On the (Recent) Parasha: Denise, and Hebrew as the Original Language

The other day, I saw this posted on Twitter:

That is, Stew Peters sounds like Stupiders. This is a joke, a pun, that works specifically in English.

Here’s another joke:

A pregnant woman was involved in a car accident and, while in the hospital, she fell into a coma. When she awoke days later, the woman noticed that she was no longer carrying a child, and asked, "Doc, what happened to my baby!"
The doctor replied, "Ma'am, you've had twins! You're the proud mother of a handsome baby boy and a beautiful baby girl. Also, you should know that while you were in a coma, your brother named the children for you."
"Oh, no!" shrieked the woman. "Not my brother! He's not really all together, if you know what I mean!"
The doctor replied, "Well, ma'am, your brother named your daughter Denise."
"Oh, that's no so bad," smiled the woman. Then, hesitantly, she asked, "What's the boy's name?"
The doctor grinned and said, "Denephew"

Again, this pun of “Denise” = “The Niece” is one that only works in English, so you can tell the language of the speaker by the joke itself.

This somehow relates to Bereishit and to Lech Lech Lecha. In the sidra of Bereishit, 2:23, Adam names the category of Woman:

וַיֹּאמֶר֮ הָֽאָדָם֒ זֹ֣את הַפַּ֗עַם עֶ֚צֶם מֵֽעֲצָמַ֔י וּבָשָׂ֖ר מִבְּשָׂרִ֑י לְזֹאת֙ יִקָּרֵ֣א אִשָּׁ֔ה כִּ֥י מֵאִ֖ישׁ לֻֽקֳחָה־זֹּֽאת׃

And the man said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.

Rashi comments:

לזאת יקרא אשה כי מאיש וגו'. לָשׁוֹן נוֹפֵל עַל לָשׁוֹן מִכָּאן שֶׁנִּבְרָא הָעוֹלָם בִּלְשׁוֹן הַקֹּדֶשׁ (בראשית רבה):

לזאת יקרא אשה כי מאיש וגו THIS SHALL BE CALLED WOMAN, BECAUSE THIS WAS TAKEN OUT OF MAN — Here we have a kind of play upon words (the words אשה and איש sounding similar): hence we may learn that the language used at the time of the Creation was the Holy Tongue (Hebrew) (Genesis Rabbah 18:4).

(This translation of Rashi, from M. Rosenbaum and A.M. Silbermann, London, 1929-1934, is not the most literal, and reflects how they understand it.)

To understand Rashi, we often need to look at his (midrashic) sources so see what they mean and how he effectively channels them. But we also need to engage our brain.

I do NOT think that Rashi means that Ish and Isha are the same word, the same root, etymologically speaking. If this was Rashi’s intent, he could just say that he said this because the feminine form (לשון נקיבה) of איש was אשה. Instead, he says that is is לָשׁוֹן נוֹפֵל עַל לָשׁוֹן, that is a play on words. And this play on words only works if the language is Hebrew. Therefore, Adam must have spoken Hebrew (or some proto-version thereof).

Note: Edited. Ibn Ezra grapples with the dikduk of this, trying to show the etymology and how one derives from the other.

ודגשות שי"ן "אשה" תמורת היו"ד הנח הנעלם שהוא באיש, ויתכן שסבת דבור אשה דגוש ולא רפה, שלא יתערב עם "אישה" שהוא בעלה כי פעם יהסרו הראות הה"א, ונשים מן אנוש ואנשים

[WOMAN.] The shin in the word ishah (woman) receives a dagesh in place of the inaudible yod which is found in the word ish (man). However, it is possible that ishah (woman) receives a dagesh to distinguish it from ishah (her husband) for at times the mapik in the suffixed pronominal heh in ishah (her husband) is not pronounced. The plural nashim (women) is derived from the words enosh (man) and anashim (men).

More modern linguists (see Klein, following Shadal) argue that the word Isha without the yud and with a dagesh chazak has the dagesh for the assimilated nun, which appears in the true shoresh, Enosh. It is the feminine form of Enosh, but Adam was able to make a great Hebrew pun. To quote Shadal:

אשה כי מאיש וגו': משה הזכיר השמות האלה כפי מה שהיו מבטאים אותם בימיו, אעפ"י שאשה לא נגזר מתחלה מאיש אלא מאנש, ומן אנש אמרו אנש (כמו מן גבר גבר) וממנו אנשים, וממנו אמרו אנשה ואח"כ אשה, אמנם שם איש כך היה מתחילתו, וממנו יש, ובארמית איתי.

