parsha bit: Sh'lach L'cha

This week's parsha tells of the spies who were sent to scout out the land of Israel and the bad report ten of them made. Rabbinic tradition teaches that this occurred on Tisha b'Av, the same date that the temple would later be destroyed. According to the talmud this is not a coincidence. Rabbah taught in the name of Rabbi Yochanan: when the people lifted up their voices and wept at the news, the Holy One Blessed Be He said: they are weeping for nothing (for the report is not true), but I will fix this day for them as an occasion of weeping for all generations. (Sotah 35a)

(Is this the earliest citation for the parental "I'll give you something to cry about!" admonishment? :-) )

random bits

CBS relented and renewed Jericho. Yay! This is a good show that, like other serials, was hurt by a mid-season hiatus. I don't understand why 24 seems to be the only prime-time show whose producers get this: run your show straight through if it's a continuing story.

A school refused to give diplomas to students for whom people cheered at graduation. They have since rescinded this decision. The whole thing has me asking WTF? How does it make sense to punish the students, who were not the ones violating the decorum of the event? Heck, given the rivalries that high schools tend to, did anyone consider that the cheering might have been a hostile move (to get the diplomas held back)?

This made me laugh out loud: "Ubuntu" is an ancient african word. It means "I can't configure debian." --zeylisse on slashdot.org, repeated by brokengoose.

What does your cat do all day while you're away? Try a cat cam. I want one. No, three. Ok, two; I only need so many pictures taken by a sleeping Baldur.

Speaking of cats, I got Embla's test results last night. We've done too good a job on treating the hyperthyroidism. Her T4 this week was 0.5 (down from 5.6 two months ago and 70 (!) three months ago). I understood the goal to be "under 4", but the vet really meant "between 1 and 4". So we're backing off the medicine just slightly.

A day late for the anniversary, but kmelion reposted this (English translation of a) transcript of a tape made during the six-day war, upon entering Jerusalem.

some progress (Hebrew)

I'm reading torah in a couple weeks, so last week I started looking at the portion I'm doing. I was able to translate most of it without aid. That was a pleasant surprise (though it's also not a hard passage). There were a few verbs I didn't know (like "strip"), for which I do not feel in the least bad.

I noticed an unusual construction in this portion (Chukat, chamishi), and I wonder what it means. (I haven't gone looking for commentaries yet.) Generally in biblical Hebrew double-noun constructions (which probably have a formal grammatical name) are "noun [implied "of"] noun", like "b'nei Yisrael" = "children of Israel". Har Sinai (har = mountain) is where we received torah. The beit t'filah is the house (beit) of prayer (t'filah). And so on. So I was a little surprised to see the phrase "hor ha-har" (= Mount Hor, but literally Hor the mountain) used consistently in this passage. "Har Hor" might sound a little funny, but is it grammatically unsound in some way I don't understand? Is this kind of stylistic variation really all over the place but I'm only now noticing it?