What’s in a Word?

cognition

hearing

שמע · האזין · אוזן

Bottom line

Haazinu is from ozen, an ear: give ear, the plain physical act of listening. Shema is hear in the fuller sense, taking in what is said and understanding it (Malbim), or hearkening in answer to a call (Rokeach). On distance, the Sifrei has haazinu for what is near and shema for what is far; Chizkuni, Abarbanel and Rabbi Yitzchak Arama hold the reverse. The trap: English "hear" and "listen" are used loosely, but Devarim 32:1 and Yeshayahu 1:2 assign the two Hebrew verbs to heaven and earth in opposite order, and any translation that does not keep them apart destroys the question the meforshim are answering.

Distinctions

haazinu (האזינו)

From ozen, ear. On this reading the verb names the ear's own work, catching sound and passing it on, with nothing said about whether the hearer grasped it. Rokeach: haazinu is simply listening of any kind, the unmarked verb. Elsewhere he offers a second distinction: haazinu is listening and inferring something only said implicitly, against shema for what was stated explicitly. The Sifrei (to parashas Haazinu): haazinu is listening from close range.

shema (שמע)

Malbim: shema is not merely the physical act; it carries a measure of intellectual or emotional grasp of what is heard. Rokeach: shema is hearkening in response to another's call, that is, hearing that answers. The column notes that these two explanations, Malbim's and Rokeach's first, fail to account for the change in phraseology between Moshe's opening and Yeshayahu's, which is the question the essay set out with; Rokeach's second distinction is brought after that observation. The Sifrei: shema is listening from a distance, which demands that a man be especially attentive to the sound, concentrate properly, hear what should be heard, and focus on its meaning.

the reversal in Devarim and Yeshayahu

Moshe Rabbeinu opens with haazinu hashamayim and v'sishma haaretz (Devarim 32:1); Yeshayahu opens with shimu shamayim and v'haazini eretz (Yeshayahu 1:2), exactly reversed. The Sifrei resolves it by proximity: each navi used the near-verb for what he was near to. Moshe was nearer the heavens and so said haazinu to them; Yeshayahu was nearer the earth and said haazini to it. Why one navi should count as nearer heaven than another, given that both were nevi'im, is answered three ways in the meforshim: that Moshe spoke his shirah just before his petirah, with one foot already above, while Yeshayahu spoke at the opening of his career; that Moshe is the father of all the nevi'im, who alone heard "mouth to mouth, in a clear vision and not in riddles" (Bamidbar 12:8), and whose nevuah became the Torah itself, where Yeshayahu's upheld it; and that Moshe was used to ascending, having gone up the mountain repeatedly and for long stretches.

Chizkuni, Abarbanel and Rabbi Yitzchak Arama reject the Sifrei's assignment and define the two verbs the other way round, explaining the difference between the two nevi'im accordingly. Some of the Baalei HaTosafos take the two words as interchangeable, used for the poetry of the verse; most meforshim will not allow true synonyms in lashon hakodesh and therefore must distinguish them.

Rendering guidance

  • Devarim 32:1: "Give ear, O heavens, and I will speak; and let the earth hear the words of my mouth." Yeshayahu 1:2: "Hear, O heavens, and give ear, O earth." Keep "give ear" for haazinu and "hear" for shema in both, so the reversal is visible in English. This is the whole datum.
  • שמע ישראל (Devarim 6:4): "Hear, O Yisrael." Not "listen"; by Malbim the word already carries understanding, and by Rokeach it carries answering a call, both of which "hear" holds and "listen" weakens.
  • Trap: English "listen" is the natural word for attentive hearing and will pull toward shema, while "hear" sounds passive and will pull toward haazinu, which is the reverse of the Hebrew. Resist the instinct: haazinu is the ear, shema is the mind.
  • Where shema means to obey (shamoa tishme'u), render "hearken" or "obey" and note the shift. (This bullet is ours; the article does not treat the obedience sense.)
  • If a passage follows Chizkuni, Abarbanel or Rabbi Yitzchak Arama rather than the Sifrei, say which view the rendering assumes rather than choosing silently; the two sides assign near and far to opposite words, and each explains the difference between Moshe and Yeshayahu accordingly.

Sources

Rabbi Reuven Chaim Klein, "Listen Up!", What's in a Word?, Ohr Somayach, 10 Tammuz 5776 (2016-07-16); raw text at sources/whats-in-a-word/raw/6850-listen-up.md. Primary loci cited: Devarim 32:1 and 6:4; Yeshayahu 1:2; Bamidbar 12:8; Sifrei to parashas Haazinu; Chizkuni, Abarbanel and Rabbi Yitzchak Arama, whom the article names without giving a locus; Malbim; Rokeach, in two places.