Radak suggests the same. And Akeidat Yitzchak suggests something similar.

A commenter on this post, Solomon Behala, pointed out I quoted Ibn Ezra incorrectly and also that the shin as opposed to tav does persist in Aramaic, like in אנשא and בר נש. See also Balashon’s writeup.

End Edit.

Alas, I think later thinkers might have missed this point, and think that the claim is that only in Hebrew, man and woman are the masculine and feminine of the same root. We see this e.g. in Siftei Chachamim, especially as translated into English:

מכאן כו'. לכך לשון נופל על לשון אבל בלשון אחר אין טעם בלשון שלכך נקראת אשה. כי אין שם אשה נגזר משם איש בשום לשון חוץ מלשון הקודש:

From this [we derive]... The proof is that איש and אשה have the same root. In no other language is there an etymological reason for her being called אשה. This is because only in the Holy Tongue is the word for woman derived from the word for man.

This translation of לשון נופל על לשון is that it is etymology — that they have the same root. And in no other language is it the same root.

In Gur Aryeh’s commentary:

בלשון הקודש. דלא תמצא בכל שאר לשונות ששם הזכר והנקיבה דומים, רק בלשון הקודש 'איש' 'אשה', אבל בלשון תרגום 'גברא' 'אתתא', וכן בכל הלשונות, שמזה תראה כי בלשון הקודש נברא העולם:

And Mizrachi cites the source in Bereishit Rabba:

מכאן שנברא העולם בלשון הקודש. בב"ר שמעת מימיך גיני גיניאה אתרופו אתרופיאה גברא גברתא אין שם האשה נגזר משם האיש בשום לשון חוץ מלשון הקודש:

Looking at the source, there are actually two separate, though perhaps related ideas. That the Torah was written / given in Hebrew / that that is what Adam spoke; and that the world itself, the nature of creation, was that of Hebrew. Thus, Bereishit Rabba:

לְזֹאת יִקָּרֵא אִשָּׁה כִּי מֵאִישׁ לֻקֳּחָה זֹּאת, מִכָּאן שֶׁנִּתְּנָה הַתּוֹרָה בְּלָשׁוֹן הַקֹּדֶשׁ. רַבִּי פִּינְחָס וְרַבִּי חִלְקִיָּה בְּשֵׁם רַבִּי סִימוֹן אָמְרֵי כְּשֵׁם שֶׁנִּתְּנָה תּוֹרָה בְּלָשׁוֹן הַקֹּדֶשׁ כָּךְ נִבְרָא הָעוֹלָם בְּלָשׁוֹן הַקֹּדֶשׁ, שָׁמַעְתָּ מִיָּמֶיךָ אוֹמֵר גִּינִי גִּינְיָא אַנְתְּרוֹפִי אַנְתְּרוֹפָא, גַּבְרָא גַּבְרְתָא, אֶלָא אִישׁ וְאִשָּׁה, לָמָּה, שֶׁהַלָּשׁוֹן הַזֶּה נוֹפֵל עַל הַלָּשׁוֹן הַזֶּה.

“This one shall be called Woman [isha], because this one was taken from Man [ish]” – from here we learn that the Torah was given in the sacred tongue [Hebrew]. Rabbi Pinḥas and Rabbi Ḥilkiya say in the name of Rabbi Simon: Just as the Torah was given in the sacred tongue, so, the world was created in the sacred tongue. Have you ever heard anyone saying: Gyne, gynea; anthropos, anthropa; gavra, gavreta? But ish and isha – one form corresponds to the other.

So, maybe Rashi actually means to discuss the language of Creation here.

I would interpret it as saying that the words for “man” and “woman” are not similar in other languages, so Ish and Isha are not generally the zachar / nekeiva equivalents of each other. Rather, it is a play on words. And that it just happened to work out in this way indicates something special about Hebrew.

