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<DIV>What I myself have noticed is that many words related to nature are both
masculine and feminine, comes up in Chumash from time
to time, words like shemesh and even (stone) and eretz. Sometimes the
same word is used with masc and fem verbs in the same pasuk, and Rashi will
comment on it, bringing examples from elsewhere in Tanach of the word being
sometimes masc and sometimes fem. Wish I could think of an example right
now. </DIV>
<DIV><FONT lang=0 color=#0000ff size=2 face=Arial FAMILY="SANSSERIF" PTSIZE="10"><BR><B>--Toby Katz<BR>==========<BR><BR></FONT><FONT lang=0 color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial FAMILY="SANSSERIF" PTSIZE="10"></B>--------------------</FONT></DIV></DIV>
<BLOCKQUOTE style="BORDER-LEFT: blue 2px solid; PADDING-LEFT: 5px; MARGIN-LEFT: 5px"><FONT lang=0 color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial FAMILY="SANSSERIF" PTSIZE="10"><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial><BR></FONT></FONT>From: JosephMosseri
<joseph.mosseri@verizon.net><BR><FONT face=Courier>>>Simon Montagu asked about Ilanot tovim vs tovot.<BR>> I was reviewing hilchot birkat ha'ilanot, and was surprised that it says<BR>> "ilanot tovot", not "ilanot tovim", although in every other context that I<BR>> can think of "ilan" is masculine. Do any mefareshim raise this question?<BR><BR>Here is my thought on this:<BR>Based upon old manuscripts of HaRaMBaM the original berakhah was:<BR>".......beriyot tovot...."<BR><BR>The word ilanot never appeared in the berakhah.<BR><BR>It may be that over time to make the berakhah more specific the word<BR>beriyot was replaced with ilanot and no one thought of adjusting the<BR>gender of tovot.
<<<BR><BR>Joseph</FONT><BR><BR></FONT></FONT></BLOCKQUOTE></DIV>
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