[b-hebrew] dagesh forte and dagesh lene
Isaac Fried
if at math.bu.edu
Tue Apr 6 20:49:28 EDT 2010
Formally, the punctuation of דְּבָרְךָ (with the personal
pronoun אכה instead of אתה ) is correct since there is a qamatz
under the B, and a dagesh (not "forte", nor "lene") does not follow a
qamatz. But, דְּבַרְכֶם (with the personal pronoun אכם
instead of אתם ) is irregular as the B is here marked with a patax.
A dages follows a patax, but if the next letter has a schwa, then the
dagesh is moved forward, so that we should have had here
*דְּבַרְכֶּם with a hard K.
I believe the dagesh (that in my opinion preceded the NIKUD) more
than the NIKUD, for instance, the lack of dagesh in the letter P of
רִדְפוּ suggests to me that this is a newer pronunciation for a
possibly older *רְדֹפוּ likewise רִבְבוֹת for
רְבָבוֹת*, and more of the like.
Isaac Fried, Boston University
On Apr 4, 2010, at 10:10 PM, Vadim Cherny wrote:
> The problem with two dageshes is why would the Masoretes mark two
> different phenomena with one sign?
>
> I suggest reading both dageshes as a pause (vocal stop).
>
> Dagesh kal resyllabifies words to break consonantal clusters to
> provide for clear chanting (ni-zchar - ni-'char, but niz-char).
>
> Dagesh hazak protects posttonic vowel by causing gemination.
>
> This explains three odd cases.
>
> Word-initial dagesh breaks consonantal clusters: natan vakar would
> be chanted as nata-nvakar - nata-'vakar. Dagesh breaks this
> concatenation.
>
> Dagesh after ha- and wa- is actually a posttonic dagesh after a
> secondary stress which falls on ha- and wa-.
>
> No dagesh in dvarcha because the Masoretes were primarily concerned
> with chanting, and d'va-'r'cha is perfectly chantable.
>
> Vadim Cherny
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