I'm just saying -- don't put beans up your nose

There’s stuff going around about protecting yourself from coronavirus with something called “germicidal UVC”. If you suspect what I'm going to say and agree, you don't need to read the rest of this.

A company in my region is advertising that you can install this in your house. Somebody I trust on other issues, but who is not a STEM person, has picked up on it and tweeted about a portable version of the technology. First, you need to know that the FDA has not approved this technology. So you can stop here if that’s enough for you.

You know that UV that tans your skin will also cause cancer. The portable version of the technology looks to me like “tanning bed on a stick”, which somebody is promoting to recoup their investment in tanning bed technology, now that tanning beds are restricted in use for the obvious reasons. You who have had surgery for skin cancer can stop reading here cos you aren’t going there again so you'll never buy either the house installation or the portable.

Some kinds of UV light will work -- against microbes. Pretending this will work on coronavirus is the same misconception as using anti-bacterials thinking it will help with the cold and flu viruses. In any case, the main ingredient in anti-bacterials used to be triclosan. The science showed that it doesn’t work any better than soap and water, but the companies were charging more than soap for their products. So triclosan was banned as not effective. We will never know what safety problems it would have caused because there won’t be 20 years of epidemiological studies to draw on. We do know the problems of UV light, and they apply to the germicidal technology as well.

http://microbiologyon-line.blogspot.com/2009/09/radiation-sterilization-method.html

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5771808/pdf/nihms917594.pdf

That’s microbes, not viruses. It takes a different UV to hit viruses and, you guessed it, it’s even more dangerous.

https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20200327-can-you-kill-coronavirus-with-uv-light

Both kinds of germicidal UV require extended exposure to work. So does tanning. That extended exposure is what promotes skin cancer.

The last problem is that UVC only works where it can reach the virus – on the outsides or the tops of things -- the same as tanning. It won’t reach your counters if the UVC fixture is above a cabinet. It won’t reach your skin under your clothes. The nice photo of the subway car in the BBC article only shows its exterior being treated. There have to be UVCs inside to reach the seats and the bars you hold onto when it’s standing room only.  The UVCs have to be mobile to reach all sides of those bars. And notice that the subway car is EMPTY. No people in it.

So there’s my usual overkill on what could be a simple “don’t put beans up your nose,” but I did give you opportunities to duck out.

Oh yeah, that title? Comes from a story I heard long ago. A mother going out to run  errands left her kids home alone. She gave them all kinds of instructions before she left, and the last thing she said was, "and don't stick beans up your nose." She came home to a house full of crying children and had to call in a doctor to pull the beans out of their noses. 

I'm just saying....

21st Century Bible Hebrew -- negation

Now here’s another way that vav does not mean “and”. It turns out that vav with the aspect changes the connotation of a negation, and that explains the grammar in some verses.

Lo is the most frequent negative particle. It is most often used with imperfect aspect, as a negative commandment. Lo plus perfect aspect is the negative of a past action.

V’lo is about half as frequent as lo. With imperfect aspect, it denies that an action will take place in the future.

With perfect aspect, it negates an expected action. See Genesis 34:17-19.

יז וְאִם־לֹ֧א תִשְׁמְע֛וּ אֵלֵ֖ינוּ לְהִמּ֑וֹל וְלָקַ֥חְנוּ אֶת־בִּתֵּ֖נוּ וְהָלָֽכְנוּ:

יח וַיִּֽיטְב֥וּ דִבְרֵיהֶ֖ם בְּעֵינֵ֣י חֲמ֑וֹר וּבְעֵינֵ֖י שְׁכֶ֥ם בֶּן־חֲמֽוֹר:

יט וְלֹֽא־אֵחַ֤ר הַנַּ֨עַר֙ לַעֲשׂ֣וֹת הַדָּבָ֔ר כִּ֥י חָפֵ֖ץ בְּבַֽת־יַֽעֲקֹ֑ב וְה֣וּא נִכְבָּ֔ד מִכֹּ֖ל בֵּ֥ית אָבִֽיו:

This is the Dinah story. Her brothers have just told her rapist that Yaaqov’s family can only let them marry if all the men of the town become circumcised. Well, they didn’t have anesthetics in this period and adult circumcision is painful; you would think he would balk at that, but verse 19 says that Shkhem didn’t stop to think about that, he was so crazy in love.

Al is not a negated commandment. It negates the imperfect when the outcome does not rely on the authority of the speaker alone. Al tiru meaning “don’t be afraid” is usually followed by reasons not to fear in an attempt to reassure the other party.

