gabai - wow.

---

gabai

ALTERNATIVE SPELLINGS

• gabbay
• gabbai

DEFINITIONS

• verb: to serve as gabai

• noun: The officer of the synagogue who determines which congregants are to receive Torah honors at the service.

• noun: The (lay) person who calls Jews to say blessings over the Torah reading and follows along with the Torah reading to correct any mistakes.

EXAMPLE SENTENCES

• "Lisa is gabbai today, so she'll be giving out the aliyahs."

• "We have a gabbai rishon [the one who calls people to say the blessings and follows along], but we still need a gabbai sheni [the one who only follows along to correct mistakes]."

• "I'm gabbai-ing at shul this weekend."

LANGUAGES OF ORIGIN

• Textual Hebrew

ETYMOLOGY

• גבאי

WHO USES THIS

• Religious: Jews who are engaged in religious observance and have some Jewish education

REGIONS

• North America

DICTIONARIES

• The JPS Dictionary of Jewish Words, by Joyce Eisenberg and Ellen Scolnic, (Philadelphia, 2001).

• The Joys of Hebrew, by Lewis Glinert (New York, 1992).

• Dictionary of Jewish Usage: A Popular Guide to the Use of Jewish Terms, by Sol Steinmetz (Lanham, MD, 2005).

NOTES

• Also called a shammes (שמש).

---