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They're called Totafot in the Torah, so why do we call them Tefilin?

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3 Answers

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Totafot is Hebrew Tefilin is Aramaic

Why there is no revival to call them Totafot, you'd have to be Gd to know why. Maybe because most of the people who like to bring back hebrew weren't themselves particularly religious. Or because Totafot only applies to the Tefilin shell Rosh... but still, nobody calls the tefilin shell rosh Totafot either.

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Isn't it unusual that even the brochos use the Aramaic? – yoel Aug 11 '11 at 14:59
It doesn't seem all that unusual to me. Kadish is in Aramaic, the passages we say before removing the Torah from the ark is in Aramaic. Parts of Tanach are written in Aramaic. – avi Aug 15 '11 at 10:30
@avi: was there ever a time when Tefillin were called Totafot? – Menachem Aug 15 '11 at 12:30
Menachem, sadly we will never know. Did B'nei Yisroel call them Tefilin or Totafot in the desert? We will never know. We only know that Onkelos translates Totafot as Tefilin, and its used that way in the Mishna as well. – avi Aug 15 '11 at 18:11
@avi, can you think of any other brocha that uses Aramaic? – yoel Aug 16 '11 at 6:38
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up vote 6 down vote

In addition to Avi's answer, that "t'fillin" is the Aramaic targum of "totafot," in the Torah "totafot" is used to refer to the shel rosh, and "ot" refers to the shel yad.

In the Mishnah (and therefore in the Talmuds) "t'fillin" is used for both the shel yad and shel rosh; the singular is "t'fillah." My feeling is that the reason everyone calls them "t'fillin" nowadays is because everyone called them "tf'illin" back then, also.

Some sources for t'fillin in the Mishnah (not an exhaustive list!):

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I would venture to say that since Tefilin was originally meant to be worn all day, which we do not do as we can not keep our D'aas on them, now we only wear it by Tefila, that is why it is called Tefilin.

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Those who say we wear it all day, also called/call it Tefilin. – avi Aug 15 '11 at 10:31
Pardon me - however do you know of more than 3 people that wear it all day? – Gershon Gold Aug 15 '11 at 14:02
@Gershon, maybe not nowadays, but they did in the era of the Mishnah - and yet they're consistently called "tefillin" there. – Alex Aug 15 '11 at 14:27
However even then it was not the Hamon Am only Yechidei Segula – Gershon Gold Aug 15 '11 at 14:40
The ruling was made that we don't wear it all day anymore. So that means at some point in History, they wore it all day. When the ruling was passed down, they didn't call them Totafot. – avi Aug 15 '11 at 18:18
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