Ein is used with progressive aspect or the copula, but in at least one case it is used instead of a narrative past as the complement to an evidentiary epistemic.  See Genesis 11:30, which I already discussed:

ל וַתְּהִ֥י שָׂרַ֖י עֲקָרָ֑ה אֵ֥ין לָ֖הּ וָלָֽד:

Sarai must have been barren; she had no children.

When you go through the possibilities of combining negation and aspect, you see that none of them work here. The other possibility would be to negate an aspectless verb. I’m not sure there are any negated aspectless verbs in Torah but they might be a recommendation not to do a certain thing, a quasi-commandment.

The evidence for the epistemic va-t’hi has to be imperfect, and since progressive and imperfect are related, we use the negation for progressive here.

21st Century Bible Hebrew -- contrasting the two ki's

Now I’m going back to contrast two things I already talked about and bring up a new one. In Exodus 22:4 we had a true if-then structure.

ד כִּ֤י יַבְעֶר־אִישׁ֙ שָׂדֶ֣ה אוֹ־כֶ֔רֶם וְשִׁלַּח֙ אֶת־בְּעִירֹ֔ה וּבִעֵ֖ר בִּשְׂדֵ֣ה אַחֵ֑ר מֵיטַ֥ב שָׂדֵ֛הוּ וּמֵיטַ֥ב כַּרְמ֖וֹ יְשַׁלֵּֽם:

If a man sets fire to a field or vineyard, and his burning gets out and burns in another field, the best of his field and the best of his vineyard he shall pay.

The if-clause uses imperfect aspect which has several functions. For one thing, it’s the definition of when there’s a case. It cuts off other possibilities like lightning strikes or wildfires. Jewish law also has the concept of proximate cause, which means that if somebody’s stack burns up, for the owner to file a court case there has to be a physically close fire started by a human within a reasonable time before the stack catches fire. So while this verse says acher and not reehu (another and not his neighbor), the trial should take into account proximate cause.

The imperfect aspect also acknowledges that this is something people sometimes do, which is not required or prohibited by Jewish law. (Burning off weeds would be a reason for setting the fire.) The ki commandments in Torah might therefore be prohibited by a later court.

Now we edge over into the confusion between this “if”, and the ki- of ki-tov in the creation story. In Exodus 21:7 we have what looks like another if-then.

ז וְכִֽי־יִמְכֹּ֥ר אִ֛ישׁ אֶת־בִּתּ֖וֹ לְאָמָ֑ה לֹ֥א תֵצֵ֖א כְּצֵ֥את הָֽעֲבָדִֽים:

But it’s not the same thing as shown by later commandments using the hyphenated word.  The real if-then is in verse 2:

ב כִּ֤י תִקְנֶה֙ עֶ֣בֶד עִבְרִ֔י שֵׁ֥שׁ שָׁנִ֖ים יַֽעֲבֹ֑ד וּבַ֨שְּׁבִעִ֔ת יֵצֵ֥א לַֽחָפְשִׁ֖י חִנָּֽם:

Verse 2 establishes the concept of the exclusive services contract along with its conditions like the term limitation. Verse 7 goes into a case when this happens to an underage girl, instead of a man. The point of the ki-yimkor is that the subject of this contract has already been brought up, now we’re changing the conditions of the situation to see how the law applies to a nonage girl.

In commandments that start with the hyphenated version, some previous commandment establishes the situation as something that can happen under Jewish law; it’s something that is neither required nor prohibited.

Jewish courts aren’t allowed to meddle with requirements or prohibitions in Torah, other than setting standards for whether we care that the commandment might have been transgressed. Thus for utensils, if they are broken to the point that they can’t serve their ordinary purpose, we don’t care if they’ve been exposed to corpses or other sources of tumah.

Jewish courts are allowed to prohibit things that were previously permitted, if they weren’t required. So they are allowed to prohibit setting fire to your field no matter what your reason is.  

And they are allowed to prohibit a man from taking out an exclusive services contract on his underage daughter. Which they did in the middle ages. Meanwhile, in the 21^st century, more than one U.S. state still allows child marriages.

So remember, with the hyphen it’s talking about an existing situation, status, or condition, but without the hyphen, it’s the klal of an allowed action that may have consequences which a court can punish.

Knitting -- my Fana jumper

So of course I had to try a Fana top to try and promote this Norwegian pattern, which is in the DG267 catalog I told you about.

