Purim thoughts and anticipations

[debka_notion]

1. shirei_shibolim, you might enjoy knowing that I got a few compliments on my megillah trope (aka, your megillah trope)this morning- because the etnakhta and sofei-pasuk are actually easy to distinguish from each other. People seemed to find this unusual.

2. Why the heck isn't Vashti held up as a model of good tzniusdike behavior (aren't they always looking for good biblical role models for religious girls?), rather than being cast as a villainess? What would people have wanted Esther to do in the same situation? I keep thinking that someone should dress up for Purim as Vashti by wearing a chador... (Even if I still get a kick out of the idea of her turning green and growing a tail...)

3. Steve brought really exciting hamentashen to minyan this morning for Rosh Hodesh. It was a pleasant surprise, and rather inspiring on my part.

Comments

[tovaks.livejournal.com]

What was so exciting about the hamentashen? Was it special in some way?

[debka-notion.livejournal.com]

She had exciting fillings- chocolate spread, chocolate with raisins, I forget which unusual jelly, and that jelly with white chocolate chips.

[sovevuni.livejournal.com]

Agree about Vashti. I always found it strange that she's so neglected in all Purim festivities.

[shirei-shibolim.livejournal.com]

The shul where I grew up always made her into a feminist icon in the Purim spiel. It wasn't uncommon to follow up on her later in the story and find that she's much happier without her man-child drunk of a husband.

[agru.livejournal.com]

I ALWAYS dressed up as Vashti. Any woman who had the wherewithal to say "f you" to a husband who wanted her to dance naked is a-ok in my books!

[fleurdelis28.livejournal.com]

Why the heck isn't Vashti held up as a model of good tzniusdike behavior (aren't they always looking for good biblical role models for religious girls?), rather than being cast as a villainess?

Because she wasn't Jewish, and her misfortune benefitted the Jews? (I'm not saying that's a good reason, but it seems to be the usual reason for attributing no good motive ever to a Biblical character, in spite of all support in the text. I suppose the more charitable interpretation would be that people assume that since bad things happened to her, she must have had major faults for which she was being punished.)

[shirei-shibolim.livejournal.com]

What about Bil`am?

[fleurdelis28.livejournal.com]

What about him?

[shirei-shibolim.livejournal.com]

He wasn't Jewish, he suffered a misfortune that benefited the Jews, and we don't think all that poorly of him, relatively speaking. We quote him right when we walk into a synagogue!

[fleurdelis28.livejournal.com]

You've never seen the midrashim about how he never had a good motive in his life, everything he does that looks like it might be honorable was actually a sneaky, underhanded tactic with evil intentions, and he slept with his donkey?

[shirei-shibolim.livejournal.com]

Hence the qualification of my statement. I believe a rabbi associated with your home synagogue cited some alternate midrashim about him in a sermon a few years ago, the gist being that he was a great prophet who wasn't so good at perceiving worldly things as they were.

[fleurdelis28.livejournal.com]

Interesting. Did I tell you that?

My point, though, is more about popular interpretations rather than possible ones. I seem to recall the Artscroll commentary is pretty clear on his never having had any good motive ever.

[shirei-shibolim.livejournal.com]

Beware the assumption that Artscroll has chosen a representative or popular opinion, as opposed to one that fits their worldview.

[fleurdelis28.livejournal.com]

Let's just say that between owning an Artscroll chumash, reading the Midrash Says, and going to a Jewish day school, I had no inkling of how sympathetically Bilam is actually portrayed until I went and objectively read the biblical text.

[fleurdelis28.livejournal.com]

(And I hadn't even heard the donkey thing.)

[debka-notion.livejournal.com]

Funny- I got a sense from my childhood bible stories that Esav and Ishmael were supposed to be lousy characters, even though the actual text doesn't suggest so much of this (something I found out a bit in high school), but never got a bad sense of Bilaam.

I also don't know why I feel compelled to write his name with two a's, or why whatever text I learned the name from felt that need. Just to make it look even odder than most transliterated/"translated" names in the Bible?

[fleurdelis28.livejournal.com]

On the latter count -- me, too. I repressed it because I couldn't think of a good reason, but it was my instinct.

[thevortex.livejournal.com]

Note that Vashti is a villainess only to the Persian monarchy. Her story highlights the chauvenism and debauchery related to said monarchy and Persian entertainment, and further elucidates the low position of women in that society. This makes it all the more incredible that Esther (who never danced naked before the king) beat the system and saved the Jews (a "lowly" woman did such a heroic deed).

Huzzah!

The Vortex

[fleurdelis28.livejournal.com]

But then, all the text says is that the king wanted her to appear wearing her crown and demonstrating her beauty. For all we know, that could have meant dressed in full royal regalia (a more usual way to show off one's queen), and she just told him to get lost because she was ornery, or maybe just tired -- at that point, she'd been drinking and partying for seven days, too. If you want to go with the midrash (I assume it's a midrash) that she refused because he was asking her to appear naked, there are plenty of other midrashim about how she was the true heir of the evil Persian monarchy and he was just a stableboy she married, and she deserved what she got because she wouldn't give her Jewish attendants time off when their children were sick. (No, really, that was what I was taught in second grade.)

For that matter, how do we know that Esther never danced naked before the king (as opposed to before the king and everyone else)? After all, she was married to him.

[thevortex.livejournal.com]

The point here is the low stature of women. The rest is honestly extra.

The Vortex

[fleurdelis28.livejournal.com]

I always wonder, though, how low women's stature could really have been (in the popular mind if not in the political laws) if it was possible for the queen's telling off the king to ignite an empire-wide rebellion of women that could only be thwarted by emergency legislation. Actually, Esther is the only facially docile or compliant woman in the whole Megillah -- the women of the court get their own seven-day drinking party, and Haman's wife speaks her mind.

