The New Bentcher is Here!

As I discussed in my post here, my Rebbetzin and I decided to compose a new bentcher (birkon, if you prefer) in honour of our son's Bar Mitzvah, almost a year ago.

Our goals with that bentcher included:

* Presenting the Hebrew text in the poetic form it was intended to have, instead of the paragraphs which make appreciation of its beauty difficult;

* To offer a legible text;

* To build on the existing English translations, and offer commentary on the songs as well as birkat hamazon;

* To present background on some of the practices of the Shabbat table.


We published that edition at the time, and received some helpful feedback.

Over the past several months, in honour of my daughter's Bat Mitzvah this week, we made some changes to that addition. We added components like al hamichyah and Havdalah, and added many songs. We also edited some of the commentary and translations we had used in the original edition.

The experience, again, was an enlightening one; I hope you will enjoy the result, the second edition of Z'morta T'hei, which is now available for free download, in pdf, here. It is meant to be printed on paper which is 7 inches tall, and 6.7 inches wide. Please send feedback!

Z'morta T'hei - The Bentcher is here!

Here is the current version of the birkon which the Rebbetzin and I prepared for our son's Bar Mitzvah this Shabbos. It's meant to be printed on paper which is 7 inches tall, 6.7 inches wide. [For the backstory on why we decided to create a birkon, click here.]

Among the 'upgrades' we hope to create for a future edition:
Al haMichyah
A halachah/guidance section in the back
More songs

We view the birkon as a work in progress; your comments would be more than welcome.

Creating a new bentcher

I've been working on a new bentcher (birkon, for the purists), hoping for it to be ready by my son's Bar Mitzvah. The goal is to produce a text which is easy to read, and which includes English translation as well as transliteration and commentary for the songs of the Shabbos table. I'm not aware of another bentcher which includes all of these elements.

For the transliteration, I'm largely using the work of the "Yale Bentcher". For the translation and commentary, though, I'm starting from scratch.

In the process of doing this, I've encountered quite a few places in which the translator must make the choice of following different commentaries. For example, the phrase in Kiddush, "כי הוא יום תחלה למקראי קדש זכר ליציאת מצרים," associating Shabbos with the commemoration of the exodus, admits of multiple explanations.

Another challenge is whether to translate songs in ways which highlight their puns. For example, Yom Zeh Mechubad includes the line, "על שתי לחם יבצעו תמימים," which has a double meaning - "upon two unblemished loaves of bread they will slice", or "upon two loaves of bread, the unblemished nation will slice". The former, literal approach is the one I've seen in various translations, but I favor the latter.

And another challenge involves translating phrases which may have been shifted from their proper grammar for the sake of rhyme or meter. One is the phrase ולנוח בחבת in Mah Yedidus; another is נעים שמכם in Dror Yikra. The standard translations take them entirely non-grammatically. For the former, I think a proper translation can work if one reads this as part of ולנוח בחבת כשושנים סוגה, which does fit the sort of enjambment seen elsewhere in the song. For the latter, I'm genuinely stuck.

It's an interesting process. Stay tuned!