Biblical Hebrew Forum

[fred burlingame <tensorpath AT gmail.com>]

Hello Isaac:

Thanks for your comments.

That's what I don't understand. When you say letters vav and bet become
"interchangeable," I don't comprehend.

עוה (ah-va) appears to mean thick or fat; but

עבה (ah-va) appears to mean bend or twist.

גוע (ga-va) appears to mean expire or die; but

גבע (ga-va) appears to mean hill or high.

קוה (ka-va) appears to mean to wait or collect; but

קבע (ka-va) appears to mean drain or bowl.

Are you suggesting that these different word meanings would not not change
with and by a substitution of one letter, bet or vav, for the other? Is that
what you mean by "interchangeable?"

regards,

fred burlingame


On Sun, Jan 30, 2011 at 9:06 PM, Isaac Fried <if AT math.bu.edu> wrote:

> 1. I know nothing about the "original" pronunciation of the letter waw, all
> I know is that today it is pronounced vav.
> 2. All we know is that the letters B (no dagesh) and W (or V) sound
> similarly, and that they are interchangeable, as, for instance in עוה and
> עבה, or גוע and גבע, or קוה and קבע
>
> Isaac Fried, Boston University
>
>  On Jan 30, 2011, at 8:22 PM, fred burlingame wrote:
>
>  Hello Isaac:
>
> Your proposal is interesting.
>
> But does any evidence exist to support it? Is there any actual instance of
> any ancient scroll or inscription or writing fragment actually utilizing
> the letter ב (bet) in the manner the letter ו (vav) is commonly used, as a
> conjunction at the beginning of a "sentence" or clause? or the stand alone
> verb בוא  (boh) for that purpose?
>
> I also gather that you don't see the original pronunciation of ו "waw" as
> "waw;" but rather the correct pronunciation of this letter was "vav?"
>
> I suppose I would observe by way of extension and analogy, that you would
> also see the pronouns attached to verbs, such as third person singular י
> (yod); as representing a contraction of an earlier stand alone pronoun?
>
> regards,
>
> fred burlingame
>
> On Sun, Jan 30, 2011 at 3:11 PM, Isaac Fried <if AT math.bu.edu> wrote:
>
>> It is not clear to me what you mean by or why you insist on
>> "vocalization". Nowadays, as soon as we see a dot in the Hebrew letter bet
>> we instinctively vocalize it as an English B, otherwise, we vocalize it as
>> the English V, to wit: BA-U, yet, U-VA-U. I think that this change of sound
>> in the presence of a dagesh is a mere historical coincidence, that came now
>> to bedevil the Hebrew language. We can safely ignore it here.
>> In Deu. 1:28 it is, indeed, VA-RAM, translated as "and ('and' being from
>> the Latin ante, 'opposite', and of the same sense as 'end') taller". It
>> stands to reason that this attached VA used to be a separate word with a
>> meaning of its own within the Hebrew language. What is it, then? I think it
>> is BA (read it VA) in disguise, and meaning 'be' in the sense of 'is' or
>> 'are', namely: "AM GADOL (is) RAM from us".
>>
>> Isaac Fried, Boston University
>>
>>
>