[thevortex.livejournal.com]

Where does the queen tell off the king? Last I checked, the king sends a letter telling the Jews that they may fight back.

The Vortex

[fleurdelis28.livejournal.com]

I was referring to Vashti. When did Esther's behavior threaten to ignite an empire-wide rebellion of women?

[thevortex.livejournal.com]

Not sure that Vashti's did either. That was more what the vizier's feared.

The Vortex

[fleurdelis28.livejournal.com]

Yes, but when a group's status is really and customarily abyssmal, there's usually not so much concern about their getting ideas because of one incident, however high-profile. That usually tends to indicate that there are other grounds for concern, or an iffier balance of power.

Also, women's status has never, to my knowledge, prevented a beautiful woman that everyone likes from persuading her husband not to exterminate her people for no good reason, particularly not when there are multiple drinking parties and an overconfident courtier involved. (Not to imply any lack of appreciation for Esther's consumate political skill.) That's totally working within the system.

[shirei-shibolim.livejournal.com]

Look closely at the conversation between the king and Mehuman in the first chapter: Ahashverosh feels threatened by Vashti. She basically questioned the size and virility of his Golden Scepter just when his six-month kegger was starting to get good, and totally ruined the buzz. I think much of Ester is about the power that women have over men, even if they lack it in any official sense.

[orawnzva.livejournal.com]

In "The Somewhat True Tale of Robin Hood", every time "the evil Prince John" is mentioned, the merry men shout "boo! hiss!", whether or not they are onstage. I can't help but feel that this is somehow relevant.

I'll be bringing the graphic novel (http://www.megillatesther.com/) to BORG this evening for you and others to peruse. It is very shiny, and very, very twisted — as befits the story, of course.

Also, shameless-but-relevant self-promotion: lyrics (http://www.sccs.swarthmore.edu/users/01/bnewman/songs/lyrics/Masquerade.txt) and MP3 (http://www.sccs.swarthmore.edu/users/01/bnewman/songs/music/Masquerade.mp3) of "Masquerade".

[margavriel.livejournal.com]

1. Yes, it is rare to find Estêr trop that clearly distinguishes between ethnahto and silluq (what you call "sôf posuq"). I try to make the latter slightly slower than the former.

2. Because the Megillo comes out of a society which seems to have viewed disobedient wives as being worse than women who are willing to display themselves as sex objects.

3. Homentashen? Feh. Real Jews have slivovitz, or scotch, or vodka, on Rôsh Hôdhesh Adhor.

[thevortex.livejournal.com]

And we fake Jews have sparkling cider. =P

The Vortex

[debka-notion.livejournal.com]

1. Yes, I'm being terribly informal about trope names. It's a journal- I'm permitted.

2. Yes, but I'm talking about it from the perspective of modern Jewish life, and perhaps also from that of earlier variations of Jewish life and ideals.

3. Hamentashen are tastier, smell better and won't leave you going to class drunk. I think they win hands down. But this is a matter of opinion.

[nuqotw.livejournal.com]

There's a gemara somewhere that says Vashti wouldn't parade her goods because she grew a tail. That seems to suggest that in her apparently usual luscious state, she had no problem parading about for all the folks from Hodu to Kush.

I may well be quoting the gemara out of context; if I am someone please correct me.

[debka-notion.livejournal.com]

I mentioned said gemara in my entry- although I've not learned it myself. And I suppose in that view, she wouldn't be a relevant role model. But why is that gemara there? It sounds like the rabbis having a good time, a bit- you know? A prime example of the Rabbis being human, including having a sense of humor, as one of my teachers is always trying to point out.

[nuqotw.livejournal.com]

So you did mention it.... and I did not read well.... (I'm in the bad habit of skimming everything and reading little :( )

I'm not sure why it's there; but the gemara in general has a tendency to meander to aggadata (sp?) and it has a whole bunch of it on megillah. It probably meanders there because it's easier to compile books full of Aramaic than it is to admit that a lot of Tanakh makes no sense.

[shirei-shibolim.livejournal.com]

Glad people like the trope, though I can't claim to have made it up or anything. It's rather similar to what Binder recorded in Biblical Chant, including the distinct strong disjunctives.

Were you practicing in front of someone, or just celebrating Purim early?

[debka-notion.livejournal.com]

We were talking after minyan about the assignment of megillah readings and someone complained about Esther trope's lack of distinction between etnakhta and sofei-pasuk/sillukim (or whatever the appropriate plurals are, my current language classes are making me almost slightly nostalgic for Arabic plurals, if such a thing is possible), and I was confused, since as I know the trope, they're darn different. I mentioned as much, was complimented on said difference and the trope in general, and got a compliment from one of the current gabbayim on how much he likes my trope, for that same reason.

[shirei-shibolim.livejournal.com]

I think it would be siluqin and etnahata, but don't hold me to that. Arabic would probably do something like sulqaat, just to be ornery.

Aramaic plurals

[margavriel.livejournal.com]

If we wanted to use the absolute state, it would be סִלּוּקִין and אֶתְנְחָן. If we wanted to use the emphatic state, it would be סִלּוּקַיָּא and אֶתְנְחָתָא.

In Jewish Babylonian Aramaic, and most subsequent dialects of Jewish Aramaic, there would be no difference in meaning between the various states. However, Lawrence is correct that the more commonly used forms in JBA would probably be סִלּוּקִין and אֶתְנְחָתָא (or, perhaps better, אַתְנְחָתָא). In Targumic Aramaic, of course, the state proper to the syntax of the sentence would be used.