Talk:Biblical Hebrew

tenses and aspects need hebrew examples
I'm currently learning Hebrew, and found the tenses and aspects section to be really unhelpful. Having a few simple examples for each would be really nice. a lot of the pages linguistic explanations go right over my head, having only a modest intellect, and not being a student of linguistics. In particular, examples of the letters appearing in root words, infixes, for tensing, would be most helpful. I have checked other parts of Wikipedia, but some of those also seem written in a way as to be intentionally hard to understand, or to need more cultural, religious, or collegiate submersion to understand.

in other words, please simplify necessary parts, and add clear examples. Wikipedia is the textbook of all knowledge in the world. make it easier for us dumber humans to understand. Gnarlytreeman (talk) 16:31, 11 December 2022 (UTC)


 * It can't be presented too simply, because it's not a simple matter -- lengthy books have been written about the Biblical Hebrew verb system, and there are still points of controversy. Also, Wikipedia is not really a textbook... AnonMoos (talk) 06:35, 12 December 2022 (UTC)


 * Why not? Grammar is taught to young children, it can obviously be simplified for easy knowledge disperal.


 * Simply skip the controversy. Gnarlytreeman (talk) 06:53, 12 December 2022 (UTC)


 * Children are sometimes taught basic things to help them understand the language which they already speak -- for example, what a plural noun is. Young children are not ordinarily taught technical linguistic analysis of dead ancient languages which were very different in some ways from the language which they already speak. AnonMoos (talk) 07:05, 12 December 2022 (UTC)
 * It's not that simple: tense grammar gets taught to young children in terms of written words because it is possible to easily distinguish tenses.  That is not the case in Hebrew; as the article notes, "Biblical Hebrew tense is not necessarily reflected in the verb forms per se, but rather is determined primarily by context."  When I took Hebrew, distinguishing tenses was something we were still agonizing over in third year of grad school.  And when the fact that the vowels and other pointings have been added to the text it gets more complicated -- and not just for verbs, either.  [One of my grad school profs told us that until we didn't need the pointings or the spaces (between words) we were really still beginners.]
 * Part of why it's not that simple is that for a given set of letters without vowel pointings there can be two or sometimes three different possible tenses. We find such words in English, for example "read" which can be present or past tense and can be indicative or imperative, but it's worse in Hebrew since there are more than a few words which are completely different despite having the very same letters; an English example of this might be "cool", which can be an adjective, a verb, an adverb, or an explanation.  The difference is that in English these are rare whereas in ancient Hebrew they're barely uncommon. Dismalscholar (talk) 20:05, 4 March 2024 (UTC)

Sure. Ancient dead languages were once taught to children, and still currently are in orthodox schools, the language simply isnt dead.

And what im asking for is the exact opposite of complex analysis.

We need simple examples. Surely that isn't too hard. Right now there is a huge list of tenses and aspects, but no language example. A massive discourse is unnecessary.

The knowledge is simply missing, making the page basically useless, at least for folk not entrenched in linguistics.

and most folk like myself who use wikipedia, are of modest intelligence and need simple examples.

Just make a different article if you think something needs a controversy or more lengthy explaination added.

Besides, wikipedia, is necessary on this subject because it is one of the few sites that has the possibility of scrubbing religious or political bias from presentation. Gnarlytreeman (talk) 07:34, 12 December 2022 (UTC)


 * There are a number of textbooks of Biblical Hebrew, and I'm sure you could find what you need in one or more of them, but for a number of reasons Wikipedia is not trying to compete with them. Consult What Wikipedia is not... -- AnonMoos (talk) 16:45, 12 December 2022 (UTC)

Quoted from the previously referenced wikipedia article, subsection textbooks

"However, examples intended to inform rather than to instruct, may be appropriate for inclusion in a Wikipedia article"

I asked for nothing more than informative examples.

Why are you being so persistently anti-knowledge? It seems like your almost trying to restrict basic free language information dispersal. Why? Gnarlytreeman (talk) 18:50, 12 December 2022 (UTC)


 * Here's what a set of examples would be like, just using English consonants: if I write bls, leaving the reader to figure out what the vowels (and other things indicated by Hebrew pointing), this could be "balls", "bills", "bliss", "blues", "blows", "bulls", "bellows", "bolas", "blush", or others.  So the very same set of letters could be more than a half dozen different word types, thus making the idea of "simple examples" impossible. Dismalscholar (talk) 20:12, 4 March 2024 (UTC)

On the chart, the voiceless bilabial fricative symbol links to the voiced dental fricative page.
Exactly what it says in the title. I'm not a normal wikipedia editor, just a conlanger using Biblical Hebrew as an inspiration, and I found this mistake. Hope someone fixes it! 74.51.145.127 (talk) 05:15, 8 December 2023 (UTC)


