emotion
laughter
At a glance
In short
Tzchok and s'chok both mean laughter, and whether they differ is disputed. The lexicographers Menachem Ibn Saruk, Ibn Janach and Rabbi Shlomo Pappenheim make them one word, sin and tzadi interchanging, with no difference of meaning, and for Pappenheim it runs the full range from laughing and playing to mocking and deriding. The Ran, in his commentary on the Torah, separates them: tzechok is in the mouth, for joy, and sechok in the heart, by way of scorn. On the lexicographers' view, the readings of the two spellings Yitzchak and Yischak are homiletical and kabbalistic, and say nothing about what the words mean.
Distinctions
Tzchok (צחוק) and s'chok (שחוק): one word or two
Menachem Ibn Saruk, Ibn Janach and Rabbi Shlomo Pappenheim all hold that s'chok and tzchok mean exactly the same thing. Sin and tzadi are interchangeable, being formed at the same place in the mouth (see also HaKsav VeHaKabbalah to Shemos 25:29). The Yerushalmi (Berachos 1:6) assumes as much: Yitzchak's name, alone among the Avos, was never changed, because Hashem Himself gave it, which takes Yischak and Yitzchak as one name.
The commentary of the Ran on the Torah (Bereishis, p. 234): tzechok is in the mouth, for joy; sechok is in the heart, by way of scorn.
The core sense
Pappenheim: the root is laughter as an involuntary response to something from outside, whether a physical tickle or something funny. Both words carry the favorable senses (laughing, playing, enjoying) and the unfavorable ones (deriding, mocking). Rav Hirsch (to Bereishis 21:6) shows the two as one idea: mockery is the use of sarcasm and irony to make someone laugh at a person or a thing. See also Malbim to Shoftim 16:25, where Shimshon is brought out to "play."
Rav Hirsch (to Bereishis 17:17) further ties tzchok and s'chok to tzaakah and zaakah, crying out, on the interchange of ches and ayin. All four, he says, are man's reaction to a gap between what he sees and what he expected: a child in an adult's wig may make us laugh, an old man in a diaper may make us weep, and both are the same reflex reconciling sight with expectation. Pappenheim makes a similar point, but without comparing the etymologies of the words involved.
The sense at Yitzchak's birth
Avraham laughs at the news (Bereishis 17:17) and Sarah after him (Bereishis 18:12). When Yitzchak is born Sarah says tzchok asah li Elokim, kol hashomea yitzchak li (Bereishis 21:6), and there Onkelos and Rashi take the laughter as an outward expression of joy, not derision. Hence the name Yitzchak, "he will laugh" (Bereishis 17:19).
Yischak (ישחק): four places, and what is made of them
The name Yitzchak appears 108 times in Tanach; four times he is called Yischak: Yirmiyahu 33:26 (the seed of Avraham, Yischak and Yaakov); Amos 7:9 (the high places of Yischak) and 7:16 (the house of Yischak); Tehillim 105:9 (Hashem's oath to Yischak). That last is customarily said at a bris, while its parallel, Divrei HaYamim I 16:16, said in the daily tefillos, reads Yitzchak. Since the words are one word, the readings of the two spellings are esoteric ones:
- Rabbeinu Bachya (to Bereishis 17:19, Bamidbar 32:3): the name is really Yitzchak, and the nevi'im sometimes wrote it with a sin to hint that Yitzchak embodies din, likened to a raging fire, aish. Rabbi Klein adds on his own account that Pappenheim derives aish from the monoliteral shin, which he takes as solidifying the connection.
- Rabbi Shmuel Feivish Kahane, a seventeenth century sage, in Leket Shmuel, holds precisely the reverse: the name should have been Yischak, but a sin would have pointed at a raging judgment from which there would be no recovery, so the Torah writes a tzadi.
A further approach has it that the name, or at least its spelling, changed or will change.
- Rabbi Yehuda Moscato (1530 to 1593): in the future the name will change from Yitzchak to Yischak, since sin stands for sasson and simchah, and it appears only four times in Tanach as a hint that it comes into its own only once the four exiles are complete.
- Rabbi Shmuel Borenstein (1855 to 1926) uses a variation of that to settle an apparent contradiction: Berachos 61b and Sefer Yetzirah ch. 5 imply that the spleen answers to s'chok, while Tikkunei HaZohar (tikkun 84) associates the spleen with sadness. There are two laughters, he answers, the legitimate and holy against the illegitimate and impure; the holy is reserved for the future, az yimalei s'chok pinu (Tehillim 126:2), while until then most laughter is an illusion masking sadness and despondency, and it is that laughter of this world, itself a cover for sadness, that the spleen answers to. He concludes that in the future, when s'chok will mean laughter in its legitimate sense, the name will change from Yitzchak, tied to the holy laughter alone, to Yischak, drawn from the form of laughter that had been the unholy one.
- The Arizal (Shaar HaPesukim to Yeshayahu 52:3) also offers an explanation of the switch.