The characteristic features of a Fana are:
1: narrow bands in your two (major) colors, 5 rows high; the middle row has single stitches in the other color. Traditionally these are black and white but nowadays other colors are cropping up. Alternate the entire length of the body and sleeves except:
2: a band in the yoke and at the top of the sleeve with the Fana stars.
3: usually a checkerboard at the bottom of body and sleeves although I have seen photos of knitwear without it.

Fanas can be either sweaters or jumpers; one website says the sweaters came out about 1900. DG267 shows both sweaters and jumpers. The photos at this site show one with sections on it like the sections on an Aran sweater.
https://www.starsandfield.com/weblog/2019/11/9/the-kirsten-project-fana-sweaters-of-norway

There are also gloves (votter) and socks (sokker). The sock pattern here uses 3-row stripes. Notice that the heel flap is checkerboard but where the pattern turns the heel is solid color; so is the toe.
https://knittingtraditions.com/product/norwegian-fana-socks/

Here are photos of mittens from Sandnes Garn. Some are Fana and some are Selbu.
https://www.sandnesgarn.no/catalogsearch/result/?q=votter#q=votter&idx=production_default_products&p=0&fR%5Bsg_theme%5D%5B0%5D=Tradisjonsstrikk&fR%5Bsg_type%5D%5B0%5D=Strikke&is_v=1

Here is a chart for the Fana star.

Again, like the Mariusgenser, this pattern is usually made in DK/sport. No matter which weight I used, I would have to do some finagling. For example, my back is an inch shorter than in other people with my measurements. That's one of the reasons the pattern went below the armpits on my Mariusgenser. If I did as many stripes as in the jumper in DG267, the jumper would go well below my waist and I would need extra width to go around my hips.

With Palette, I need 312 stitches in the hem to fit 26 stars around the top. But the checkerboard at hem and wrists is much smaller than if I used DK. I could make the checks 9x9 instead of 3x3, but it would add 3-4 inches to the body. (And of course I would have to bleed those stitches out in the stripes so as to only have 312 stitches when I got to the stars.) The alternatives would be to take out 6 of the stripes or do only a 3-level checkerboard instead of 5. So I stuck with the stitch counts in the motifs that I found in the DG267 instructions.

You may not have to face these issues but I'm telling you about finagles because if you're going to knit by hand for yourself, you deserve something that fits you. We've all had enough of the mass-produced alternative to custom-fitting.

Anyway, at the hem do 3 rounds of K1/P1 rib and then work the checkerboard.  Knit in the round until you get to the armpits and then work on the flat, and knit together at the shoulders. Work a K1/P1 turtleneck as shown in the photo. Work the sleeves in either direction, with the 3 rounds of K1/P1 rib at the cuffs. I suggest working bottom up and then joining to the body as soon as you finish.

The tradition is to have white dots on the black stripes and black dots on the white stripes. I had a skein of Tarragon and I used that for all the dots. Of course, nowadays with the multi-color fanas shown on Ravelry, the knitters had to figure something else out. 

Oh yes: here's a chart for the Selbu Rose. Notice that the petals are not joined; that's the difference between this and the rays of the Fana star. I don't know if one of them is a version of the other but the Selbu rose is known from the Renaissance period and was resurrected in the 1950s. I don't know how far back the Fana pattern goes.

These and the X on the Setesdal pattern are traditional Norwegian motifs. If you see a sweater or jumper advertised as Fair Isle and they have these three motifs, probably whoever wrote the promotional copy didn't know what he was talking about.

21st Century Bible Hebrew -- v'hayah/v'hayu

I said something last week that I don’t think I discussed before, which is a real shame because the grammar occurs a lot in Torah but is always mistranslated.

Genesis 2:24 ends with a phrase that I translated “from then on X”.

כד עַל־כֵּן֙ יַֽעֲזָב־אִ֔ישׁ אֶת־אָבִ֖יו וְאֶת־אִמּ֑וֹ וְדָבַ֣ק בְּאִשְׁתּ֔וֹ וְהָי֖וּ לְבָשָׂ֥ר אֶחָֽד:

As we all know, hayah is “be”. Hayu is “they were”, perfect aspect. So you would imagine that this is the man and his wife forever being one flesh, which can be true, except that the grammar is also correct for an oblique modality, the result of setting one’s parents aside.

Also, hayah l’ means “turn into”.

But look at this important set of verses, Deuteronomy 11:13-14.

