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Seforimchatter

SmallTalk: The Wonders of the Holy Tongue (with Rabbi Yehoshua Steinberg)

September 16, 2026

AI Summary

5 min read

In the midst of a sudden deployment after 9/11, Rabbi Yehoshua Steinberg, a chaplain in the U.S. Army reserves, found himself needing to deliver frequent sermons to soldiers who often had little background in Jewish texts. To connect with them, he started playing a kind of word game: “What does frost have to do with atonement? What does the cover of the holy ark have to do with tar?” The answer, in each case, is that the words share a single Hebrew root—kaf-pei-reish—and according to the medieval grammarian known as the Radak, there is a distinct conceptual connection between them. That improvisational teaching method became the seed of a decades-long project, culminating in The Wonders of the Holy Tongue, now available in both Hebrew and English editions.

How two-letter roots open a new world of connections

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What you'll learn

  • 1 (00:32) **The Origin Story: From Army Chaplain to Root-Word Detective** - Rabbi Steinberg explains how being drafted after 9/11 led him to study Hebrew roots for soldier sermons, sparking a decades-long project.
  • 2 (04:00) **The Sefer's Structure: Choosing One Unique Word Per Parsha** - The host asks for a structural overview of "The Wonders of the Holy Tongue."
  • 3 (05:03) **The Two-Letter Root: A Whole New World of Connections** - The core methodological insight: moving from three-letter roots to two-letter roots dramatically expands the connections between words.
  • 4 (07:34) **The Key Sources: Menahem ben Saruk and the Pappenheim Sefer** - Rabbi Steinberg identifies the primary grammarians and texts that form the basis of his work.
  • 5 (09:36) **The "Horah": Words as Teaching Tools** - The sefer aims to reveal the *horah* (the essential teaching or meaning) of a word, which is revealed by the connections between its disparate meanings.
  • 6 (10:39) **Who Is This Sefer For? It's For Everyone** - Addressing the listener who might think this is only for grammar experts.
  • 7 (15:13) **The Next Project: A Comprehensive "Shorashim" Concordance** - Rabbi Steinberg reveals his 25-year work-in-progress, a side-by-side comparison of all major grammarians.

+ Full timestamped outline available in the app

Show Notes

#523

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