Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Vadim Cherny" <VadimCherny AT mail.ru>]

> >begedkefet pairs,
>
> they exist because plosives became
> fricativised, not vice versa. At least, there is very good evidence that
> the process went that way. You are asserting that the process went the
> other way, but have given no evidence for this.
>
What I say, basically, is that the Masoretes recorded some instances of
begedkefet (with dagesh kal) more plosified than others (without dagesh).
Yes, I believe that begedkefet with dagesh kal is more of a plosive than the
same letter stand-alone. No, I don't assume that stand-alone (say,
pronounced in alphabet) begedkefet's are pure fricatives. Quite possibly,
they were aspirated plosives.

> >Dagesh "causes" gemination, but dagesh does not "mean" gemination, rather
a
> >stop. ...
>
> Dagesh doesn't "cause" anything. It is a mark indicating something. It
> does not indicate only gemination. It appears to indicate either
> gemination or lack of fricativisation. But maybe there is some common
> factor to these.
>
Right. And if dagesh is a stop, intermission, then it "causes" gemination or
stronger plosification.

> >This process created begedkefet pairs.
>
> Actually this is indeed not far from my position, although I would
> suggest that more of the changes had happened before the  Masoretes.
>
I think otherwise mostly because the Slavonic Bible shows no trace of strong
plosives still in the 11th century. Considering the tremendous influence the
Hebrew exerted on Slavic language, Slavonic Bible likely reflected the
current Aramaic pronunciation.
Initially, I connected stronger plosification of begedkefet's by dagesh kal
with loss of vocal schwa in inter-consonatal position, niz(e)chchar -
nizcar. The Masoretes recorded supposedly all schwas as vocal, so the loss
of vocalization and the "begedkefet spread"  occurred after the Masoretes.
But eventually I'm coming to another opinion, that stronger plosification
relates to initial consonants in accented syllables: A-bra(h)am, Re-bekkah.
Note that the plosives are only clear after stop: Re.bekkah, but not in soft
continuous pronunciation, Revekkah. In guttural speech with strong accent,
syllabification was ni-zchar, but in singing there was a stop (dagesh kal),
ni-z(e).chchar - ni-z(e).car.
Perhaps, the truth is in between: forced syllabification by stop caused
gemination and might cause relative plosificiation, but when the schwa
became silent in speech, gemination ceased to be an option (niz-chchar,
nih-vvod are not comfortable to me, probably because the stop is very weak
in speech; with good stop, gemination is comfortable, niz.chchar), and was
replaced with stronger plosification (niz-car).

> >I therefore believe that both dagesh kal and hazak originally caused only
> >gemination. Only later, when inter-consonantal schwa became silent,
> >gemination was replaced with plosification (in the sense of aspirated
> >plosives becoming unaspirated).
>
> Did this loss of aspiration actually happen? Are modern Hebrew
> word-initial pe, tav and kaf aspirated or unaspirated? Maybe it depends
> on the speakers' former homes.

Both Sephardic and Ashkenazic phonology universally have the dagesh kal
letters as strict plosives.

> >Why the dagesh kal was only applied to begedkefet? To answer this
question,
> >ask why the Masoretes needed dagesh kal. The likely answer is, to avoid
> >"eating" the second-in-a-row consonant. Why, then, of all consonants,
only
> >begedkefet's tended to be "eaten"? Because they were more aspirated than
> >others.
>
> What is wrong with the obvious answer, that only these consonants had
> distinct plosive and fricative forms?

I don't think these pairs were available at the time of the Masoretes.
The same dagesh sign marks any consonant in one (post-tonic) environment,
but only begedkefet in another (second-in-a-row) environment. Why? What is
the difference between these environments? Why the Masoretes needed to
geminate any post-tonic consonant, but only begedkefet second-in-a-row's?
Still in other words, why did not the Masoretes put dagesh kal in
non-begedkefet consonants?
My answer is, because only the considerably aspirated begedkefet's were
"eaten" in second-in-a-row position. In speech, chaf is quite clear in
nizchar. But in singing, chaf is all but lost--unless we put a stop in front
of it, niz(e).chchar. Non-begedkefet's do not suffer thus, e.g., second nun
in nihnas is distinct in singing.

> in Arabic pe/fe was fricativised in all
> positions at some time, so was gimel/jim in most dialects.

The Masoretes and their later interpreters lived in Arabic milieu. The
dagesh kal cannot be explained by natural phonetic processes of speech, as
we see in Arabic. Why did the Masoretes hear stronger plosification where
other Semitic-speaking people did not? Because the Masoretes were singing.

Vadim Cherny