[Mesorah] pronunciation of rashei taivos

[kennethgmiller at juno.com]

Last week, someone commented that the proper pronunciation of "four cubits" is "arba amos", and that "daled (or dalet) amos" is a recent development. (I don't remember the definition of "recent" in that context.)

I saw an interesting Mishneh Brurah relating to this. In Hilchos Eruv Tavshilin MB 427:41, he refers to a yom tov which falls on Thursday and Friday. "Thursday" is spelled "yud-vav-mem heh-apostrophe", and "Friday" is spelled "yud-vav-mem vav-yud-doubleapostrophe-vav".

I won't suggest how Thursday would be pronounced with that spelling, but it seems undeniable that the author (or at least the typesetter) would certainly have pronounced Friday as "yom vav".

This could be used as evidence for the more recent development of this pronunciation, since the Magen Avraham at this same point (427:13) spells Friday as "yud-vav-mem vav-apostrophe".

Akiva Miller