[Mesorah] kodashim

[David Cohen]

On Wed, Feb 20, 2008 at 8:26 PM, Michael Hamm <msh210 at math.wustl.edu> wrote:

> A baal k'ria recently told me that kadashim/kodashim has a kamatz gadol
> (rachav) at its start, but hakodashim has a kamatz katan.  Is this
> correct?  I always thought each had a kamatz katan.  (And why would the
> prefixed he make a difference?)


In the expression "kodesh hakodashim," the kuf has no meteg, and the vowel
under it is a chataf kamatz, which, if I'm not mistaken, is always
pronounced (by those who distinguish between them) as a kamatz katan.

In the expression "kodesh kadashim," the kuf has a regular kamatz under it,
meaning that since it's an open syllable, one would expect it to be a kamatz
gadol.  In addition, there is a meteg on that syllable, which ought to
clinch the kamatz gadol.  This is, in fact, how it appears in the "Simanim"
tikkun.

However, I noticed that someone who is usually very medakdek (and uses
Israeli pronunciation, which distinguishes between the two) was pronouncing
the second case as "kodashim."  I asked him about it, and he told me that
his great uncle, R' Mordechai Breuer z"l, taught him that whenever the
underlying word has a cholam that it turns into a kamatz upon being
pluralized (such as kodesh or ohel), that kamatz should be pronounced as a
kamatz katan, even if there is a meteg on the syllable.  He doesn't know
offhand if R' Breuer ever wrote about this, he just has the "family
mesorah."  Does anybody else know what R' Breuer's basis for this was?

--D.C.
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