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  • From: Isaac Fried <if AT math.bu.edu>
  • To: Vadim Cherny <him AT vadimcherny.org>
  • Cc: b-hebrew Hebrew <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] About Dagesh's
  • Date: Thu, 19 Jun 2008 20:19:45 -0400

Vadim,

Some Hebrew grammar books say that the piel form is for XIZUQ HA-P(UL- AH, the strengthening of the action, to wit, $ABAR is plain 'broke', but $IBER is 'broke to pieces'. I don't see any justification or basis for this interpretation. It is only because of the multiple meanings of DABAR that we use DIBER for 'spoke'.
In present-day Hebrew the piel form is used to extend the meaning of a word, for instance, $AMAR is 'guarded', but $IMER is 'conserved'. RAXAQ is 'distanced himself', while RIXEQ is 'pushed something or someone away'. $ATAQ is 'was silent', $ITEQ is 'paralyzed', and HI- $TIQ is 'silenced something or someone'.

Isaac Fried, Boston University

On Jun 19, 2008, at 1:53 PM, Vadim Cherny wrote:

Piel has general semantics of a command, strong action. Why not consider a parallel in milspeak which strengthens the second consonant and reduces the first vowel? That's exactly what we see in piel: davar - [d'vvvvAar!!!] - d'ber - diber.

Vadim Cherny


Isaac Fried wrote:
It is conceivable that the dagesh in middle radical of the piel and the pual forms are just vestiges of a hinting system preceding the nikud. I can imagine the public Torah reader or the local teacher placing a discreet central dot, pertaining to the entire word, in, say, the B of $BR of Exodus 9:25
ואת כל עשב השדה הכה הברד ואת כל עץ השדה שבּר
in order to remember to read it $IBER and not $ABAR.
Similarly, a dot was placed in the B of TB(U of Exodus 15:4
ומבחר שלשיו טבּעו בים סוף
to remember to read it as TUB(U, not TAB(U.
The nakdanim incorporated this hinting system in the nikud and the result is what we have today.

Isaac Fried, Boston University

On Jun 16, 2008, at 11:06 PM, Isaac Fried wrote:

Yakov,

Allow me to write V for a soft bet, and B for a hard. Also, F for a
soft pe and P for a hard. Recall also that $ is shin.
So we have in Hebrew DAVAR, 'thing, word', but also DABAR, 'leader,
speaker'. We have NAFAX, 'blew', but also NAPAX, 'blacksmith'.
I do not know why there is a dagesh in the middle radical of the piel
form, but does it practically matter now if we write NI$EK, 'kissed',
without a dagesh in the $? Those who pretend to read it NI$-$EK
delude themselves. I think that BK"P became hard thereby only
incidentally, but now we are stuck with this phenomenon and need to
say DIBER, not DIVER.
Look at the word KAF, 'palm of the hand'. 'My hand' is KAPI. Why is
the pe now dgusha? Because, say the grammar books, the word is from
the root KPP. So what? Does this have to turn an F into a P?
Conclusion: The less you explain the better off you are.

Isaac Fried, Boston University

On Jun 16, 2008, at 9:43 PM, Yakov Hadash wrote:

On Jun 16, 2008, at 8:11 PM, Isaac Fried wrote:
We will need to keep the dot, the "dagesh qal", in the letters
bet, kaf, pe to distinguish between their "hard" and "soft"
manifestation. Otherwise, the dagesh is redundant in plain speech.

Yeah but you didn't address my issue.

Without the dagesh hazak, there is no way of explaining a lot of
confusing issues with vocalizing Hebrew, especially with פיעל
and התפעל, which have dagesh hazak as part of the stem.

Do you want people to just not be able to know why there's a noun
"davar" and a verb "medabber" (and not "davar" and "medaver")?

YH.

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