יג וְהָיָ֗ה אִם־שָׁמֹ֤עַ תִּשְׁמְעוּ֙ אֶל־מִצְוֹתַ֔י אֲשֶׁ֧ר אָֽנֹכִ֛י מְצַוֶּ֥ה אֶתְכֶ֖ם הַיּ֑וֹם לְאַֽהֲבָ֞ה אֶת־יְהוָֹ֤ה אֱלֹֽהֵיכֶם֙ וּלְעָבְד֔וֹ בְּכָל־לְבַבְכֶ֖ם וּבְכָל־נַפְשְׁכֶֽם:

יד וְנָֽתַתִּ֧י מְטַֽר־אַרְצְכֶ֛ם בְּעִתּ֖וֹ יוֹרֶ֣ה וּמַלְק֑וֹשׁ וְאָֽסַפְתָּ֣ דְגָנֶ֔ךָ וְתִירֹֽשְׁךָ֖ וְיִצְהָרֶֽךָ:

From then on, if you duly listen to My commandments that I command you today; to love the Lord your Gd and serve Him [exclusively] with all your heart and with all your soul,

Then I shall set the rain of your land at its period, lighter or heavier, so that you collect your increase, your wine and oil.

We can’t call v’hayah at the start of verse 13 an oblique modality. The preceding three verses describe the Holy Land. There is no necessary connection between believing that the Holy Land is as stated in those verses, and v’hayah. V’hayah introduces a conditional “if”, im shamoa, etc.

This is sort of the converse of va-y’hi as an evidentiary epistemic about time. Not “it must have been at that time,” but “From that point on” and then whatever will happen.

I had to search on all the occurrences of possible forms and analyze the context to see what was going on. V’hayah and v’hayu can be translated as “then” but, as we all know, “then” can simply be one step into the future. The context is always about something that persists long-term. A case in point is Numbers 35:12:

יב וְהָי֨וּ לָכֶ֧ם הֶֽעָרִ֛ים לְמִקְלָ֖ט מִגֹּאֵ֑ל וְלֹ֤א יָמוּת֙ הָֽרֹצֵ֔חַ עַד־עָמְד֛וֹ לִפְנֵ֥י הָֽעֵדָ֖ה לַמִּשְׁפָּֽט:

From then on they are for you cities for [the purpose of] refuge from the [blood] redeemer so that the murderer does not die until his standing before the witness for judgment.

Now, while hayah l’ means “turn into”, you can’t say that these cities “turn into you”. So the other possibility is that this is like the verse in Deuteronomy and means that from the point when the cities of refuge are set aside, they have a purpose which the rest of the verse states. This is one more example of how you have to analyze the context before just assuming that the meaning you are most familiar with applies everywhere.

These words are sometimes translated “it shall come to pass”. For once, this is not the fault of the horrible Septuagint. It ignores v’hayah in the verse from Deuteronomy and goes straight to “if”. It uses a future tense in the verse from Numbers. Where the translators got “it shall come to pass” is a mystery to me. But since it doesn’t apply in every place where we find v’hayah/v’hayu, and “from then on” does, I’ll go with the more consistent concept.

21st Century Bible Hebrew -- oblique modality

The third type of modality is called oblique. I’m not sure why it’s called that, but how it works in BH might be a clue.

Oblique modality requires a main and a subordinate clause.

The main clause says something generally or specifically known; its truth is always assumed.

The subordinate clause is supposed to be accepted on the strength of the truth of the main clause. It’s not a direct truth, it’s sort of off to one side.

The syntax is main clause plus vav plus a perfect aspect verb plus the subject.

Note that this is a change from the imperfect aspect base of other modality.

The subject may be the personal information encoded in the perfect aspect suffix, or may be named in the main clause or the rest of the context.

Oblique modality may encode the existence of a condition or a purpose, result, cause or effect.

One of the best and earliest examples is Genesis 2:24:

כד עַל־כֵּן֙ יַֽעֲזָב־אִ֔ישׁ אֶת־אָבִ֖יו וְאֶת־אִמּ֑וֹ וְדָבַ֣ק בְּאִשְׁתּ֔וֹ וְהָי֖וּ לְבָשָׂ֥ר אֶחָֽד:

Yaazov is the man setting his parents on one side; that is the situation in which the result will be his clinging to his wife (v’davaq). From that point on (v’hayu) they become one flesh. The subject of the oblique modality v’davaq is understood to be ish, “man”, because the verb is 3^rd masculine singular.

