<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN">
<HTML><HEAD>
<META content="text/html; charset=US-ASCII" http-equiv=Content-Type>
<META name=GENERATOR content="MSHTML 8.00.6001.19046"></HEAD>
<BODY style="FONT-FAMILY: Arial; COLOR: #000000; FONT-SIZE: 10pt" id=role_body bottomMargin=7 leftMargin=7 rightMargin=7 topMargin=7><FONT id=role_document color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT lang=0 color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial FAMILY="SANSSERIF" PTSIZE="10">
<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial>From: "kennethgmiller@juno.com" <A href="mailto:kennethgmiller@juno.com">kennethgmiller@juno.com</A><BR>-1<BR><BR>R'
Zev Sero wrote:<BR><BR>> Flags were invented in the early 2nd millennium
CE. They did<BR>> not exist in Biblical times, or in Chazal's. I
don't know when<BR>> standards were invented; the medrash about the tribes'
standards<BR>> may be historical for all I know, but it wouldn't shock me if
it<BR>> weren't.<BR><BR>[snip]> It's probably something that serves the
same purpose for which<BR>> flags were invented, but it can't mean a flag,
unless they're<BR>> a technology that was lost and rediscovered.
Chazal seem to<BR>> have thought it meant a standard, which was an invention
known<BR>> in their day, but perhaps not in David's; I don't
know.<BR><BR></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial>.....Anyway, I concede that on Bamidbar 21:8, Rashi says that a
"neis" is a "klonas" - a pole. But there's another common word for flag:
"degel". And Rashi on Bamidbar 2:2 seems to use "degel" in what seems to me like
a pretty good description of a flag (although it is a flag of one solid
color).<BR><BR>Akiva Miller</FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>>>>></DIV>
<DIV>In modern Hebrew the word "degel" means flag (I don't know how long
the word "degel" has been used to mean flag -- maybe RZS knows?) But Rashi
seems to have understood the word "degel" to mean a division. There were
12 shevatim (well, 13 counting Levi) around the Mishkan but only four degalim --
three shvatim to a degel, i.e., three to a division.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>In Bamidbar 2:2 it says that each person camped "ish al diglo be'osos
leveis avosam" which according to Rashi seems to mean each person in his
division, with "signs" for his father's house [trbe]. And what Rashi says
there is that each degel had its own os -- and then he goes on to explain
that the osos were colored cloths, a different color for each tribe.
He says that each person can recognize his own degel by its os -- IOW that he
can find his way home to his division, his area, by looking up at the
flag. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Whether Rashi was being anachronistic by assuming that they had flags in
the desert I don't know but as RAM mentioned, the technology involved in
creating a flag and putting it on a pole (Rashi doesn't mention poles, but where
else would a flag be?) doesn't seem so advanced that they couldn't have had
flags in the desert. And if RZS doesn't think they had flags, then
what /were/ the "osos"?</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT color=#0000ff></FONT><BR><FONT color=#0000ff><STRONG>--Toby
Katz<BR>================</STRONG></FONT><FONT lang=0 color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial FAMILY="SANSSERIF" PTSIZE="10"><BR><BR><BR><BR><BR>_____________________
<DIV> </DIV></FONT></DIV>
<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><BR><BR></FONT> </BLOCKQUOTE></FONT></DIV></FONT></BODY></HTML>