Vowels

[hyssop]

VOWELS

Sounds Like . . .	Vowel	Vowel	Vowel
AH (as in "father")	}X	;X	'X
EH (as in "wet")	?X	,X	eX
EE (as in "cheek")	&nbsp	yiX	iX
O (as in "store")*	|X	AX	OX
OO (as in "moon")	&nbsp	WX	uX
silent	&nbsp	X	.X

^*NOTE: If one of the consonants is a Shin (with the OX vowel on the right), the dot for the "O" vowel overlays the dot on the Shin and cannot be distinguished.

Example: h,vm = Moses. Notice that the mem has no vowel associated with it; therefore, one can assume the "O" vowel is there above the shin.

Diphthongs: Combinations of two back-to-back vowel sounds within the same syllable. For example, oy in the word boy is a diphthong.

DIPHTHONGS

Sounds Like . . .	&nbsp	&nbsp
AH-Y, forming I, as in "like"	y;X	y'X
EH-Y, forming A, as in "make"	&nbsp	yeX
OH-Y, forming OY, as in "boy"	yOX	yAX
OO-Y, forming OOEY, as in "gooey"	yuX	yWX

As far as I know, the tables above cover the Hebrew vowels and vowel sounds. Any other marks that you may see above or below the Hebrew letters (including the wishbone-looking mark) in printed texts are used to indicate how the verse is supposed to be "sung" by one reading the scripture in the synagogue and have nothing to do with the meaning/translation of the verses. You will find, however, that the dot (or "dagesh") will appear with many of the consonants within a word (e.g. T, C, L, etc.) that are often there for grammatical reasons that go well beyond Basic Hebrew.


Back to Table of Contents