Biblical Hebrew Forum

[yochanan bitan-buth <ButhFam AT compuserve.com>]

RE:     Copy of: re:Arabic influence on Tiberian pronunciation

shalom brian,  katavta:

>1. In what ways did Arabic influence Tiberian pronunciation?

Personally, I'd say remarkably little. 
For example, Arabic `ayin can be lengthened ("doubled") but MT cannot.
Arabic does not bother to add helping vowels before Het and `ayin but MT
does. the MT people are not 'thinking phonemically within Arabic', but they
are apparently preserving a real Hebrew tradition, including subphonemic
data. Quite remarkable, really. 

>2. Are the Masoretic gutturals modeled after Arabic gutturals?

So in the light of notes to #1, no. 
On the other hand, once the writting tradition started back in pre-1st
temple days the retracted-tongue-root feature will continue to be written
in Hebrew no matter how they were pronouncing it. (retracted-tongue-root is
what makes Tet, Sade, Qof, `ayin and Het distinctive from tav, samex, kaf,
and he.) 

>3. Is there an online site than anyone is aware of that one may hear or 
>learn Arabic pronunciation?

Wouldn't you rather learn Hebrew with real gutturals? The Living Biblical
Hebrew for Everyone has three CDs with nice clear retracted-tongue-root
(pharyngeal) fricatives, i.e. voiced `ayin qualitatively distinct from alef
and voiceless Het distinct from xaf.  Contact me offlist or see the
following: 
http://buth.jerusalemschool.org 
They are alot of fun.

bivraxot
Randall Buth
Jerusalem