CIV(ILIZATION)
YaSHah(V) Yod-Shin-Bhet
Ya-SHOVE ישב [YSH-(V) à soft-CV]
ROOTS: The root of CIVILATION is said to be Latin cīvis (resident). The
Latin Lovers of lexicography (a field we can now shelve in the library’s
“fiction” section) might imagine that the Italic ancestors of the Romans had a
concept of CIVILIZATION when they were yet club-wielding cavemen. But becoming
culturally and intellectually refined took a while. Latin cīvis (resident, later
townsman… still later, a citizen) is simply about being situated somewhere, not
about being CIVIL enouph to pit captives against lions in Coliseum sport. How
much CIVILITY is there in CIVIL WARS? Latin
cīvis is pronounced
like “tshivis.”
A resident of Canaan is a תושב TOASHah(V) in Genesis 23:4.
The Modern Hebrew for “civilization” is ישוב YiSHOO(V). ישב YaSHaiV is to dwell or sit. The imperative שבה SHiBHaH, dwell or settle, appears in Genesis
29:19. The core-root is just the ש-ב Shin-Bet of שב
SHahBH or SHahV, he
returned (II Kings 2:25), while the formal is שוב
SHOO(V) or SHOOBH (Isaiah
52:8). This last verse is about the return to Zion from a long, far Exile. The ש-ב Shin-Bet opposite of returning home is שבה SHa(V)aH, being taken away from home in שבות SH’(V)OOT, captivity. Lot goes from a ישב YoaSHai(V) (resident) to being
captive, נשבה
NiSHBaH, in two verses: Genesis 14:12-14.
Home base is a reversal of that fricative-bilabial:
בית
BaYi(S) or BaYiT. On שבת SHaBaT (Sabbath day) we return to our homes, our souls, to sit
in peace, without getting and spending.
Freedom from the ring tones of the
rat race … now that’s civilization.
BRANCHES: CIVIC, CIVILIAN, CIVILITY, CIVILIZE and CIVVIES
are from cīvis, Roman residency.
Western CIVILIZATION has advanced so much since
the Romans that unwanted babies are now sliced up by physicians in sterile clinics,
rather than being birthed, then left on rocks to die.
See “MUNDANE” for “world” words that are more
scientific or geographical. In Slavic the focus is on the inhabited world, the ישוב YeeSHOOBH (settled area, where people ישב YaSHahBH, dwell ). Perhaps the best preserved ישוב YeeSHOOBH is Croatian svijet (M2321). Other Slavic fricative-bilabial words for "world" include Belarusian свеце sviecie, Polish świata , Serbian свет svet … (similar
in Bulgarian, Czech, Slovak, Slovenian
and Ukrainian). Polish also has reversed Shin-Bet “dwelling” words like : WieŚ (village) < ß S-F S-B, extending our S-B root to מושב MOASHahBH,
rural settlement.
Albanian “region, land, country” is vis, another Babel-babble reversal of ש-ב Shin-Bet .
Lithuanian is the rare language that uses (Latin?) CV in its “citizen” and “civilian” word: civilis. Possibly related is Russian zhivushchiy живущий, living, indwelling. A Swedish resident, bosatt, might br reversing תושב TOASHahBH (resident). In Uzbek/ Turkic yashovchi is an inhabitant, denizen
or dweller.
When searching “resident” words, forms of אחזה AK[H]ooZaH (property -- Genesis 23:4) came up. אחוזה AK[H]ahZ is to settle (Genesis 47:27). An authentic
local resident or citizen was one who inherited land holdings -- see
“HAS.” The Chichewa nzika (citizen, native, inhabitant) echos the Basque “resident,” auzoko. The Basques, the famous linquistic isolates of the Pyranees, are not
being suggested as long-lost relatives of the Bantu speakers of South Central
Africa. But perhaps these two people are prehistoric long-lost relatives from a
homo sapiens homeland that we may call Eden.---------
This new entry will appear in the 2017 E-Word: Edenics Digital Dictionary. 1700+ pages, $15 at edenics.org,
in time for holiday orders in mid-December 2016