Also, what does lashon nofel al lashon mean, for Rashi? I really think it means a play on words. Here is Rashi on Bemidbar, about the copper snake:

נחש נחשת. לֹא נֶאֱמַר לוֹ לַעֲשׂוֹתוֹ שֶׁל נְחֹשֶׁת, אֶלָּא אָמַר מֹשֶׁה, הַקָּבָּ"ה קוֹרְאוֹ נָחָשׁ וַאֲנִי אֶעֱשֶׂנּוּ שֶׁל נְחֹשֶׁת, לָשׁוֹן נוֹפֵל עַל לָשׁוֹן (בראשית רבה ל"א):

נחש נחשת A SERPENT OF COPPER — He had not been told to make it of copper, but Moses said, “The Holy One, blessed be He, terms it נחש; I will therefore make it of נחשת — one term fitting the other term” (Genesis Rabbah 31:8).

Or Rashi on Michah:

עוד היורש אביא לך. אויבים שיורישו אותך את היושבת במרשה, יורש למרשה לשון נופל על הלשון:

I will yet bring the possessor to you—The enemies, who will possess you, you who dwell in Mareshah. The possessor (הַיוֹרֵש) to Mareshah (מָרֵשָה) -another play on words.

At the end of the day, I think the translation of Rashi I cited up top seems correct. That it is not etymology, but a pun, and that pun shows that the language used by Adam, and describing the very nature of the Creation, is Biblical Hebrew.

I already was thinking this, but what sparked the post was a recent post on Facebook by Dawidh Yoseph Aguirre I was scrolling past, which read in part:

An important aspect of limud Torah is not only studying what our invaluable mefarshim teach to better understand the Parasha, but also utilizing modern resources—learning in conjunction with scientific, archaeological, linguistic research, etc.—to enrich our learning.

In our case, medieval mefarshim on Bereshit 11:1, as well as the Midrash, interpreted the story of the Tower of Bavel literally, with the commentary that the one language humanity spoke was Hebrew. Rashi, for instance, cites a proof from Bereshit 2:23 that Adam spoke Hebrew, as shown when he called Chawa Isha since she derived from Ish. Rashi argues that, because no other ancient language shares this same etymological root, Hebrew must have been the language Adam spoke.

Barukh HaShem, with the aid of modern research, we can reach closer to the truth. While Hebrew remains a vital language for every Jew to know to learn Torah in the most authentic way possible, it likely wasn’t the original language of humanity. At least, the proofs commonly cited by the mefarshim require stronger evidence, as current archaeological findings suggest there may never have been a single “original language.”

A refutation to the traditional view comes from the Sanskrit language, where Nara (नर), meaning man/male, and Nārī (नारी), meaning woman, share a similar linguistic connection.

Even in Akkadian (the oldest attested Semitic language), there are terms such as Mutu (husband) and Amtu (female servant) amd Amēlu (man) and Amēltu (woman). Although the exact words for "man" and "woman" differ, these examples suggest other ancient languages also displayed gendered linguistic connections, undermining the argument that Hebrew alone held this distinction.

It shouldn’t be surprising that the Midrash, Gemara, and mefarshim would assume Hebrew was the original language, as the belief in one’s own culture or religion having the most special and/or original language was common across civilizations such as the Greeks, Sumerians, and Hindus.

Despite the reality of the historical context not matching the story, it still retains its valuable moral lessons. As Rashi quotes Ribbi Yitzchak in his commentary to Bereshit 1:1, the goal of the Torah is not primarily to record history, but to teach the commandments and moral standards HaShem has set for us.

I mean, I don’t know. If the proof was that Hebrew alone has this alternation of the words for man / woman, and that the name was based on pure etymology, fine. But I’d expect Rashi to say something different, and also to explicitly quote that part of the midrash. Also, we didn’t have to wait scholars to tell us about Akkadian and Samaritan. The yud in Ish and lack in Isha; the dagesh in Isha and lack in Ish already told us that the etymology is just wrong. Shadal and Radak [note: edited] already told us the etymology was wrong.

Make it into a pun, לָשׁוֹן נוֹפֵל עַל לָשׁוֹן, and Rashi’s argument may still hold some weight. If Adam named his niece Denise, that would show the original language was English. The same holds for איש and אשה to tag Hebrew as the original language.