Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Henry Churchyard <churchh AT uts.cc.utexas.edu>]

The spelling of "Jerusalem" where the _pathah._ seems to be juxtaposed
directly against _h.ireq_ is actually really a Q're -- implicitly
based on the spelling Y-R-W-Sh-L-Y-M, as opposed to the K'tibh
spelling Y-R-W-Sh-L-M.  Not quite sure what you're saying about
_pathah._ furtivum (_g@nubhah_); logically speaking, _pathah._
furtivum always directly follows the vowel under the preceding
consonant, but graphically speaking the _pathah._ furtivum is under
the word-final consonant (just like any other vowel diacritic).

As for _tah.ath_ in Exodus 20:4, the double cantillation in the
decalogue is accompanied by double pointing in other respects -- for
example, the few _raphe_ marks which are transcribed in the
Claremont-Michigan-Westminster BHS e-text version are mostly (all?)
cases where a consonant receives _dagesh_ under one version of the
accentuation, but is spirantized (i.e. _raphe_) under the other
version of the accentuation.  Similarly with _mittah.ath_ -- if this
word receives an _'athnah._ accent, then the first syllable has a long
_qames._ vowel appropriate to pausal status, while if the word
receives a lesser accent, then its vowel is unlengthened short
_pathah._ appropriate to non-pausal status.

In general, "consonant letters with two accompanying vowel diacritic
symbols" does not really seem to be a natural category or
instrinsically very significant feature, in and of itself, of the
Tiberian orthography, as far as I can see...

--
Henry Churchyard   churchh AT crossmyt.com   http://www.crossmyt.com/hc/