And, of course, the IDF Southern Command is known for singing "מדרום תפתח הטובה", an obvious play on this verse.
Thanks for your link to my blog and your further explanation of the Jeremiah haftorah regarding the significance of 'the north' in Hebrew.
I am making aliyah to Haifa from the UK on August 6th and have heard from friends there that they are in shelters and it is a bit like the WW II blitz. But am still determined to go, at this of all times.
Irene
Thanks for the link. It's seems like the "bulb lit" in Jewish heads all over the world.
i definitely made the connection.
BTW - hebrew compass directions, at least one set of them, point to actual geographical features.
e.g., from in the land of israel, west is yamah - toward the sea, south is negbah, toward the negev.
so what's tzafon? probably Mt. Sappunu, a sacred mountain (similar in function to the greek olympus) in Lebanon.
perhaps, like olympus, its peak was hidden from view by clouds, which could have given it its 'hidden' name.
"We also find the expression in Hebrew לאבד את הצפון - l'abed et hatzafon"
In English we can say that someone is disoriented - they have lost their "east". Before the widespread use of compasses directions were measured relative to an east-west axis, following the path of the sun. A traveller setting out in the morning would observe the rising sun in the east and use that to establish the correct direction of his journey. If he forgot it, he was "disoriented".
As for the theory about Mt Suppunu, surely it's enough to note that the northern sides of objects are "hidden" from the sun.
Joel -
I wish these days it was more than just a song...
Irene -
Fantastic that you're coming now. Everyone who comes gives us more strength.
Muse -
I agree. By the way, I actually sat next to you at the ETAI conference, sorry I didn't introduce myself..
adderabbi -
I can't find any reference to Mt. Sappunu. Could you provide a link?
Joe in Australia -
I agree. From what I can see, both naming the Hebrew word for compass from the northern direction, and the expression quoted are based on a more recent concept of "the top of the map". As I've written earlier - http://balashon.blogspot.com/200...06/05/
asia.html - Hebrew used to also have east at the top.
Similar to Joe's comment about the northern sides of objects- in the Northern Hemisphere, the suns's east-west path dips through the southern sky. In other words, the sun never appears in the north, it is tzafun in the tzafon.
I've done a bit of googling on Mount Sapan (variant spellings), and it seems to be the Tzafon of Baal Tzafon! I guess I should have caught that.
More information:
http://www.piney.com/BaalEpic.html
http://rbedrosian.com/mythft3.htm - note 90
I just learned a modern meaning of "tzefoni" from Jameel at http://muqata.blogspot.com/2005/...que-part-
1.html
As Jameel writes:
Tzfoni (northerners) comes from "Northern Tel-Aviv/Tzfon Tel- Aviv" where the beautiful people of body and soul live.
A "Tzofoni" settler lives 10 meters over the green-line...or naïvely believes there's a nation-wide concensus on their home being essential to Israel's Zionist empire.
Interestingly, we have that distinction in other places as well - for example, there's a bit of that between northerners and southerners in the US.
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