Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Jason Hare <jaihare AT gmail.com>]

John,

I'm still completely clueless as to what you're asking. I know you've
asked the question several times and in a couple of different ways. In
the end, I just don't think your question makes sense. Is there a
reason why a whole slew of Hebrew scholars and laymen cannot come up
with a satisfactory answer for your question? Perhaps somethings wrong
with what you're asking and not with the (often complex and fantastic)
answers you've been receiving from so many of the list members. Is
there a reason you're asking this specific question and insisting on
its preciseness?

I will say that there are times when certain words contain dagesh and
the same word doesn't in other situations. This is especially true for
dagesh lene when it appears at the beginning of a word. If a word
ending in a vowel sound precedes the letter normally holding a dagesh,
it will often drop.

Notice the word BDRK ("in the way") in Deuteronomy 6:6, for example:

וְשִׁנַּנְתָּם לְבָנֶיךָ וְדִבַּרְתָּ בָּם בְּשִׁבְתְּךָ בְּבֵיתֶךָ
וּבְלֶכְתְּךָ בַדֶּרֶךְ וּבְשָׁכְבְּךָ וּבְקוּמֶךָ׃

It is vocalized BAD.EREK: rather than B.AD.EREK, as it would be if not
preceded by a word ending in a vowel. Notice that this is not
consistent, as we see even in the same verse in the word BBYTK ("in
your house/home"). This could just as easily have been pointed without
the dagesh without affecting the meaning.

Sometimes you will find a dagesh inserted into, for example, the L of
the word L). I don't have examples of this available (or of other
places in which the dagesh is inserted into the first letter of some
words as a sort of consonantal emphasis), but someone here certainly
has this information.

Is this at all what you're asking about? If not, what in the world do you 
mean?!

Regards,
Jason Hare
Rehovot, Israel

On Thu, Feb 26, 2009 at 10:39 PM, Brak <Brak AT neo.rr.com> wrote:
> The base parts are not the same graphically - as one has a dagesh, the
> other doesn't.
> My diving the word is not arbitrary! The morpheme breaks I gave are not
> of my invention!
> My question is about the "base" - weather you approve of it or not. So
> please don't tell me what questions to ask.
>
> So my question is what it is: Does the addition of a dagesh(es) into the
> "base" of the word change the meaning the of "base" of the word?