Mishpocha

Word of the Day for Sunday, June 16, 2013

Mishpocha \mish-PAW-khuh, -POOKH-uh\, noun:

an entire family network comprising relatives by blood and marriage and sometimes including close friends; clan.

Levinsky told him he didn't need a lawyer. "Dealing with us is like mishpocha. Who needs a lawyer to talk to mishpocha." Simon learned later they had cheated him, but who cares, who would have cared?
-- Arthur A. Cohen, In the Days of Simon Stern, 1973

“You can speak now. We're all mishpocha here and we got no secrets.”
-- Leon Uris, Exodus, 1958

Mishpocha entered English in the mid-1800s and comes from the Yiddish and Hebrew words for "family" or "clan."

Thanks to: www.dictionary.com