Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Ryan Clan <robert.ryan AT xtra.co.nz>]

Hi Yitzhak
> Can you give an example where the dagesh is absent in this situation?
> In any case, this is the correct view.
>   
I'll give you A.B. Davidson's example: He says that before another shewa
the pointing of the preposition becomes a hireq, forming a half-syllable
eg lebhav becomes bilebhav (in the heart of.)  He says that the shewa
here is sounded because it was necessarily so in the original, and is
therefore not bilbav. In another section, he also says that the vocal
shewa, simple or composite has the same effect as the full vowels on a
following begadkephat letter [ie the dagesh lene drops out], and thus
the state of a begadkephat letter makes it clear whether the shewa
is silent or vocal. He gives the example of bilebhavo (in his heart),
saying that the shewa before the letter beth must be vocal because the
beth has no dagesh lene.

So I went to my analytical lexicon and went searching for examples. A
cursory search revealed plenty of such instances, so that while
exceptions might well exist (I didn't stumble on any, but then I wasn't
looking for them), the effect on the begadkephat letters seems
to be well established. Below are some examples.In each case the initial
consonant is a preposition, and in each case the begadkephat letter
following the shewa is without a dagesh lene. I have marked the shewa as
a colon to do with it what you will.

bibh:khor
bigh:bhul
bidh:bhar
kil:bhav
kir:bhiyviym
ligh:dhud

(If there is a particular transliteration scheme I should be using on
b-hebrew, please let me know. I can't find any reference to it in my
emails or at the site).

> There is no rule that a short vowel
> likes to be closed.  
>   
Yes, I overstated the rule part, but is "like" so very wrong? Are not
short vowels usually seen in closed syllables more often than not?

> An open short (and unstressed) vowel is simply denoted
> by a schewa or hataf.
>   
I may be misunderstanding you, but isn't this exactly the issue I have
stated with my two schools of thought? Essentially one lot say the first
syllable is closed with a silent shewa, and the other lot say, no, no,
what we have is..."an open short (and unstressed) vowel denoted by a
shewa or hataf" same as the Davidson examples. Given what you say here,
why do you then favour the first option (closed syllable, silent shewa)
and not the second.

Regards
Kay Christensen



Yitzhak Sapir wrote:
> On Thu, Apr 15, 2010 at 11:04 PM, Ryan Clan wrote:
>   
> > Your opinions please.
> >
> > My grammars are divided into two schools of thought concerning the way
> > an inseparable preposition attaches itself to a word that begins with a
> > vocal shewa.
> >
> > The first school of thought says that under these conditions, an
> > inseparable preposition creates a closed syllable at the beginning of a
> > word, usually invoking the "rule of shewa." However, this approach
> > ignores the absence of a dagesh lene in any following begadkephat letter.
> >     
>
> Can you give an example where the dagesh is absent in this situation?
> In any case, this is the correct view.  There is no rule that a short vowel
> likes to be closed.  An open short (and unstressed) vowel is simply denoted
> by a schewa or hataf.
>
> Yitzhak Sapir
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