Korean was originally written using Chinese characters, much like Japanese was, because both Korea and Japan looked at China as the big refined center of culture and civilization in the world. But Chinese is a terrible script for Korean, arguably worse than it is for Japanese, because Korean loves to form words with tons of prefixes … Read more
Okay. “Gangnam” was easy: two syllables. Why is “Style” written as three syllables? There’s two linguistic reasons for this: clusters, and diphthongs. Bear with me. Clusters I told you that Korean doesn’t like consonant clusters in syllables. One at the beginning and one at the end at most. So the “ST” at the beginning of … Read more
All right. In the previous post we talked about how syllable blocks fit together in Hangul. Now we’re ready to break down the song’s title into its individual jamo. Remember that a jamo is a Korean “letter”, and that in Hangul you pack the jamo into blocks of two or three symbols to make syllables. “gang” Let’s … Read more
My friends know I love languages and linguistics. Today I wanted to share with you one of the most amazingly elegant and beautiful writing systems in the world: Hangul (also spelled hangeul in English, but properly spelled 한글 in the system itself), the system used for writing Korean. In order to approach this — and I hope … Read more
Alyavë tulilyë palanello / Fortunately you come from afar Etta uminquë rucë i randar / Thus we do not fear the long ages Alyavë melin ettelëanorë / Fortunately I love foreign lands Ar nan amanya pan melilyen / And I am blessed that you love me Lelyuvan Tolenna Eressëa / I will travel to Tol … Read more
At first I saw this image on Wikipedia, and I was all: Then I thought about it, and I was like:
Crowley translates Hebrew עולה as “common holocaust”. Yikes. Let’s look into it. First off, he published Sepher Sephiroth years before the rise of Hitler to power. Whew. Second, he lifted the definition straight from von Rosenroth’s “comm. holocaustû” which dates back centuries. The word actually refers to the Israelites’ burnt offerings, particularly while they were … Read more
I’m going through every Hebrew entry in Crowley’s Sepher Sephiroth (“book of emanations”, or simplified, “book of numbers”) and looking at what each Hebrew word actually means by comparing it to Hebrew Biblical dictionaries, and sometimes looking at modern Hebrew ones too for a backup (being aware of linguistic change, of course). There are lots of typos. This will … Read more
Continuing to work on fixing Crowley’s gematria entries, I find the Hebrew word אשת. Crowley doesn’t define it; he simply says “Deut. xxiii. 1.” Deuteronomy 23:1 does not contain this Hebrew word. But it translates to: He that is wounded in the stones, or hath his privy member cut off, shall not enter into the congregation … Read more