[Avodah] What is the preferable time to say selichos?

[Micha Berger]

On Sat, Aug 28, 2021 at 11:03:33PM +0300, Eli Turkel via Avodah wrote:
>> Who said there is one correct way? Even back in seifer Shofetim different
>> shevatim had different accents. As we know, in Efraim's accent shin
>> and sin have the same sound.

> Doesn't mean Bnei Efraim was right just they couldn't pronounce the
> difference just like some litvaks in the past.

Define "right accent". It's ancient, millennia before the Baalei Mesorah
of Tiveriah and the accent that shaped their choice of nequdos. Litvaks
are the product of moving from culture to culture where the host country's
language didn't always have all the sounds in the Hebrew they had been
speaking. Ephraim was an autonomous entity at that point, the only other
potential influences being a marked enemy and the other shevatim. And
had been so since Har Sinai.

> Even if the Yeminites are correct it is difficult for a non-yemenite to
> speak like that - doesn't make it correct.

What makes Yemenite Hebrew so close to that of the Baalei Mesorah is
that the outside influence on their accent was another semitic language.
And, they weren't pushed from country to country every several centuries.
Makes a much smaller vector for change.

> Many people have trouble with a gutteral chet again not necessarily correct
> but the best they can do.

But that is due to picking up accents from a succession of host countries.

The Yiddish "Yankef" is testimony to Ashkenaz once having a sound for
ayin. Even if it fell out since. Which is unsurprising, since I don't
know a European language that has one of the ayin sounds.

In Moshav Matityahu, R Zev Leff has them lein parashat Zakhor according
to each of the traditional havarot of any member of the Moshav. But
Yekkish is done twice -- once modern, and once with recreations of the
Old Ashkenaz ches and ayin. (And to be honest, I think I remember them
making Poilish suffice for the Litvaks, even without the right choelem.)

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger                 You want to know how to paint a perfect
http://www.aishdas.org/asp   painting?  It's easy.
Author: Widen Your Tent      Make yourself perfect and then just paint
- https://amzn.to/2JRxnDF    naturally.              -Robert Pirsig