The Hidden Hebrew Root of Ramadan |
Ramadan may have ended about a week ago—but it leaves behind a question that most Hebrew speakers would get wrong:
Does ‘Ramadan’ have a Hebrew root?
At first glance, the answer seems obvious: no. After all, it’s the 9th month of the Islamic Hijri calendar, and the sounds don’t align. Or so it seems.
To solve the mystery, we need to recover a root that is seldom used in modern Hebrew—but preserved in Arabic.
The Scorching Ground
In Arabic, the root is R-M-Ḍ, using the heavy, emphatic Ḍād letter (ر-م-ض), and it does not mean fasting. Rather, it........