Research to Writing (Turbines to Speed)
Twilight Sparkle (the human, not the horse), sighed with dismay as she looked at her assignment. She was Jewish and was learning Biblical Hebrew but was not finding it as easy for her as the physical sciences which came to her so naturally. At Crystal Prep Academy Biblical Hebrew had been a course offering (it being a private school there were no Constitutional issues involved) and she had taken advantage of that fact. But now that she was enrolled at Canterlot High she was forced to study on her own with materials provided by her synagogue. If it was difficult before it was even more so now.
She was sitting outside at a table on the campus at this minute, trying to comprehend the material and finding it hard to keep her mind from wandering to particle physics. Another sigh brought Spike out from his hiding place in her knapsack.
“What's wrong, Twi?” he asked in his inimitable manner.
She sighed a third time. “Spike, I don't think I can ever learn all seven of these paradigms for the verb,” she confessed.
“What? You? Not learn something? That's hilarious!”
“No it isn't, Spike! There are seven different paradigms for each verb, and that's not even counting irregularities like the pe nuns, lamed hes and `ayin vavs. Complex mathematical formulae are a snap, but this? I just don't know!”
Just then Twilight heard that multisyllabic yet unrecordable sound that Rarity often made to show she thought something she heard had sounded silly.
“Oh come, darling! You're the smartest person I know! I'm certain that after a little time and hard work you'll master the material like you do everything else! It's just a little out of your usual field,” she assured her friend as she sat down beside her. “Tell me, darling, are you using the inductive or the deductive method?”
“Deductive,” Twilight said. It's a little unusual in this day and age, but so far my teachers find that for learning textual languages that's the best way. Inductive works mostly for learning spoken languages, and even then it works best with a total immersion experience.”
“Oh, I quite agree, darling!”
“Um...what are you guys talking about?” came a soft voice as another of their friends sat down.
“Twilight is expressing frustration at the 'seven headed monster' of the Hebrew verbal paradigms, dear,” Rarity answered.
“Oh,” Fluttershy commented. “Um...are you using Weingreen or Lamdin?” she asked her bespectacled classmate.
“Weingreen,” Twilight replied. “It's a really old text, but a classical textual language isn't going to change any, so I can learn the rules from him as easily as some more recent author. Besides,” she added, “I've looked at Lambdin and I just like Weingreen better. It's more complete and in a smaller size at that.”
From out of nowhere, from beneath the paper-thin layer which lies between the world we know and another that conceals monsters beyond human comprehension, a Pink head rose up between the two girls.
“Oh, Hebrew, huh? Did you have any trouble with the absolute and construct states, or with the vav hahippukh?”
“Actually no,” Twilight said, completely unfazed by the strange, inexplicable, nigh-omnipotent powers of the being, the ENTITY known as Pinkie Pie, who had deigned to make this reality her home. “I was worried at first, especially about the vav, but it was actually fairly easy. Though I still sometimes get the absolute and construct plurals mixed up. I mean, semachot instead of simchot? What's up with that?”
“Yeah, that's a real gullywhomper,” the accented voice of Applejack added as she joined the group, “but mah big problem was always to know when it was a qametz and when it was a qametz-chattuf. Ah know there're rules and all, but but sometimes the text just don't foller the rules! And don't even git me started on the Aramaic! Hoo-boy! That's more puzzlin' than a persimmon-puckered possum's posterior!”
“That's why you need to study the development of the language,” the confident voice of Rainbow Dash rasped as she suddenly appeared on her scooter. “A lot of that has to do with your Canaanite shift. I mean, when the qametz went to a cholem it made it a lot less complicated. Just remember in Aramaic the cholem is still a qametz, so what in Hebrew would require a qametz-chattuf (as a closed unaccented syllable always requires a short vowel) doesn't in Aramaic. Of course, there's still tons of time when it totally does, so there's really no way to tell without super awesomeness!” She posed as a nimbus surrounded her.
Applejack's face was contorted with rage. “Er you a-sayin' that Hebrew evolved from a more primitive Canaanite ancestor when we know from ChaZa”L that it was the original language, a-causin' Eve is called 'isshah, kime'ish luqachah zo't'?”
Rainbow's smirk could have penetrated ten feet of marble.
“Cognates,” she said. “Besides, there's no getting around the paleo-Hebrew script!”
“If you're referrin' to ketav `Ivrit as opposed to ketav 'Asshurit,” she hissed dangerously, “as always, ChaZa”L have th' answer. In fact, in the Talmud there are three separate positions recorded on th' issue, an' we all know” [she really stressed this word, even rising up on the balls of her feet] “that 'ellu va'ellu divrei-'Eloqim Chayyim!'”
“Oh yeah?” Rainbow said snidely as she glanced at her nails (something she never did). “Well I say that ketav `Ivrit is the original Hebrew script and ketav 'Asshurit obviously refers to 'Assyrian script'--an originally alien Aramaic script adopted only during the Babylonian Exile that began in the year 586BCE which replaced the original and authentic Hebrew.”
“You durn COMMUNIST!” Applejack seethed, “first of all, it was the year 422BCE or more precisely the year 3338 from Creation, and second of all…!!!”
“'Bere'shit' is in the construct state,” Pinkie Pie calmly observed, interrupting Applejack's imminent going medieval on Rainbow's tachat.
“Huh?” The word seemed to come from everyone.
“The first word in Genesis is in the construct state, even though it isn't followed by a noun,” Pinkie continued nonchalantly, “its genitive is a verbal phrase, 'bara' 'Eloqim.' The absolute form would have been 'barish'onah'. Rashi observes that this indicates that the events 'bara' 'Eloqim 'et-hashamayim ve'et-ha'aretz' are not to be construed chronologically. The water actually came first.”
The tenseness slowly ebbed away as Dash and AJ slowly smiled and embraced one another while their friends gave thanks that the UNKNOWABLE LOVECRAFTIAN THING that had assumed the form of a pink-skinned girl to befriend them was always there when they needed her...it...whatever.
“Say,” Twilight said, “why don't I just let you guys help me? You may all be certifiable morons when it comes to science but it really looks like when it comes to this you know your stuff!”
“Of course, darling!” Rarity agreed.
“Shore 'nuff!” Applejack assured her.
“Just bein' in the same atmosphere will have you awesome in no time! Just not as awesome as me,” Rainbow said.
“Bxklt xr@ qmhld!” Pinkie said in her unutterable language, which no mere mortal could even look at without going insane. (Or maybe it was Irish. They look about the same to me.)
“Yay!” added Fluttershy.
As they were thus confirming their assent to another project that would bring them even closer Sunset Shimmer appeared.
“Hi, girls! What are you all up to?” When she saw Twilight's book her eyes became the eyes of saucers.
“I can't believe it!” she said, “you guys know Equestrian?”
Sof davar hakol nishma`.
Author's Note
Happy Purim, everyone!