[Mesorah] Kean, Kadun, Na

[Aharon Gal]

> that the development from the temporal sense to the wider meanings<
I wonder if the same happened to the words K’an and Kdon.
In the Tanach the word “K’an” as it appears in Ezra and Daniel only, means “now”.
I did not find the word “Kadun”, only in the targum called “Targum Yonatan”.
A person that speaks Aramaic told me that both words mean “now”.
The origin of the words (he said) are K’IDAN” .

It looks like these words in the old days and also today mean “Now”.
When we read the source and the commentaries, there are verses in the Tanach where it is clear that the meaning of “NA”
is “please”, or at least a word that comes to soften a command, still the Targumim write “k’an” or “kadun”.

It is hard for me to understand that the Targumim understood almost all “na” as “now”.
Do these two words widen to the meaning of baksha or idun (soften, moderate)?

Thanks,

Aharon


> On Nov 14, 2019, at 8:01 AM, Mandel, Seth <mandels at ou.org> wrote:
> 
> That was my point, that the development from the temporal sense to the wider meanings is common among many languages, not only English, but Hebrew, Aramaic, German, and others.  So it should be a surprise to no one that a word meaning "at this time" also has these other usages in other languages. and so would be used to translate "v¯atta" in German, English, Spanish, and Aramaic.
> 
> Rabbi Dr. Seth Mandel

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