Page 40 - HaMizrachi Chanukah 2021 - USA

WHAT'S IN A WORD?

Spiritual

Center

David Curwin

I sun rises" or "where the sun begins to o,, is also related to the root l!i;;,i,
n honor of the 120th anniversary
o~iginally meaning "a team of horses~'
of the founding of the Mizrachi
shine." Another word deriving from
movement, let's take a look at the the same root is n1.n5, meaning "citizen, (Esther 8:10), as horses were bound to
history of the movement's name. civilian." It originally meant "one who the same vehicle. However, today l!i;;,l.
While the political organization was rose and grew up in the land," that is, generally means purchasing, from the
word l!i~:J7 - "property." This is because
founded in 1902, the name precedes one who was born there. possessin.g animals, like horses, cattle
it by nearly a decade. In 1893, Rabbi A synonym for n1.r1;i in Biblical Hebrew or camels, was a sign of wealth. Other
Shmuel Mohilever created a religious is o·n~, deriving from the root tl1ii!, words in Hebrew that connect animals
branch in the Hovevei Zion move-
meaning "to be before, in front." For and property include il~i?l;i - "cattle"
ment (a predecessor to Herzl's Zionist
those accustomed to seeing maps with (from the root ;,m - "acquire"), il?rn;i
movement) which he called Mizrachi
the north on top, it may seem strange - "property" (related to the Akka-
- an acronym for '~o~, 97~. meaning to view the east as "in front" of the rest dian word sugullu - "herd of cattle"),
"spiritual center." Later, when Rabbi
of the world. But as the English word and 0•1;9~ - "property" (related to the
Yitzchak Yaakov Reines founded the Aramaic ·root for killing, O?~, meaning
Religious Zionist movement, the writer "orient" attests, we find our bearings
when facing east. While o·n~ isn't used "cattle to be slaughtered").
Avraham Yaakov Slutsky suggested
in modern Hebrew for "east," the root
that he adopt the earlier name, and the The second half of Mizrachi's name,
appears in many common words,
movement became "Mizrachi." •lmi, derives from m, - "spirit." The
including owr -"early," ilt}"]'R - "prog- s·;me word also ~eans "wind" or
In addition to the abbreviated •~o~, t;.>71'}, ress," and il7}'1ii! - "forward!" "breath" and is similar to Iii~~ and iltJW~
the name Mizrachi is strongly associ- - meaning "breath" and "soul." The root
ated with the word nw;i, "east," the In the poetry of Tehillim, sunrise is IJ~, also means "to be wide, spacious,"
direction long associated with praying described as in~QP. N~'• l.lJIJ'.P, "like a as in the word nn., meaning "space,"
toward and longing for Eretz Yisrael - groom coming forth from the cham- "relief," and "profit." Some scholars
even if many Jews lived to the north ber" {19:6). The idea of the sun "going connect the two roots by saying that
of Israel. out" at sunrise is found in other Semitic the space between two things is com-
languages and eventually gave us the
This dual meaning represents two crit- posed of air or wind.
name "Asia" - "the land of the sunrise
ical components of Religious Zionist
(in the east)." A parallel can be found The converse of "spiritual" is 'l;ilp~ -
ideology. "Spiritual center" expresses
in a suggested origin of the name "physical" and was incorporated into
the belief that spiritual concerns must medieval Hebrew from Arabic. It is
"Europe" - from l-µ/, where the sun
remain central to our movement, even related to the Aramaic Nt}lp~, meaning
sets at night (in the west).
when working together with secular "body." Some say it is connected to the
political partners. At the same time, By contrast, 971'} is of recent origin. It Hebrew ow~ - "rain" because the rain
"east" expresses our belief that redemp- entered Hebrew in the Middle Ages, was considered very heavy as if it had
tion will not come from above while we borrowed from the Arabic markaz, a body.
wait passively in the Diaspora. We must meaning "foothold, stand, center." This
do our part by actively going east and
Arabic word is related to the Hebrew
settling the land.
root o;n - "to bind," the root for words
"Mizrachi" also derives from the root such as 0?1 - "mountain ridge" (the David Curwin is a writer living in Efrat,
n-u, which means "to shine" or "to rise." mountains are fastened together), and and the author of the Balashon blog,
"Mizrach," therefore, means "where the rg~;, - "zipper." balashon.com.

40 I HAfv11ZRACHI