[Avodah] hayom yom rishon....

[Micha Berger]

On Sun, Aug 14, 2011 at 11:53:01PM -0400, Zev Sero wrote:
>> Definitely not. The name actually means son of the sun in Sumerian.

> Which part means what?

I thought it was from the Sumerian Dumu+zid = faithful (dumu) son (zid),
which got shortened by the time we got to Bavel to "Dumuzi", the month
being "Dumuzu" = Dumuzi's month. Both became "Tammuz" in Aramaic,
kayadua'.

While the /name/ does not (to my recollection) tell you who Tammuz was
supposed to be the faithful son of, he was thanked when crops were good,
and his reappearance from the underworld was believed to be the cause
of spring and summer. Which might explain why the first month of summer
was allegedly his month.

(Tammuz is part of a long list of parallels: Osiris [Egypt], Baal
[Canaan], Tammuz, Adonis [Phoenicia, then Greece]. All are deities of
rebirth and vegetation.)

...
>> Which doesn't help us much if we don't know what that heter is.

> We don't need to know the heter in order to do the same as they did.

But we don't know the parameters of what they did. Which gods' names
are okay, and which not? And we do know that most usages are assur.

Mordechai went around being called by a tribute to Marduk, Hadasah went
by a name taken after Ishar (Mrs Tammuz, paralleling Isis, Asheirah,
and Aphrodite). Would you deduce from this that it's appropriate to
have little boys running around named Christopher Weiss?

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             The Maharal of Prague created a golem, and
micha at aishdas.org        this was a great wonder. But it is much more
http://www.aishdas.org   wonderful to transform a corporeal person into a
Fax: (270) 514-1507      "mensch"!     -Rav Yisrael Salanter