licking

Distinctions

lechichah (לחיכה)

Root ל-ח-ך. Twice in the Torah, both in Balak's speech to the Midianite elders: the congregation will lick away everything around us as an ox licks away the grass of the field (Bamidbar 22:4). Four further times in Tanach (Melachim 18:38, which the article prints as Melachim II and which is Melachim I; Michah 7:17; Yeshayahu 49:23; Tehillim 72:9). Rabbi Yaakov Berger of Kiryat Sefer (Milon Leshon HaMikra) conjectures that the word derives from cheich, the palate, taking the initial lammed as no part of the core; Rabbi Yaakov Yehudah Zilberberg (Leshonenu HaKedoshah p. 304) connects it to cheich in a similar way, licking being the use of the tongue to roll liquid (lach) toward the palate. Ibn Parchon (Machberet He'Aruch): lechichah is eating quickly. Chazal extend it to fire, which "licked" (lichacha) a plowed field, in the sugya of one liable for a fire that scorches a field so that the owner must plow it again (Bava Kamma 6a; Yerushalmi Bava Kamma 6:5). The column suggests the flames coming out of the greater fire may be likened to a tongue coming out of a mouth to lick something, and then says plainly that beyond that it is at a loss to explain the connection, pointing to Melachim I 18:38 and the Targum to Malachi 3:19, where verbs for licking are again used of a fire singeing something. In Esther Rabbah 8:7 Mordechai says he would have licked (lechichah) the shoe on Haman's foot for the sake of Klal Yisrael had the honor of Heaven not been at stake, which fixes the word firmly in the register of degradation.

lekikah (לקיקה)

Root ל-ק-ק (Ibn Chayyuj, Ibn Janach, Radak, Ibn Parchon) or the biliteral ל-ק (Menachem Ibn Saruk, Rabbi Shlomo Pappenheim). Seven times in Tanach in two settings: Gideon's water test, where Hashem would not have him lead so large an army lest the miracle be less apparent, and the men who lapped (yalok) the water like a dog were kept and called hamelakekim, "the lickers," while those who knelt down to drink were taken as too steeped in avodah zarah and discharged (Shoftim 7:5-7); and Eliyahu's warning that at the spot where the dogs licked (lakeku) Navos's blood they will lick (yaloku) Achav's (Melachim I 21:19, fulfilled 22:38). Rabbi Pappenheim gives the biliteral core as "detaching something small from something larger," since a lick takes only a little at a time; on that core he groups yelek, the grasshopper that feeds by lekikah (Nachum 3:16; Yoel 1:4, 2:25), for which Ibn Ezra (to Yoel 1:4) cites a similar explanation in the name of the Karaite exegete Yefet ben Ali; melikah, the Kohen detaching a bird's head from its body with his finger, the head being smaller than the rest (Vayikra 1:15, 5:8); and lahakat (Shmuel I 19:20) as a subgroup drawn out of a larger grouping. (Others read lahak as a metathesis of kahal.) Ibn Parchon: lekikah is drinking without a vessel. Chazal read the root into two names: Amalek as am plus lak, the nation that came like a dog to lick Yisrael's blood as they left Mitzrayim (Tanchuma, Ki Seitzei 9; Pesikta D'Rav Kahana, Zachor 8), and Balak as ba plus l'lok, he who came to lick their blood (Midrash Aggadah to Balak, and so too Baal HaTurim and Sefer Russiana).

Are they one word or two?

Ibn Saruk and Radak define ל-ק-ק with cognates of ל-ח-ך, which treats the pair as synonyms; kuf, kaf, and ches interchange freely. Rabbi Shlomo of Urbino (Ohel Moed) lists them outright as synonyms, and Rabbi Asher Weiser (Mikra V'Lashon) reads lechichah as a cognate of lekikah, the column adding that he probably assumes the ches turns into the first kuf and the kaf into the second.

