[Mesorah] [Avodah] Hilchos Kaddish

[kennethgmiller at juno.com]

R' Micha Berger asked:
> Tangent: this appears to be a general rule. "Luchos" is spelled in the
> chumash with the melupum malei, and the cholam chaseir. Even though
> "-os" is otherwise usually spelled malei.
>
> Someone know the kelal?

I did hear a klal on this, and I think it was right here on Mesorah in a thread about the word "tzitzis". But unfortunately I have forgotten who said it. But the klal suggested then was something like this:

This is not a thing about specific words, but rather it is the Chumash's style to avoid using more than one "aym l'mikra" (= vav or yud as a vowel) if at all possible, and that it is usually the first one.

I found lots of exceptions to the above, but skimming the Chumash from the beginning, I do get the feeling that the Author does prefer to avoid these letters. There were lots of opportunities for words to have more than one of these, but often there is only one, or none at all. Look at how these are spelled:

Elokim (we're so used to the five letters that [except for modern Israelis] we don't even perceive the vav as "missing")
tohu, vohu, choshech, boker, oseh

"L'meeno" (1:11) and "l'meenayhoo" (1:12) have both a yud and a vav, and can't be any more malay. But perhaps the klal I quoted might hold that a final vav doesn't count even when it clearly a vowel, because it is so important.

Check out "m'oros" and "l'oros" in 1:14, which have no vav at all. But the very next word is "ulmoadim" (vav lamed mem vav ayin daled yud mem), which could easily have skipped the middle vav or yud.

Then again, that's one omittable vav and/or one omittable yud. For homework, does anyone want to look for a word which has two omittable vavs, or two omittable yuds?

Akiva Miller

PS: Found it! "Toldos" in 2:4. So much for this supposed "klal"...

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