The southern coastal plain of Eretz Yisrael, known to English speakers and many others today as Gaza, is in Hebrew, of course, Azah. It is, as recounted in Shoftim, where Shimshon was taken by the Pelishtim, blinded and mocked by thousands of the idolaters in their temple, before—in his final act—he quite literally brought down the house.
Many years ago, I was taken aback by a transliteration I saw in a non-Ashkenazi Hebrew-English siddur, probably a Teimani one. Its English rendering of “Shema” was…“Shemang.”
“Shemang”? Who ordered that “g”? Or, for that matter, the one in “Gaza”? And, while we’re at it, the one in “Gomorrah,” the standard spelling and pronunciation of Sedom’s sister-city Amorah?
The answer lies in the fact that there are sounds in many languages that don’t precisely transliterate into other languages’ alphabets. Our English “th” for instance, is very difficult for Francophones to duplicate, resulting in “zis” for “this.”
And zen zer is ze Spanish trill—rr—and the Hebrew ches, that some Anglophones find challenging. Some Japanese, for a lack of clear distinction between r’s and l’s, are wont to call the tongue we in America speak “Engrish.” And there are African languages that incorporate a variety of clicks of the tongue that are no more easily rendered in other languages than the sounds made by birds or other animals.
(Which is why even those sounds are rendered differently in different languages. A dog’s bark, what we render as “bow-wow,” is, in Hebrew, “hav-hav”; in Arabic, “hau-hau”; in Russian, “gav-gav”; in Mandarin, “wang-wang”; and in Burmese, “woke-woke”; Burmese dogs might consider running in some primaries next election season.)
Returning (well, figuratively) to Gaza, the true, original sound of the Hebrew letter ayin, which Ashkenazim pronounce no differently from an alef, is one not easily duplicated in other languages. It is what linguists call a velar nasal, something closer to the “ng” at the end of “sing.” And it survives only among Teimanim and certain European Jewish communities like Italy and Holland.
Thus, in recognition of velar nasalhood, Azah became Gaza; Amorah, Gomorrah; and Shema, Shemang.
It’s also likely why, in Yiddish, Yaakov became Yankev (and Yankie and Yankl). Interestingly, the sound may be reflected in the ksav Ashuris form of the letter ayin, which contains what can easily be imagined as an elongated nun.
Also interesting is the fact that the attempt to accomplish an ayin by adding a “g” to Azah may also be the key to the origin of an English word: gauze.
Gauze, of course, is a fabric, these days usually cotton and used in medical dressings, and which has a loose, open weave. (If you really must know, its weft yarns are arranged in pairs and are crossed before and after each warp yarn, keeping the weft firmly in place. Okay?)
It has been claimed that the word gauze derives from Gaza, which, it is further claimed, was a center of weaving in the ancient world. There was, in fact, a fine type of silk known as gazzatum that was imported from Gaza in the Middle Ages.
But there is a machlokes in etymological circles about whether gauze in fact has Gazan roots. If you check your copy of Trésor de la Langue Française Informatisé, the venerated French dictionary, you’ll see that it contends that the more likely origin of the word gauze is the Arabic and Persian word qazz, “raw silk.”
As to the territory’s true Hebrew name, Azah is clearly reminiscent of the word az, which can be translated as “strong” or “determined”; or as “brazen” or “arrogant.”
In Avos, Yehudah ben Teima employs the word in both its positive and negative senses. He exhorts us to be as az, as strong and determined, as a leopard to do the will of Hashem.
And in the same mishnah, the tanna states that an az panim, an arrogant-faced person, is destined for gehinnom.
The azei panim in Gaza today are well recognized, and their destiny is assured. And what, with Hashem’s help, will send them to their just deserts is the azus, the determination, of klal Yisrael in these trying times.
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