Dagesh

Dagesh qal

A dagesh kal or dagesh qal (דגש קל, or דגש קשיין, also dagesh lene, weak/light dagesh) may be placed inside the consonants bet, gimel, dalet, kaf, pe and tav. They each have two sounds, the original hard plosive sound (which originally contained no dagesh as it was the only pronunciation), and a soft fricative version produced as such for speech efficiency because of the position in which the mouth is left immediately after a vowel has been produced.

Although there is debate, some scholars suggest that prior to the Babylonian captivity, the soft sounds of these letters did not exist in Hebrew, but they were later differentiated in Hebrew writing as a result of the Aramaic-influenced pronunciation of Hebrew. The Aramaic languages, including Jewish versions of Aramaic, have these same allophonic pronunciations of the letters.

The letters take on their hard sounds when they have no vowel sound before them, and take their soft sounds when a vowel immediately precedes them. In Biblical Hebrew this was the case within a word and also across word boundaries, though in Modern Hebrew there are no longer across word boundaries, since the soft and hard sounds are no longer allophones of each other, but regarded as distinct phonemes.

When vowel diacritics are used, the hard sounds are indicated by a central dot called dagesh, while the soft sounds lack the mark. In Modern Hebrew, however, the dagesh only changes the pronunciation of bet, kaf, and pe. Traditional Ashkenazic pronunciation also varies the pronunciation of tav, as does Yemenite pronunciation. Some traditional Middle Eastern pronunciations carry alternate forms for dalet.

In Ashkenazi pronunciation, tav without a dagesh is pronounced , while in other traditions it is assumed to have been pronounced at the time niqqud was introduced. In Modern Hebrew, it is always pronounced .

The letters gimel () and dalet () may also contain a dagesh kal. This indicates an allophonic variation of the phonemes and , a variation which no longer exists in modern Hebrew pronunciation. The variations are believed to have been: pronounced as , as , as , and as . The Hebrew spoken by the Jews of Yemen (Yemenite Hebrew) still preserves unique phonemes for these letters with and without a dagesh.

Pronunciation

Among Modern Hebrew speakers, the pronunciation of some of the above letters has become the same as others:

Dagesh hazaq

Dagesh ḥazak or dagesh ḥazaq (דגש חזק, , i.e. 'gemination dagesh', or דגש כפלן, also 'dagesh forte') may be placed in almost any letter, indicating a gemination (doubling) of that consonant in the pronunciation of pre-modern Hebrew.

This gemination is not adhered to in modern Hebrew and is only used in careful pronunciation, such as the reading of scripture in a synagogue service, recitation of biblical or traditional texts or on ceremonial occasions, and only by very precise readers. However, the rules of the dagesh ḥazak still influence pronunciation in modern Hebrew, though not by gemination: in all cases where Biblical Hebrew geminates a letter, modern Hebrew retains a dagesh inside the letter, which influences pronunciation in the following way: in ב‎ bet, כ‎ kaf, and פ‎ pe, it turns a fricative sound (vet, khaf, and fe) into a plosive sound (bet, kaf, and pe); in all other letters, it is not pronounced.

The following letters, the gutturals, almost never have a dagesh: aleph , he , chet , ayin , and resh . A few instances of resh with dagesh are recorded in the Masoretic Text, as well as a few cases of aleph with dagesh, such as in Leviticus 23:17.

The presence of a dagesh ḥazak or consonant-doubling in a word may be entirely morphological, or, as is often the case, is a lengthening to compensate for a deleted consonant. A dagesh ḥazak may be placed in letters for one of the following reasons:

