Re: [HM] Aleph

Avinoam Mann (MANN@vms.huji.ac.il)
Mon, 1 Feb 1999 01:50:29 +0200 (IST)

On Sun, 31 Jan 1999, Augusto Franco de Oliveira wrote:

> Dear Listmembers,
> Could someone confirm (or deny) whether the Hebraic letter "aleph" is the
> first letter of the word meaning "infinite" in Hebrew? Thank you.
> AJFO
>

This is quite true. The Hebrew word is "einsof", literally meaning "no
end", and it begins with aleph. Dauben, in his book _Georg Cantor_,
p.179, argues that Cantor chose Aleph because it is the first letter of
the Hebrew alphabet. As far as I remember, Prof. A.Fraenkel claimed the
same, when I learned set theory from him.
Avinoam Mann