[Lexicog] Hutzpah / hutzpe

[Dr. Hayim Y. Sheynin]

To the Lexicography listeners.
 
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The word hutspah (from the root het-tsade-peh) is of Aramaic provenance.
In Hebrew texts of the Rabbinic period it is frequently interchenged
with the segolate noun |hotsef| In the written language it occurs for
the first time in Mishnah treatise Sanhedrin 101,105 [about 3rd cent.
B,C.) and Aramaic Targum to Jeremia 3:3 (about 1st cent. C.E.) It is
generally translated by German Frechheit (insolence, impudence,
effrontery, audacity). In the most ancient occurancies it is said mostly
on relation of man to God. In the case of Jeremia it is about impudence
of a street woman. In the ancient period this was pretty rare word.
However when it was adopted in modern Hebrew and especially in Yiddish,
the usage was drastically increased, but all the meanings of Frechheit
prevailed in relation not only to God, but to also other man or society,
The meaning of daring was adopted in time of borrowing the word as
Yiddishism in American English, but even increased following publication
of a famous book of the same title by Alan Dershowitz, the Harvard
professor of Law and an advocate of civil rights..
The regular modern Hebrew meaning is 'insolence'. (Check G. Dalman,
Aramaeisch-Neuhebraeisches Handwoerterbuch, Frankfurt a. M., 1922; Even
Shoshan, 1960, v.1)
For German I used an older spelling replacing the Umlaut with e after
the effected vowel.
 
NB. By the way, it is of interest to the linguists, how the word changed
the category of gender.
Hutspa in Aramaic is spelled with aleph after letter peh. In Aramaic
this is a definite state of a noun of masculine gender (in Hebrew =
ha-hotsef), but Hebrew speakers hear the stress on the last syllable and
imagine regular he at the end, which is an ending of feminine gender
(exactly like -a in the Latin first declension Nom.Sg., e.g. silva,
puella, patria), so in modern Hebrew they write it with he at the end
and consider the noun of feminine gender.
 
Hayim Y. Sheynin  
 
 
Dr. Hayim Y. Sheynin
Adjunct Professor of Jewish Literature
Gratz College
7605 Old York Rd.
Melrose Park, PA 19027
 
Tel.: 215 635-7300 x 161
Fax: 215 635-7320
email: hsheynin at gratz.edu
 
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