If you have been taught that the three verbs in this sentence are three independent actions, now you know differently. Men can’t properly cling to their wives unless they decide to keep their parents from interfering with the marriage.

The result and purpose uses are the most common for oblique modality. Genesis 33:13 has an effect modality:

יג וַיֹּ֣אמֶר אֵלָ֗יו אֲדֹנִ֤י יֹדֵ֨עַ֙ כִּֽי־הַיְלָדִ֣ים רַכִּ֔ים וְהַצֹּ֥אן וְהַבָּקָ֖ר עָל֣וֹת עָלָ֑י וּדְפָקוּם֙ י֣וֹם אֶחָ֔ד וָמֵ֖תוּ כָּל־הַצֹּֽאן:

He said to him [Esav], “My lord knows about the children being weak, and the depending on me of the sheep and cattle; if one pressures them one day, [then] all the herd will die.”

Notice that Yaaqov uses progressive aspect as a description of Esav, yodea, and says what it is that Esav knows. Then drawing on their shared past as shepherds, Yaaqov tells Esav the effect of pressuring the young of man and beast to move too fast.

Exodus 12:11-12 has a rare oblique of cause:

יא וְכָ֘כָה֘ תֹּֽאכְל֣וּ אֹתוֹ֒ מָתְנֵיכֶ֣ם חֲגֻרִ֔ים נַֽעֲלֵיכֶם֙ בְּרַגְלֵיכֶ֔ם וּמַקֶּלְכֶ֖ם בְּיֶדְכֶ֑ם וַֽאֲכַלְתֶּ֤ם אֹתוֹ֙ בְּחִפָּז֔וֹן פֶּ֥סַח ה֖וּא לַיהוָֹֽה:

יב וְעָֽבַרְתִּ֣י בְאֶֽרֶץ־מִצְרַ֘יִם֘ בַּלַּ֣יְלָה הַזֶּה֒ וְהִכֵּיתִ֤י כָל־בְּכוֹר֙ בְּאֶ֣רֶץ מִצְרַ֔יִם מֵֽאָדָ֖ם וְעַד־בְּהֵמָ֑ה וּבְכָל־אֱלֹהֵ֥י מִצְרַ֛יִם אֶֽעֱשֶׂ֥ה שְׁפָטִ֖ים אֲנִ֥י יְהוָֹֽה:

Thus you eat it, your clothes girded, shoes on your feet, staves in your hands; eat it in chipazon, it is Pesach to ****

I pass in the land of Egypt this nght, I strike every firstborn in the land of Egypt fro an to beast; against all the gods of Egypt I shall do judgment, I am ****

This seems backward to us, because how could observing the commandments of Passover in verse 11 be supporting evidence for something that will be happening at the same time? In fact in Egypt the Israelites had to be collected into houses with each other. Only then did Gd do His thing. Picking “cause” is a process of elimination, since we know that the observance by the humans does not have the purpose or result or effect of what Gd did; He was already going to do it.

With the initial vav, an oblique modality is easily mistaken for a commandment like v’akhaltem. A commandment will not be in 1st person, and it does not need a main clause of fact to support it; it can be the main clause. But the possibility of confusion is why Torah has to be read carefully, with attention to the grammar, not as one runs.

Knitting -- men who knit

Unfortunately one man who knits, well known on Ravelry, has passed. But his family did a wonderful thing for us knitters, whatever our families may think, by making his work available free.

So here is the page of things that are free for only a registration with Ravelry. I may have to do this some day but I'm so busy it hasn't reached the top of my queue yet.
https://www.ravelry.com/bundles/the-freebies

Go there just for the pictures. A lot of MMario's patterns are lace to die for.

The other men's knitting tradition is socks. In Germany in the Middle Ages there was a sock-maker's guild and it only accepted men. That's what they mean when they call sexism "medieval". The knitters used to travel from market to market, on foot, knitting as they went. I don't mean getting to market and sitting down and knitting. I mean knitting on your feet while moving.

There are men producing the famous Cowichan sweaters in the Pacific Northwest.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ynpvos7UFZo

And finally, all the demos at the New Stitch a Day site are done and voiced by a man.

What's important to know for both women and men is that you can knit while watching the game. The Irish pit knitting style actually goes faster if you don't watch your fingers. Once you get the hang of it, it's like the old joke about the centipede walking: if he thought about it at all, he wound up on his back in the ditch, confused about which leg to move next.

So guys, steal your woman's tools and her stash and get out there and knit!