 * Done. (not by me) Emdosis (talk) 02:52, 19 March 2024 (UTC)

Vocabulary
There really ought to be a note about how many words Biblical Hebrew had, which IIRC is on the order of 2,000 roots forming some 8,000 words. I'm not sure where in the article that should go, nor do I have a source at the moment; I would appreciate it if someone better at this could make the addition. Dismalscholar (talk) 20:24, 4 March 2024 (UTC)


 * That's the vocabulary of Hebrew in the Bible, not necessarily the same thing as the vocabulary of the speakers of the language recorded in the Bible. When a book is divergent in genre and subject matter from most other books (e.g. the Song of Songs), there are many hapax legomena in that book, a sign that there were probably words of the spoken language which didn't make it into the Bible... AnonMoos (talk) 22:55, 4 March 2024 (UTC)

On the presence of ʋ in the Article
Hello, everyone!

I am unsure if I am showing proper etiquette as of now as this is the first time I've ever written one of these, but does anyone know as to any possible research in regards to the phoneme ʋ possibly being a phoneme in Biblical Hebrew? A friend of I have not encountered upon any research in regards to this specific matter, but I'm unsure if I should edit it out or of I should fist sort eveything here before to see if there is anything. I decided to be safe and bring it up here for the time being.

If anyone can inform me on this matter, I would be most glad :). Best regards and thanks in advance Yippur (talk) 10:42, 8 March 2024 (UTC)
 * It's already in the article in 3 different tables Emdosis (talk) 15:30, 29 March 2024 (UTC)


 * Presumably for the fricative allophone of "b", which could be transcribed [β] or [v]. Not sure why [ʋ]... AnonMoos (talk) 19:52, 30 March 2024 (UTC)

proposal to add ⟨zˤ⟩, ⟨ðˤ⟩, and ⟨d̪ˤ⟩ (and perhaps also ⟨dˤ⟩) to the consonant (corresp.) table (for ז and ד respectively)
As you can see here and here, these sounds existed in proto-semitic times and it's very possible they were still around in biblical times. Also proposing to add [d͡z] for ז Emdosis (talk) 11:39, 4 April 2024 (UTC) All of the sounds mentioned exist in Arabic today as well. Emdosis (talk) 11:40, 4 April 2024 (UTC)


 * Only if you have sources. Remsense  诉  11:57, 4 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I don't. (Unless you count Wikipedia as a source, then maybe.) Emdosis (talk) 12:05, 4 April 2024 (UTC)
 * Very explicitly not, as that would be WP:circular. Remsense  诉  12:08, 4 April 2024 (UTC)

Also worth mentioning that ⟨d̪⟩ exists in modern day Sepharadi Hebrew. Emdosis (talk) 14:32, 4 April 2024 (UTC)


 * Also, not sure why these emphatics are reconstructed as voiced. Most indications during early periods are of voicelessness, as well as the symbols listed on Ejective consonant.  Arabic kept to the older Semitic pattern of voiceless-emphatic-voiced trios until well into the medieval period (maybe roughly ca. 800 A.D.), and voiced/voiceless contrasts between emphatic sounds only occur after that.  The pharyngealized/velarized [z] pronunciation of Ẓāʾ ظ is semi-artificial, due to a need to keep ظ and ض distinct in formal tajwid (in Arabic colloquial dialects, they've generally merged)... AnonMoos (talk) 17:49, 13 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I don't know man, but in practise I don't know if there's much of a difference between ⟨ʼ⟩ and ⟨ˤ⟩. I used ⟨ˤ⟩ to keep in concordance with the trend on Wikipedia... Emdosis (talk) 22:44, 13 April 2024 (UTC)


 * We have an article on Emphatic consonant. Many linguists reconstruct them as ejective consonants (linked above) in early Semitic, including Richard C. Steiner in his book "Affricated Ṣade in the Semitic Languages".  In any case, contrasts between voiced and voiceless emphatic sounds seem to be innovative to post-800-AD (roughly) Arabic... AnonMoos (talk) 20:50, 15 April 2024 (UTC)


 * If I've read this article correctly, it seems to be indicated that [sˤ] existed early on in the Secunda, so like 200 AD?... Does that sound plausible to you? Emdosis (talk) 04:47, 19 April 2024 (UTC)
 * I'm not sure what that means. The letter &#1510; is reconstructed for Biblical Hebrew more often as sʼ (ejective) than sˤ (pharyngealized) -- and since across languages ejective fricatives are often affricated, that likely means tsʼ (Alveolar ejective affricate) as is discussed at length by Richard C. Steiner in his book "Affricated Ṣade in the Semitic Languages".  The letters &#1510; and &#1505; remain distinct in most pronunciation traditions down to the present day (except some versions of Sephardi Hebrew). -- AnonMoos (talk) 17:22, 23 April 2024 (UTC)