In other sources it seems that the original name was Yischak and was later changed to Yitzchak: when Yisrael cried out in Mitzrayim, Hashem asked the Avos which of them would give up the numerical value of his name to save them, and Yitzchak stepped forward and gave up the sin (300) for a tzadi (90), a difference of 210, which is why they were redeemed after an exile of 210 years (cited in numerous works, among them Imrei Noam to Shemos 6:2, which is called the Rosh to Shemos 6:1; Siddur Rokeach; Be'er Mayim Chaim to Bereishis 15:13; Leket Shmuel to Bereishis 25:19).
- The Vilna Gaon (to Sifra d'Tzniusa, end of ch. 3) writes that each of the three Avos had a lower name and a higher name; Rabbi Klein applies this to Yitzchak, alongside Avram and Avraham and Yaakov and Yisrael or Yeshurun, giving him two names, or at least two spellings of the one name, Yitzchak (lower) and Yischak (higher).
- Sefer HaShem, ascribed to the Rokeach, notes that Avraham, Yischak and Yeshurun together total 2448, the year of Matan Torah, taking final mem as 600 and final nun as 700.
Where the authorities disagree
Whether tzchok and s'chok differ at all.
- Menachem Ibn Saruk, Ibn Janach and Rabbi Shlomo Pappenheim: one word, sin and tzadi interchanging, with no difference of meaning.
- The Ran (commentary on the Torah, Bereishis p. 234): tzechok is in the mouth, for joy; sechok is in the heart, by way of scorn.
Radak on these roots
Sefer HaShorashim
צ-ח-ק
To laugh; and to make sport, whether in amusement and rejoicing, in mockery, or in abuse. All of them, he says, come under the sense of laughter.
Sarah's laughter
וַתִּצְחַק שָׂרָה בְּקִרְבָּהּ (Bereishis 18:12), and Sarah laughed within herself: that is, she laughed and said it within herself, and brought no word out of her mouth, which is why she denied it, out of fear. Or it means that she laughed by herself, with nobody seeing her laugh. The noun, צְחֹק עָשָׂה לִי אֱלֹהִים (Bereishis 21:6), God has made laughter for me, is laughter in the mouth.
Sport and play
In the heavy form, וַיְצַחֵק לִפְנֵיהֶם (Shoftim 16:25), and he made sport before them, מְצַחֵק אֵת רִבְקָה אִשְׁתּֽוֹ (Bereishis 26:8), sporting with Rivkah his wife, and וַיָּקֻמוּ לְצַחֵֽק (Shemos 32:6), and they rose up to make merry: this is amusement and rejoicing.
Mockery and abuse
לְצַחֶק־בי (Bereishis 39:17) is להתעולל בי, to deal abusively with me; and in אֲשֶׁר־יָֽלְדָה לְאַבְרָהָם מְצַחֵֽק (Bereishis 21:9), whom she had borne to Avraham, mocking, the word is מלעיג, mocking. All of them, he says, come under the sense of laughter.
לָמָּה זֶּה צָֽחֲקָה שָׂרָה (בראשית יח, יג), לֹא צָחַקְתִּי (בראשית טו), כָּל־הַשֹּׁמֵעַ יִֽצֲחַק־לִֽי כא, ו) וַתִּצְחַק שָׂרָה בְּקִרְבָּהּ יח, יב), כלומר צחקה ואמרה בקרבה לא שהוציאה דבר מפיה על כן כחשה בעבור היראה. או פירוש וַתִּצְחַק שָׂרָה בְּקִרְבָּהּ שצחקה בינה לבין עצמה שלא ראה אותה אדם צוחקת. והשם צְחֹק עָשָׂה לִי אֱלֹהִים כא, ו), זה צחוק בפה. והכבד [פִּעֵל] וַיְצַחֵק לִפְנֵיהֶם (שופטים טז, כה), מְצַחֵק אֵת רִבְקָה אִשְׁתּֽוֹ (בראשית כו, ח), וַיָּקֻמוּ לְצַחֵֽק (שמות לב, ו), וזה שעשוע ושמחה. לְצַחֶק־בי (בראשית לט, יז), להתעולל בי. אֲשֶׁר־יָֽלְדָה לְאַבְרָהָם מְצַחֵֽק (בראשית כא, ט), מלעיג וכולם נכנסים תחת ענין הצחוק.
ש-ח-קhis headword שׂחק
Laughter, which is sometimes a matter of joy and sometimes of mockery.
Laughing, and laughter
שָֽׂחֲקוּ עַל מִשְׁבַּתֶּֽהָ (Eichah 1:7), they laughed at her ceasing; לִשְׂחוֹק עֹשִׂים לֶחֶם (Koheles 10:19), bread is made for laughter; הָרֹאִים בִּשְׂחוֹק שִׁמְשֽׁוֹן (Shoftim 16:27), those who watched Shimshon's sport; and in another pattern, וְרֹֽזְנִים מִשְׂחָק לוֹ (Chavakuk 1:10), and rulers are a laughing matter to him.
