Abracadabra

I am reading The Dovekeepers, by Alice Hoffman.

 "Over five years in the writing, The Dovekeepers is Alice Hoffman's most ambitious and mesmerizing novel, a tour de force of imagination and research, set in ancient Israel.  In 70 C.E., nine hundred Jews held out for months against armies of Romans on Masada, a mountain in the Judean desert.  According to the ancient historian Josephus, two women and five children survived.  Based on this tragic and iconic event, Hoffman's novel is a spellbinding tale of four extraordinarily bold, resourceful, and sensuous women, each of whom has come to Masada by a different path.... The lives of these four complex and fiercely independent women intersect in the desperate days of the siege.  All are dovekeepers, and all are also keeping secrets - about who they are, where they come from, who fathered them, and whom they love."

Throughout the book are scattered transliterated Hebrew phrases (with their translations), with which most I am familiar.  But this one surprised me: Abra k'dabra: I will create something from the word.  And this is what I found on Wikipedia:  Abracadabra is an incantation used as a magic word in stage magic tricks, and historically was believed to have healing powers when inscribed on an amulet. The word is thought to have its origin in the Aramaic language, in which ibra (אברא) means "I have created" and k'dibra (כדברא) which means "I created through my speech", providing a translation of abracadabra as "created as I say", thus its use in magic.

 I'd always thought it was just a made-up word.  You learn something every day!