how to say “boycott” in Hebrew
חֵרֶם, לְהַחֲרִים[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/חרם-1.wav” /]
The English word boycott is named for a 19th-century Irishman, Charles C. Boycott, who was ostracized after refusing to lower rent for his tenant farmers (see Online Etymological Dictionary).
The Hebrew word for this social (or antisocial) action goes further back, all the way to the Bible. The word is חֵרֶם[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/חרם-2.wav” /], and its first meaning was contraband – that which is off-limits.
Though Hebrew was not spoken by your average Jew for much of the two thousand years in the Diaspora, some key words, such as חרם, were uttered by all. When there was a Jew who behaved in ways that were intolerable to the community, that person would often be “put in חרם” – excommunicated.
With the rise of Modern Spoken Hebrew, excommunicate or boycott became a verb of the active-causative variety: לְהַחֲרִים[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/חרם-3.wav” /].
For example:
[audioclip url=”https://archive.ulpan.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/חרם-4.wav” /]מַנְכַּ”ל אוֹרַנְג’ מַחֲרִים אֶת יִשְׂרָאֵל.
The CEO of Orange is boycotting Israel.