# How much pure yiddish do you understand?



## gevenamolalandaziseafaine

Of course you won't get all the Polish, Romanian and Upper German from the Middle Ages but what about it's Semitic part? 

Can you say Rakhmunes for sorry or Ponim for the face?
are the antisemites the soyne yizorel? do you expect them to take the "mize meshine"? Is Israel known as "the little medine"?
do you understand such verbs as "mamshekh", "mekane" or "maskem"?
do you use expressions as "khas vesholem", "kholile", "mekhteyse", "m'zeyt" or "a makhaye"?
do you understand them?
do you understand the connectives like "hagam", "tomer" or "makhmes"?
would you have used "bikhlal" for "in general" or "bifret" for "concretely"?

If so is this still considered the high style that it used to be in yiddish?


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## arielipi

Everything that is taken from hebrew can be understood and all the rest depends on knowledge, all the questions about using, some do some not.
the last q should be asked to yiddish natives or speakers


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## Yaella

It sometimes takes some thinking and application of algorithms to find out the Hebrew word matching the Yiddish one.
_Rakhmunes _would relate to _rah'amim_ (mercy) but you wouldn't use it to excuse yourself (_sorry _is usually translated as _slih'a_).
_Ponim _is yiddish version of the word _panim _(this is what I call algorithm application: some types of "a" sounds in modern hebrew become / were "o" sounds in Yiddish) in the same way as "_khas vesholem_" and "_kholile_" would be said "_h'as veshalom_" and "_h'alila_".
There may be some historical changes or sociological divides, but when I used to live in Israel, anything linked to Yiddish would not be considered as high style. _Galuti _was a despictive expression.


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## David S

I'm interested in whether Israelis understand religious Yiddish terms that are NOT from Hebrew, for example:

shul (beit kneset)
daven (lhitpalel)
bentsch (birkat hamazon)
yahrzeit (? )
schuckle (? )
glatt (chalak)
gebrokts (sheruya?)
dreidel (sevivon)
hamantaschen (oznei Haman)
cholent (chamin)
gefilte fisch ( ? )
negelwasser (netilat yadaim)
frum (chasid / dati)

And then there are Hebrew-based Yiddish words that aren't grammatically correct in Hebrew: shabbosim, talleisim, brissim being the plural for shabbos, tallis, and bris.


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## arielipi

why would we? do you understand terms that are not from english, lets say zulu?
and to some yes.


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## David S

arielipi said:


> why would we? do you understand terms that are not from english, lets say zulu?
> and to some yes.



Since half the Jews in Israel are of Ashkenazi descent, I would think that Yiddish would have some influence on Modern Hebrew.

There's a reason why alef and ayin sound the same, qof and kaf with dagesh sound the same, and so do chet and kaf.


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## arielipi

yea, but you also forget the tzabar vs galutic jewish conflict in israel.


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## berndf

David S said:


> There's a reason why alef and ayin sound the same, qof and kaf with dagesh sound the same, and so do chet and kaf.


Yes, because it is so in Sphadri Hebrew which is the phonological basis of Modern Hebrew. Yiddish influence is when you call the letter "quf" instead of "qof".


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## tFighterPilot

berndf said:


> Yes, because it is so in Sphadri Hebrew which is the phonological basis of Modern Hebrew. Yiddish influence is when you call the letter "quf" instead of "qof".


Sepharadic Hebrew isn't a single language, as Sepharadic people were spread from the Netherlands to Morocco to Syria. Some of these dialects distinguished these (e.g. in Dutch Hebrew Ayin was pronounced /ŋ/). In Yiddish Alef and Ayin were used as vowels, Alef being /a/ and Ayin being /e/. It's important, though, not to confuse Yiddish with Ashkenazi Hebrew.


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## origumi

shul (beit kneset) - few would understand
daven (lhitpalel) - no
bentsch (birkat hamazon) - no
yahrzeit (? ) - yes, this expression entered Hebrew and yet sounds very much Yiddish
schuckle (? ) is this שאקאל  = jackal? (silly me - it's to move while praying) - no
glatt (chalak) - yes, this expression entered Hebrew, mostly as part of the idiom glatt kasher
gebrokts (sheruya?) - no
dreidel (sevivon) - no
hamantaschen (oznei Haman) - no
cholent (chamin) - yes, definitely
gefilte fisch ( ? ) - yes, definitely
negelwasser (netilat yadaim) - no
frum (chasid / dati) - no


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## itzik

The vast majority don't understand. But of course the Hebrew-speaking Haredim would understand most of these words. I think they for example would say dreidel instead of sevivon. But certainly not the general secular public, Ashkenazim included.



David S said:


> And then there are Hebrew-based Yiddish words that aren't grammatically correct in Hebrew: shabbosim, talleisim, brissim being the plural for shabbos, tallis, and bris.



I thought these were American errors. Is this really how my European ancestors used to talk?


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## arielipi

ya ofc it was


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## David S

arielipi said:


> ya ofc it was



Sarcasm is harder to detect on the Internet than in real life. Are you being serious?

I was going to ask about "pushkas" (Hebrew: "kupat tzedaka", or a charity box) but based on the answers everyone's given, I'm guessing the word doesn't exist in Israel.


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## arbelyoni

> I was going to ask about "pushkas" (Hebrew: "kupat tzedaka", or a  charity box) but based on the answers everyone's given, I'm guessing the  word doesn't exist in Israel.


That's true, it doesn't.


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## arielipi

i was serious. this is really how our European ancestors used to talk


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