Once again, I have encountered the גפן = געזונד, פרנסה, נחת vertel.
Lipa Schmeltzer was singing it in a 'niggun simcha' in his le'eila ule'eila release playing on an internet radio station.
I had encountered it a number of years ago, in the dinner journal of a supposedly Litvishe Yeshiva. In a message from one of the roshei Yeshiva, he blessed the Yeshiva supporters, with 'birkas gefen', gezund, parnosso, nachas. It appeared stranger to me at the time. I was surprised that a Litvishe Rosh Yeshiva would say that. Something seemed wrong to me. But I couldn't fully articulate what about it bothered me. Now I think I can do a better job at it though, so here goes, בעזרת השם.
1) gezund (health) is a Yiddish word, while parnossoh and nachas are not. So it is sort of weird to have a roshei teivos with a Hebrew word allegedly standing for words in more than one language.
2) Why is a Litvishe Rosh Yeshiva using such a Chassidishe type vertel? Does he have not have any substantive Torah thought to share?
Does anyone know where the vertel comes from?
גבורה, פרנסה, נחת
ReplyDeleteI believe that it is not Hassidic in origin actually. I think I saw it from some other source after I originally wrote the post, but can't recall where. Nevertheless, one wonders why a gadol resorts to such vertlech rather than something more spiritually nutritional.
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