• The letter follows the definite article, the word "the". For example, שָׁמָיִם (shamayim, 'heaven(s)') in Genesis 1:8 is הַשָּׁמַיִם (hashshamayim, 'the heaven(s)') in Genesis 1:1. This is because the definite article was originally a stand-alone particle הַל (hal), but at an early stage in ancient Hebrew it contracted into a prefix הַ (ha-), and the loss of the 'l' was compensated for by doubling the following letter. In this situation where the following letter is a guttural, the vowel in 'ha-' becomes long to compensate for the inability to double the next letter - otherwise, this vowel is almost always short. This also happens in words taking the prefix לַ la-, since it is a prefix created by the contraction of לְ le- and הַ ha-. Occasionally, the letter following a he which is used to indicate a question may also receive a dagesh, e.g. Numbers 13:20 הַשְּׁמֵנָה הִוא (Hashshemena hi?, 'whether it is fat').
• The letter follows the prefix mi- where this prefix is an abbreviation for the word min, meaning 'from'. This is because, similarly to the case of the definite article above, the loss of the 'n' at the end of the abbreviated min is compensated for by doubling the following letter. For example, the phrase "from your hand", if spelled as two words, would be מִן יָדֶךָ (min yadekha). In Genesis 4:11 however, it occurs as one word: מִיָּדֶךָ miyyadekha. This prefix mostly replaces the usage of the particle min in modern Hebrew.
• The letter follows the prefix she- in modern Hebrew, which is a prefixed contraction of the relative pronoun asher : the prefix's first letter is dropped and its last letter combines with the following word's first letter, which is therefore doubled and a dagesh ḥazak appears in it. For instance (Song of Songs 4:1), "who descend" becomes where the dot inside indicates the letter has been doubled. This prefix is far less common than the full asher in Biblical texts, but mostly replaces it in Modern Hebrew.
• It marks the doubling of a letter that is caused by a weak letter losing its vowel. In these situations, the weak letter disappears, and the following letter is doubled to compensate for it. For example, compare Exodus 6:7 לָקַחְתִּי (lakachti) with Numbers 23:28, where the first letter of the root has been elided: וַיִּקַּח (vayyikkach). Lamed only behaves as a weak letter in this particular root word.
• If the letter follows a vav-consecutive imperfect (sometimes referred to as vav conversive, or vav ha'hipuch), which, in Biblical Hebrew, switches a verb between perfect and imperfect. For example, compare Judges 7:4 יֵלֵךְ (yelekh, 'let him go') with Deuteronomy 31:1 וַיֵּלֶךְ (vayyelekh, 'and he went'). A possible reason for this doubling is that the וַ (va-) prefix could be the remains of an auxiliary verb הָוַיַ (hawaya, the ancient form of the verb הָיָה hayah, 'to be') being contracted into a prefix, losing the initial ha, and the final ya syllable disappearing and doubling the next letter.
• In some of the binyan verbal stems, where the pi'el, pu'al and hitpa'el stems themselves cause doubling in the second root letter of a verb. For example:
  • Exodus 15:9 אֲחַלֵּק (achallek, 'I shall divide'), pi'el-stem, first person singular future tense
  • in the phrase הַלְּלוּ יָהּ (hallelu yah, 'praise the '), where hallelu is in the pi'el-stem, masculine plural imperative form
  • Genesis 47:31 וַיִּתְחַזֵּק (vayyitchazzek, 'and he strengthened himself'), hitpa'el-stem

Rafe

Main article: Rafe

In Masoretic manuscripts the opposite of a dagesh would be indicated by a rafe, a small horizontal line on top of the letter. This is no longer found in Hebrew, but may still sometimes be seen in Yiddish and Ladino.

Pronunciation of modern Israeli Hebrew

Below is a complete list of Hebrew letters which may take a dagesh, and their pronunciation as consonants in modern Israeli Hebrew:

:{| class="wikitable" |- ! Character !! Name !! Pronunciation

Dagesh and mappiq symbols, the dots in otherwise identical letters, are often omitted in writing. For instance, בּ is often written as ב. The use or omission of such marks is usually consistent throughout any given context.

Matres lectionis

The letters alef, he, vav and yod are consonants that can sometimes have the value of vowels. Vav and yod in particular are more often vowels than they are consonants.

:{|class="wikitable" |- !Symbol!!Name!!Vowel formation |- || alef || ê, ệ, ậ, â, ô |- || he || ê, ệ, ậ, â, ô |- || vav || ô, û |- || yod || î, ê, ệ |}

Loanwords

The sounds /tʃ, dʒ, ʒ/, written 'ז', ג', צ, are found in many loanwords that are part of the everyday Hebrew colloquial vocabulary, even among people who don't know the source languages. In addition, there are ways of writing some sounds in words that are truly foreign, not part of Israeli Hebrew:

:{| class="wikitable" |- !! colspan=6 | Everyday Colloquial Hebrew |- !! colspan=1 | Name !! colspan=1 | Symbol !! colspan=1 | IPA !! colspan=1 | Transliteration !! colspan=1 | Example ! Letter |-

Pronunciation

In Israel's general population, many consonants have merged to the same pronunciation. They are: :{| class="wikitable" |- ! Letter ! with !! colspan=3 | Letter(s) |- alef hey |- vet vav |- het kaf |- tet tav |- kaf qof |- samech sin (with left dot) |- tzadi tav-semech tav-sin |- |}

Unicode encodings

In computer typography there are two ways to use a dagesh with Hebrew text. The following examples give the Unicode and numeric character references:

• Using combining characters:
  • bet + dagesh: = U+05D1``U+05BC or ב``ּ
  • kaf + dagesh: = U+05DB``U+05BC or כ``ּ
  • pe + dagesh: = U+05E4``U+05BC or פ``ּ
• Using precomposed characters:
  • bet with dagesh: = U+FB31 or בּ
  • kaf with dagesh: = U+FB3B or כּ
  • pe with dagesh: = U+FB44 or פּ

Some fonts, character sets, encodings, and operating systems may support neither, one, or both methods.

Notes

References

References

1. "Transliteration Standards of the SBL".
2. "הכתיב המלא".
3. "Vocalization of Hebrew Alphabet".
4. "Genesis 1 / Hebrew - English Bible / Mechon-Mamre".
5. "Genesis 1 / Hebrew - English Bible / Mechon-Mamre".
6. Weingreen, J.. (1963-03-26). "A Practical Grammar for Classical Hebrew". OUP Oxford.
7. "Numbers 13 / Hebrew - English Bible / Mechon-Mamre".
8. "Song of Songs 4:1 {{!}} Sefaria Library".
9. "Numbers 23 / Hebrew - English Bible / Mechon-Mamre".