Word.ws English Dictionary

helek

/ˈheɪlɪk/

helek noun: a unit of time equal to an eighteenth of a minute (3⅓ seconds).

Noun

helek (plural halakim)

  1. (Judaism) A unit of time equal to an eighteenth of a minute (3⅓ seconds)
    • For calendrical calculations, the day begins at 6 P.M., which is designated 0 hours. Hours are divided into 1080 halakim; thus one helek is 3 1/3 seconds.1992, L.E. Doggett, “Calendars”, in P. Kenneth Seidelman, editor, Explanatory Supplement to the Astronomical Almanac, page 585
    • By some estimates the mean lunation was actually 29.5 days and 793 halakim somewhere around the beginning of the Common Era.2004, Sheldon Epstein, Bernard Dickman, Yonah Wilamowsky, “A 5765 Anomaly”, in Tradition: A Journal of Orthodox Jewish Thought, volume 38, number 3, page 585

Forms of helek

pluralhalakim
alternative formchelek

Origin of helek

Borrowed from Hebrew חֵלֶק (ḥēleq).

Questions about helek

What does helek mean?
Helek means a unit of time equal to an eighteenth of a minute (3⅓ seconds).
What part of speech is helek?
Helek is a noun.
How do you pronounce helek?
Helek is pronounced /ˈheɪlɪk/.
What is the plural of helek?
The plural of helek is halakim.

Words near helek in the dictionary

  1. helectite
  2. heled
  3. heleia
  4. heleid
  5. heleids
  6. helek
  7. helen
  8. Helen Keller
  9. Helen Kellers
  10. Helen'geli
  11. Helena

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: helek (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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