[Avodah] yaroq

[Micha Berger]

On Wed, Mar 02, 2011 at 04:31:52PM -0500, Zev Sero wrote:
> You seem to be assuming that "yarok kekarti" means "very yarok".  That
> is not so.   "Yarok kekarti" simply means "green"; its alternative is
> "yarok kekarkom", which means "yellow"...

Not really... I take it to mean "very green", I just didn't bring in the
English yet because that would presume the conclusion. In fact, the point
of the latter part of that post was to support the argument that Rashi's
description (Shemos 25:4, Chullin 89a) of dam hachilazon as yaroq fits
the "pale sickly yellow green" of a baby whose bris should be delayed,
and thus of the extract from the hypobranchial gland that is used for
that particular candidate for techiles. I would have therefore thought
it clear I meant the exact reverse of how you took me.

It seems pretty clear that pre-modern Hebrew only had three words for
color: adom, yaroq and kachol. So yaroq would run all the way from karkom
(which is saffron, not quite a yellow) to aqua. RSRH notes this, and
then points out that every other seemingly color word really refers to a
specific substance. Tekheiles isn't a color. It's specifically wool dyed
by a specific dye. Similarly argoman. You say "kekarkom", or "kekarti",
so I guess if you wanted to refer to that shade of blue you /could/ say
"ketekehiles" or ke'argaman. But that's using simile, not names of colors.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             The thought of happiness that comes from outside
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