Against that, and along lines the column ties to Gesenius, Rabbi Moshe Tedeschi-Ashkenazi (Otzar Nirdafim 175) grants they mean the same act but separates them by sound: ל-ק imitates the slurp of taking up liquid, hence Gideon's soldiers at the water, while ל-ח-ך makes a harder sound implying the licking of something less liquid, hence the ox in the field, and he too anchors that root in cheich. Ibn Parchon's quick-eating versus vessel-less drinking the column reads as perhaps alluding to the same distinction. The Tedeschi and Ibn Parchon reading is the useful one for a translator; the majority position is simple synonymy.

the onomatopoeia excursus

Gesenius held that Semitic and Indo-European (his "Indo-Germanic") share many stem-words and grammatical roots, and put this down either to direct borrowing or to the two families independently coining similar words in imitation of the same natural sound. For the latter he adduces (Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar, Introduction §1:4) lakak and lachach in Hebrew, leicho in Greek, lingo in Latin, lecher in French, lecken in German and lick in English: all mean licking, and on his view they are not etymologically cognate but each an imitation of the sound of a lick. The column lengthens the list with lek (Afrikaans), likken (Dutch), slikke (Danish and Norwegian), sleikja (Icelandic), ligh (Irish), leccata (Italian), linge (Romanian), yaleaq (Arabic), and leki (Esperanto), and then dissents in its own voice: the onomatopoeia account is not enough, it says, since different cultures hear and record the same natural sound differently, and the resemblance across so many languages rather suggests to it that Indo-European languages may have borrowed from or evolved out of Semitic ones, as it notes some linguists posit, instead of developing alongside them independently.

Separately, the column raises the root ל-ק-ה, hitting or smiting, the root of malkus, lashes. It says this may not be connected to lekikah at all, but that one could argue the whip is like a tongue lashing the sinner's body as a tongue licks. It notes the parallel that English "lick" means both to smite or defeat an enemy (an idiom it traces to Bamidbar 22:4) and to pass the tongue over something, and that linguists would probably call that resemblance to ל-ק-ה and ל-ק-ק pure chance.

Rendering guidance

• Bamidbar 22:4 (yelachaku, twice): "lick away" or "lick clean." Do not soften to "graze"; the mashal wants the totality of what the ox leaves behind.
• Shoftim 7:5-7 (yalok, hamelakekim): "lap" and "the lappers." English "lick" here loses the dog and loses the test.
• Melachim I 21:19 (dogs and blood): "lick" is right and should stay ugly.
• Trap: English "lick" absorbs both words without a trace. If a passage sets the two side by side, or a derashah hangs on the root (Amalek, Balak), fix lekikah to "lap" and reserve "lick" for lechichah, and say in a note that the Hebrew uses two roots.
• Second trap: "lick" in English also means to beat or defeat, an idiom the column traces to Bamidbar 22:4 itself. That makes "lick" serviceable in Balak's mouth, but never use it that way for lekikah.

Sources

Rabbi Reuven Chaim Klein, "Balak: Lick It Up," What's in a Word?, Ohr Somayach, 14 Tamuz 5784 (2024-07-20): sources/whats-in-a-word/raw/11448-balak-lick-it-up.md. Primary loci: Bamidbar 22:4; Michah 7:17; Yeshayahu 49:23; Tehillim 72:9; Shoftim 7:5-7; Melachim I 18:38, 21:19, 22:38 (the article prints II Melachim 18:38 for the fire episode; the Eliyahu fire on Har HaCarmel that "licked" the water is Melachim I 18:38); Vayikra 1:15 and 5:8; Shmuel I 19:20; Nachum 3:16; Yoel 1:4 and 2:25; Bava Kamma 6a and Yerushalmi Bava Kamma 6:5; Esther Rabbah 8:7; Tanchuma, Ki Seitzei 9; Pesikta D'Rav Kahana, Zachor 8; Machberes Menachem; Ibn Parchon, Machberes He'Aruch; Rabbi Shlomo Pappenheim, Cheshek Shlomo; Rabbi Shlomo of Urbino, Ohel Moed; Rabbi Moshe Tedeschi-Ashkenazi, Otzar Nirdafim 175; Targum to Malachi 3:19; Midrash Aggadah to Balak; Baal HaTurim; Sefer Russiana; Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar, Introduction §1:4; Ibn Ezra to Yoel 1:4 citing Yefet ben Ali. The comparative and academic material the article carries, Gesenius on onomatopoeia and the column's own dissent from it, is reported here as the article reports it.