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Shoah


Question:

I heard that tonight begins the Holocaust Day. Can you give me some more info on the origin of this word and its meaning? Thanks.



AskTheRabbi.org answered:

The term holocaust originally derived from the Greek word holokauston, meaning a " whole (holos) burnt (kaustos)" sacrificial offering to a god. For hundreds of years, the word holocaust was used in English to denote massive sacrifices and great slaughters or massacres. After World War II, the word was used to describe Nazi atrocities and attempted genocide of the Jews.

The biblical word Shoah, meaning "calamity," became the standard Hebrew term for the Holocaust as early as the 1940s. Shoah is preferred by many Jews for a number of reasons, including the theologically offensive nature of the word holocaust, as a Greek pagan custom.

The word Shoah was chosen in Israel to describe the Holocaust, the term institutionalized by the Knesset on April 12, 1951, when it established Yom HaShoah VeMered HaGetaot, the national day of remembrance. Nowadays the word Holocaust has come to refer principally to the genocide of the European Jews.


 
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