, 3:17, 4:31 and Devarim 26:7.

Others say that lechem oni refers to the poor quality or taste of matza, as compared to the better tasting leavened bread. Perhaps aligned with this, Alter translates the phrase as “poverty’s bread.” This is the approach of Bekhor Shor and Hizzkuni.

A slightly different take is offered by Tigay, in the JPS Devarim, who notes that bread of poverty suggests “that it is eaten by the poor or those intentionally deprived, such as prisoners.” He mentions a theory that as such, matza was eaten by the Israelites while they were slaves (see Seforno on the verse), but then rejects it because “eating unleavened bread recalls the haste of the Exodus, not the bondage.” 

In a footnote to his commentary, Tigay sees how this disagreement is reflected in different versions of the Haggadah. In the passage of ha lachma anya, some manuscripts have it as “this is the bread of affliction that our fathers ate in the Land of Egypt” (בְּאַרְעָא דְמִצְרָיִם)  and others read “when they left the land of Egypt” (דנפקו מארעא דמצרים).

Occupy

Here occupy means “to busy oneself.” It only appears in Kohelet, along with its derivative עִנְיַן inyan, such as in this verse:

וְנָתַתִּי אֶת־לִבִּי לִדְרוֹשׁ וְלָתוּר בַּחׇכְמָה עַל כׇּל־אֲשֶׁר נַעֲשָׂה תַּחַת הַשָּׁמָיִם הוּא  עִנְיַן רָע נָתַן אֱלֹהִים לִבְנֵי הָאָדָם לַעֲנוֹת בּוֹ׃

“I set my mind to study and to probe with wisdom all that happens under the sun.—An unhappy business, that, which God gave men to be concerned with!” (Kohelet 1:13)

Here the verb is translated as “to be concerned with” and the noun inyan as “business” However, others such as Ibn Ezra, prefer to translate the verb as “to be afflicted with” and the noun as “task.” 

But even if in Kohelet it means to afflict (a claim I agree with in my book, based on parallels with other biblical texts - see pages 132-133), the meanings “occupy, occupation” certainly do continue throughout later Hebrew. Klein notes that in Talmudic Hebrew, inyan means “matter, subject”, and in Medieval Hebrew it gained the sense “meaning.” In Modern Hebrew it also means “interest” (as in something that draws attention), and from here we get the words הִתְעַנְיֵן hitanyen - “to express interest”, מְעַנְיֵן me’anyen - “interesting”, and מְעֻנְיָן me’unyan - “interested.”

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A possibly related word is עוֹנָה onah - meaning “marital duty, cohabitation” in Shemot 21:10, and later Hebrew “time, period, season.” The etymology of this word is seriously debated, and I won’t get into it in this post. For further reading, see Klein’s etymology, and these essays: Onah: A Husband’s Conjugal Duties? - TheTorah.com  and The Etymology of “Onah” – The Seforim Blog. 

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