Highly gongable parshiot

Today we read one of the most highly gonagble parshiot in the Torah as Parshat B'Shalach includes Az Yashir....There is nothing like a baal koreh reading through Az Yashir and making dikduk/pronounciation mistakes indicating that not only did he not prepare the parasha well enough (gong!), he's also a dufus (sp?) because he has now shown the entire kehilla that he mis-reads Az Yashir everyday while davening shacharit (double gong!). Of course this assumes that the dufus in question actaully davens everyday but that is a whole other discussion. For the record, the guy who lained today in the NF's local yokel shul did mess up a bit but more from brain freeze, not from not knowing how to read az yashir. Thus he was not gonged (unlike the dufus who messed up his bar mitzvah parsha at mincha). However, he did not get a second helping of dessert at lunch.



Other highly gongable parshiot include Ve'etchanan (shma), E'kev (v'haya im shemoa) and Shlach (Tzitzit).



As an aside perek 15, pasuk 16 presents one of the classic opportunities where screwing up a shva na/nach changes the meaning of the word/phrase.

תִּפֹּל עֲלֵיהֶם אֵימָתָה וָפַחַד בִּגְדֹל זְרוֹעֲךָ יִדְּמוּ כָּאָבֶן

Note the dagesh in the dalet of yid'emu. Missing the dagesh (yidmu instead of yid'emu) will lead to a misreading of the word and changing the meaning of the phrase from "they will be as still as a stone" to "they will be similiar like a stone". (triple gong!)

Mazal Tov to my chavruta Yoni R on passing the vaad mishmeret stam oral exam and thus becoming a sofer stam musmach....Mazal Tov to the nusach freak as well for passing the aforementioned exam.

Below is a picture of the nusach freak's latest megillat esther.

I'm not thrilled with the writing --- I made a new quill right before beginning the column and while testing the quill on a scrap piece of klaf I was getting much sharper writing....the cow/calf that "donated" the klaf must have been anti-semitic. Only logical answer.

Shavua Tov....

NF