The heavier forms
וְשִֽׂחַקְתִּי לִפְנֵי י"י (Shmuel II 6:21), and I will make merry before Hashem; קִרְאוּ לְשִׁמְשׁוֹן וִישַֽׂחֶק־לָנוּ (Shoftim 16:25), call Shimshon that he may make sport for us; מְשַֽׂחֲקִים לִפְנֵי י"י (Shmuel II 6:5), making merry before Hashem. Another heavy form: וַיִּֽהְיוּ מַשְׂחִיקִים עֲלֵיהֶם (Divrei HaYamim II 30:10), and they were laughing them to scorn.
Radak’s root שׂחק
שָֽׂחֲקוּ עַל מִשְׁבַּתֶּֽהָ (איכה א, ז), לִשְׂחוֹק עֹשִׂים לֶחֶם (קהלת י, יט), הָרֹאִים בִּשְׂחוֹק שִׁמְשֽׁוֹן (שופטים טז, כז). ומשקל אחר וְרֹֽזְנִים מִשְׂחָק לוֹ (חבקוק א, י). והכבד [פִּעֵל] וְשִֽׂחַקְתִּי לִפְנֵי י"י (שמואל ב' ו, כא), קִרְאוּ לְשִׁמְשׁוֹן וִישַֽׂחֶק־לָנוּ (שופטים טז, כה), מְשַֽׂחֲקִים לִפְנֵי י"י (שמואל ב' ו, ה). וכבד אחר [הִפְעִיל] וַיִּֽהְיוּ מַשְׂחִיקִים עֲלֵיהֶם (דברי הימים ב' ל, י). ענין השחוק יש שהוא בענין שמחה ויש בענין לעג.
To grind, a known sense, and more than treading; the noun שַׁחַק is dust, as the dust on the scales; of בַשַּׁחַק and שְׁחָקִים, skies, he says only that they are known.
Grinding
וְשָׁחַקְתָּ מִמֶּנָּה הָדֵק (Shemos 30:36), and you shall grind some of it fine; אֲבָנִים שָׁחֲקוּ מַיִם (Iyov 14:19), water wears stones away; and וְאֶשְׁחָקֵם כְּעָפָר עַל־פְּנֵי־רוּחַ (Tehillim 18:43), and I ground them like dust before the wind. The sense of grinding is known, and it is more than treading.
The noun, and שְׁחָקִים
The noun from it is וּכְשַׁחַק מֹאזְנַיִם (Yeshayahu 40:15), and like the dust of the scales, which he glosses as אבק, dust. Of כִּי מִי בַשַּׁחַק יַעֲרֹךְ לַי"י (Tehillim 89:7), for who in the skies can compare to Hashem, and וּבְגַאֲוָתוֹ שְׁחָקִים (Devarim 33:26), and in His majesty the skies, he says only that they are known.
Radak’s root שׁחק
וְשָֽׁחַקְתָּ מִמֶּנָּה הָדֵק (שמות ל, לו), אֲבָנִים שָֽׁחֲקוּ מַיִם (איוב יד, יט), וְֽאֶשְׁחָקֵם כְּעָפָר עַל־פְּנֵי־רוּחַ (תהלים יח, מג). ענין השחיקה ידוע והוא יותר מהדריכה, והשם ממנו וּכְשַׁחַק מֹאזְנַיִם (ישעיה מ, טו) אבק. כִּי מִי בַשַּׁחַק יַֽעֲרֹךְ לַי"י (תהלים פט, ז), וּבְגַֽאֲוָתוֹ שְׁחָקִֽים (דברים לג, כו), ידוע.
Radak, Sefer HaShorashim, Berlin 1847. Public domain, digitised by Sefaria from the National Library of Israel.
Sources
Rabbi Reuven Chaim Klein, "A Laughing Matter," What's in a Word?, Ohr Somayach, 31 October 2020.
Rabbi Reuven Chaim Klein, "A Laughing Matter," What's in a Word? Synonyms in the Hebrew Language (book manuscript).
Cited in the essay: Bereishis 15:13, 17:17, 17:19, 18:12, 21:6, 25:19; Shemos 6:2, 25:29; Bamidbar 32:3; Shoftim 16:25; Yeshayahu 52:3; Yirmiyahu 33:26; Amos 7:9, 7:16; Tehillim 105:9, 126:2; Divrei HaYamim I 16:16; Yerushalmi Berachos 1:6; Berachos 61b; Sefer Yetzirah ch. 5; Tikkunei HaZohar tikkun 84; Rav Hirsch to Bereishis 17:17 and 21:6; Malbim to Shoftim 16:25; HaKsav VeHaKabbalah to Shemos 25:29; Rabbeinu Bachya to Bereishis 17:19 and Bamidbar 32:3; Leket Shmuel; the Vilna Gaon to Sifra d'Tzniusa ch. 3; Arizal, Shaar HaPesukim; Sefer HaShem; Ran, commentary on the Torah, Bereishis p. 234.