הִמּוּר (himur) — a bet; gambling
Etymology
The words הִמּוּר (a bet, gambling) and הִתְעָרְבוּת (a wager) are related but not identical. A הִמּוּר involves staking resources on an uncertain, often random outcome — especially games of chance. הִתְעָרְבוּת is an agreement between parties to perform some action (usually pay money) if a factual question was answered incorrectly or a prediction failed to materialize. The linguistic history of both words is entangled, and both trace to a creative misreading of a Talmudic text.
The story begins with a famous passage in the Babylonian Talmud (Shabbat 31a) about a bet on the patience of Hillel the Elder. Two men wagered 400 zuz: whoever could provoke Hillel to anger would win. One went to Hillel on the eve of Shabbat — when Hillel was washing his hair — and repeatedly interrupted him with absurd questions ("Why are Babylonians' heads round?" "Why are Palmyrenes' eyes bleary?"). Hillel answered each question with good-natured patience. When the man finally declared that he regretted meeting such an infuriatingly patient person because the bet had cost him 400 zuz, Hillel replied: "Better that you lose 400 zuz than that Hillel should lose his temper." In this story the Talmud uses the verb הִמְרוּ to describe the betting. This verb is most naturally read as from the root מר״י in the Hifil — meaning "they rebelled" — in the sense of "they challenged each other." But Rashi, in his commentary, read it as meaning "they wagered," linking it to a phrase about gambling on pigeons in Sanhedrin.
This interpretive sleight of hand gave the verb הִמְרָה the meaning "to make a wager," and the form appeared in subsequent rabbinic literature — including the Shulhan Arukh. Enlightenment-era writers began using the verb in this sense from the late 18th century onward. In the 1870s, the forms הִמְרָה and הַמְרָאָה appear in the Hebrew press. Then in the 1920s, editors of הארץ began using a new form — הִמֵּר, with the verbal noun הִמּוּר — as though the root were a regular Pi'el root ה.מ.ר. This was grammatically anomalous, and prescriptivists objected loudly: Shaul Perlmutter wrote against it in 1944, Yitzhak Avinery in 1947, and Nisan Berggreen in 1957 in לשוננו לעם still hoped the error would be eradicated. It was not. The form הִמּוּר / הִמֵּר had entered common usage and stayed.
The parallel word הִתְעָרְבוּת has its own interesting genealogy: Rashi in his commentary on II Kings 18:23 — where the Assyrian general Rabshakeh challenges King Hezekiah to "התערב" — interpreted the verse as a wager ("come, let's bet: if you have 2000 riders I'll give you 2000 horses"), and this interpretation gave the verb הִתְעָרֵב its modern sense of "to make a bet or wager." Both words, then, are Rashi's legacy.
Key Quotes
"מעשה בשני בני אדם שהמרו זה את זה: אמרו כל מי שילך ויקניט את הלל יטול 400 זוז" — תלמוד בבלי, שבת ל״א, א׳
"הכותב בחשבו ש׳המרו׳ בא מהשרש ׳המר׳ מבנין השלמים בבנין פיעל...ולא היא. ׳המרו׳ שרשו ׳מרה׳ (נל״ה) בבנין הפעיל" — שאול פרלמוטר, לשוננו לעם, מאי 1944
"לפיכך אי אפשר לומר על כך ׳שבשתא כיון דעל על׳, ועל עורכי העיתונים החובה מוטלת לשרש שיבוש זה" — ניסן ברגגרין, לשוננו לעם, 1957
Timeline
- Talmudic era: Hillel betting story uses הִמְרוּ (actually from root מר״י)
- 11th century: Rashi interprets הִמְרוּ as meaning "they wagered"; also interprets התערב in II Kings as a wager
- 18th century onward: Maskilim begin using הִמְרָה / הַמְרָאָה in the Rashi-derived sense
- 1870s: Verb and verbal noun המרה / המראה appear in Hebrew press
- 1920s: New form הִמֵּר / הִמּוּר appears in הארץ, based on misanalysis as Pi'el
- 1944: Perlmutter criticizes the form in לשוננו לעם
- 1947: Avinery also objects
- 1957: Berggreen still calling for the "error" to be eradicated
- 2000: Hebrew Language Academy formally accepts מֶקַח alongside מִקָּח (the related noun), acknowledging the colloquial form
Related Words
- הִתְעָרְבוּת — a wager, bet (parallel term with distinct nuance; also Rashi-derived)
- מַמְרֶה / מֵרֶה — one who rebels (from the actual root מר״י)
- מִקָּח / מֶקַח — the purchase-price root connected to the related history of התמקחות