Talk:raca

What about the more common biblical meaning, "worthless", derived from Hebrew?

RFV discussion: May 2016–April 2017

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raca

Rfv-sense - Latin noun. Not in Lewis and Short. Needs headword correcting if OK. SemperBlotto (talk) 14:34, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

It's not really a Latin word, it's an Aramaic word in Latin transliteration. Many English translations also use "raca" in Matthew 5:22, but that doesn't make it an English word either. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 14:41, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

Well, strictly speaking, it's a Latin transliteration of a Biblical Greek transliteration (ῥακά (rhaká) of an Aramaic word (ריקא (reika, “empty one”)). My Vulgate spells it as racha and my Peshitta spells it as ܪܰܩܰܐ (raka)/רַקַא (raka). Chuck Entz (talk) 15:41, 8 May 2016 (UTC)

In Latin there's also āmēn, which can also be found in dictionaries. So raca could be Latin too.
Georges' dictionary has raca, see raca in Georges' dictionary at www.zeno.org: "raca (see note below), eitler Wicht, ein Schimpfwort, Vulg. Matth. 5, 22. Augustin. de doctr. Chr. 2, 11, 16.".
Some Vulgates have the spelling raca, like Latin Vulgate (Clementine), others have racha, like Wikisource's Biblia Sacra Vulgata (Stuttgartensia) and Nova Vulgata.
So the word should be attestable in Latin. However, gender and declension could be unknown. -Ikiaika (talk) 11:31, 9 May 2016 (UTC)

Some additions:

• Note to Georges' text quoted above: The Semitic characters at www.zeno.org are different from the characters in Georges dictionary. They seem to be similar to but different from ריקא.
• Augustinus Hipponensis - De Doctrina Christiana libri quatuor - Liber II spells it Racha. Other editions have it as Racha or racha, often with italics or quotation marks, but there could be an edition with raca.
  BTW: Different spellings of the other foreign words in this example are: Amen, Halleluja (Halleluia, Alleluia), Hosanna (Osanna).
• Texte und Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der altchristlichen Literatur contains "et raca". Lehrbuch der Kirchengeschichte has the same example (though it has Geennam and not gehennam) and mentions a source: Hieron. adv. Jov. II, 20, which can be found at Hieronymus - Adversus Jovinianum Libri Duo - Catholica Omnia (PDF page 54, column 328). Latin text: "Qui fratri dixerit fatue et raca, reus erit gehennae (Geennae)".
  Is this the same word? Georges has another raca, see racana: "rācāna (rāchāna, rāchēna, racēna, rāca od. rāga), ae, f., eine Art Oberkleid, bes. als Mönchstracht". Without reading the text and just by the context with Gehenna, i.e. Hell, I'd guess it also contains the word meaning idiot. This English translation translates it as: "He who says to his brother, 'thou fool,' and 'raca,' will be in danger of Gehenna."
• This Latin text seems to dicsuss the word Raca.

-Ikiaika (talk) 00:37, 11 May 2016 (UTC)

AFAICT this is attested (in some editions of the Vulgate), even though the headword may need cleanup. - -sche (discuss) 05:31, 27 April 2017 (UTC)