Kokan tattoo photos

The Girl Who Thought She Was A Goat

Hebrew is not the simplest language. Half the time you only know how a written word is pronounced based on its context. This is why taking a word out of context can lead to... interesting results:


Today's victim wanted the Hebrew word for "Strength" tattooed on her wrist. And she got it, sort of...

See, she used the letters AYIN and ZAYIN to spell "Oz", which means courage and also more obscurely - strength. However, she didn't use Nikkud (vowels), so the reader is left guessing how to pronounce this word. And it just so happens that the most common way to read this specific letter combination is "Ez" which means "Goat".

Yep, this tattoo will definitely read "Goat" to any Hebrew speaker. Nice way to label yourself!

Now, don't be crushed if you wanted your very own Hebrew "Strength" tattoo, you still can have one. You can have any other strength synonym, plenty of those in the Hebrew language. If you're set on "Oz", you could have it too, just use either Nikkud or Full Spelling, so that people won't confuse you with a goat.

Okay then, lets explore the possible translations of "Strength" to Hebrew:


You can see that all the strength words have subtly different meanings and connotations. If you want to use them in a certain situation or sentence, you should ask someone with a working knowledge of Hebrew for advice.