[b-hebrew] About Dagesh's

Vadim Cherny him at vadimcherny.org
Wed May 28 17:22:00 EDT 2008


Dagesh is not really redundant. Do you think that dagesh worked just 
fine for two thousand years so that the Masoretes heard it, and suddenly 
became redundant in 60 years of the Modern Hebrew?
Dagesh was just never meant for speech, it is a very proper cantillation 
device, as indeed the entire Masoretic marking system is a cantillation 
guide.
In singing, dagesh is very necessary to avoid jamming by forcing 
syllabification.

Vadim Cherny

Isaac Fried wrote:
> <div class="moz-text-flowed" style="font-family: -moz-fixed">1. Well 
> known biblical exceptions for words starting with BB, BP and KK are 
> worth calling attention to:
>
> עַל-לִבּוֹ בְּבֹאוֹ אֶל הַקֹּדֶשׁ Exodus 28: 29.
>
> וַיְהִי בְּבוֹאוֹ וַיִּתְקַע בַּשּׁוֹפָר Judges 3:27
>
> וְאִכָּבְדָה בְּפַרְעֹה וּבְכָל חֵילוֹ Exodus 14:4
>
> הֲלֹא כְּכַרְכְּמִישׁ כַּלְנוֹ Isaiah 10:9
>
> 2. Indeed, few vestiges to soft initial B, K, P are left us now in: 
> )AXAREY-KEN, LIPNEY-KEN, )AP-AL-PI-KEN, LO)-KEN? And LO)-KLUM. On the 
> other hand B, K, P are hard now [by sanction of the Hebrew Academy] 
> even following the close )IY-, ‘no-, un- dis-’, LO)-, ‘no, not’, and 
> DU-, ‘double’, as in )IY-B.HIR-UT , ‘lack of clarity’, LO)-K.A$IR, 
> ‘unfit’, DU-K.IWUNI, ‘bidirectional’.
>
> 3. Abolishing the dagesh altogether from Hebrew script would clear the 
> orthography of a redundant mark and simplify the grammar.
>
>
>
> Isaac Fried, Boston University
>
>
>
> ----- Original Message ----- From: "Yaakov Stein" <yaakov_s at rad.com>
> To: <b-hebrew at lists.ibiblio.org>
> Sent: Sunday, May 25, 2008 7:05 AM
> Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] About Dagesh's
>
>
>>
>>> ' Ve'avarti VE'eretz mitzrayim ba'lailah hazeh, ve-hikeiti
>> CHOL-bechor....'
>>
>>> I was wondering if anybody could explain why the usual dagesh-ed form
>> is not used!
>>
>> The rule is very simple actually. The dagesh is dropped after an open
>> syllable.
>>
>> This is always the case after an open syllable in the middle of a word,
>> and is also the case after open syllables at the end of the previous
>> word
>> when the two words are "connected" (i.e. the previous word has a
>> connecting cantillation mark).
>>
>> Yaakov (J) Stein
>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> b-hebrew mailing list
>> b-hebrew at lists.ibiblio.org
>> http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/b-hebrew 
>
>
> </div>



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