Says Leo Rosten in The Joys of Yiddish: "Pronounced KHOOTS-pah; rattle that kh around with fervor; rhymes with "Foot spa." Do not pronounce the ch as in "choo-choo" or "Chippewa," but as the German ch in Ach! or the Scottish in loch. Hebrew: "insolence," "audacity."
"Gall, brazen nerve, effrontry, incredible "guts"; presumption-plus-arrogance such as no other word, and no other language, can do justice to.
"The classic definition of chutzpa is, of course, this:
Chutzpa is that quality enshrined in a man who, having killed his mother and father, throws himself on the mercy of the court because he is an orphan.
"A chutzpanik may be defined as the man who shouts "Help! Help!" while beating you up."
I offer a new example of chutzpa which - embodying both examples above - I call chutzpa-squared:
The building of a mosque at Ground Zero.
Source: World Net Daily, http://www.wnd.com/?pageId=119328
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