Blau on Biblical Hebrew polyphony
For a discussion by a very reputable scholar, see "On Polyphony in Biblical Hebrew" by Joshua Blau (PDF here). He agrees with the standard polyphony of &#1513; (of course), and argues in great detail for the polyphony of &#1495; and &#1506; (each representing both a pharyngeal consonant and a velar fricative) in "literary" or formal Biblical recitation Hebrew down to the late centuries B.C. However, he does not support other polyphony. AnonMoos (talk) 03:01, 6 April 2024 (UTC)


 * However, he does not support other polyphony.
 * Does not support? Or does not mention to begin with? Emdosis (talk) 20:34, 15 April 2024 (UTC)


 * He discusses and rejects possible polyphony of צ corresponding to Arabic ض vs. צ not so corresponding, as you can see for yourself. AnonMoos (talk) 20:44, 15 April 2024 (UTC)
 * So just צ? What about all the other polyphones (ת ,פ ,כ ,ו ,ד ,ג ,ב)?
 * Also nobody argues that צ was ever officially polyphonic with [sʼ] and [ɬʼ] (where one would be used for example for initial syllable and the other for closed syllable). Just that the sound ṣ́ ([ɬʼ] or [tɬʼ]) evolved to ṣ [sʼ] over time (i.e. over 1000+ years) while some regions may still have clung to the original ṣ́ for another while (before those Israelites too, as a result of centuries of exile, started to pronounce it like the modern day ⟨t͡s⟩) Emdosis (talk) 21:43, 15 April 2024 (UTC)


 * I really don't know what the heck the non-emphatic stops are supposed to be polyphonous with (they do not have multiple sources in terms of the conventional reconstructions of proto-Semitic with 29 distinct consonants). Earlier non-sibilant fricatives in Semitic merged with sibilant fricatives.  Also, [w] became [y] initially before attested Bible Hebrew, but what became [w]? AnonMoos (talk) 23:27, 15 April 2024 (UTC)


 * A little while after I posted the above comment, I realized that you meant the fricative allophones of the stop sounds (the so-called Begadkefat letters). The thing is, scholars like Blau and Steiner were not concerned with that at all when they investigated what they referred to as "polyphony".  It's a fairly safe bet that the Phoenician language contained just 22 distinct consonant sounds when the 22-letter Phoenician alphabet was formed just a little bit before 1000 BC.  However, it seems that in a number of cases, this 22-letter alphabet was then borrowed to write other languages or dialects where more than 22 of the 29 conventionally reconstructed Proto-Semitic consonants had remained distinct.  This is known for certain in some cases (such as shin vs. sin in Hebrew) and is strongly suspected in other cases.   That's what Blau was trying to do, to penetrate behind the 22 letters of the alphabet to try to determine if at some stages of Hebrew there were more than 22 distinct consonant phonemes derived from proto-Semitic.
 * By contrast, the "Begadkefat" fricative sounds were not originally phonemes at all, but mere allophones. (By the time of Tiberian Hebrew, there might be a partial phonemic contrast between stops and fricatives, according to the traditional 1950s concept of the phoneme at least, caused by additional sound changes, but the functional load would be low.)  There's no archaism or proto-Semitic survivals involved, so it's just not the same thing as what Blau discusses. AnonMoos (talk) 15:30, 16 April 2024 (UTC)
 * This page is about biblical hebrew, not proto-semitic. According to the article itself, 'Biblical' implying even as late as the Secunda. If Blau's discussing proto-semitic polyphony (which from what I've seen, he seems to be talking about late Biblical Hebrew as well) then maybe his book should be renamed to 'On Proto-semitic polyphony'...Emdosis (talk) 01:36, 19 April 2024 (UTC)
 * What does polyphony even mean in linguistics? Do you mean 2 different sounds at once? I thought you were talking about allophones... :/ Emdosis (talk) 02:33, 19 April 2024 (UTC)


 * Whatever -- he's talking about distinctions of sounds that were very likely preserved in some cases into the late centuries B.C., which is most definitely not the proto-Semitic period, but is highly Hebrew-specific. Reconstructions of Proto-Semitic provide the basic original inventory of 29 phonemic consonants (in the standard reconstruction) but various of the consonants merged together at different times and in different ways in various of the daughter languages, and figuring out that some of these mergers occurred in the Biblical (or even post-Biblical) period is part of the historical study of Hebrew.  You need to brush up on basic facts and concepts, because it isn't really my job to keep explaining them to you... AnonMoos (talk) 04:04, 19 April 2024 (UTC)