A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | CH | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z | 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9
| Biblical Hebrew | |
|---|---|
| Classical Hebrew | |
| שְֹפַת כְּנַעַן, יְהוּדִית, (לָשׁוֹן) עִבְרִית, לְשׁוֹן הַקֹּדֶשׁ | |
 | |
| Region | |
| Era | attested from the 10th century BCE; developed into Mishnaic Hebrew after the Jewish–Roman wars in the first century CE |
Standard forms | |
| Language codes | |
| ISO 639-3 | Either:hbo – Ancient Hebrewsmp – Samaritan Hebrew |
hbo | |
smp | |
| Glottolog | anci1244 Ancient Hebrewsama1313 Samaritan |
Biblical Hebrew (עִבְרִית מִקְרָאִית ⓘ or לְשׁוֹן הַמִּקְרָא ⓘ), also called Classical Hebrew, is an archaic form of the Hebrew language, a language in the Canaanite branch of Semitic languages spoken by the Israelites in the area known as the Land of Israel, roughly west of the Jordan River and east of the Mediterranean Sea. The term "Hebrew" (ivrit) was not used for the language in the Hebrew Bible, which was referred to as שְֹפַת כְּנַעַן (sefat kena'an, i.e. language of Canaan) or יְהוּדִית (Yehudit, i.e. Judaean), but the name was used in Ancient Greek and Mishnaic Hebrew texts.[1]
The Hebrew language is attested in inscriptions from about the 10th century BCE,[2][3] when it was almost identical to Phoenician and other Canaanite languages, and spoken Hebrew persisted through and beyond the Second Temple period, which ended in the siege of Jerusalem (70 CE). It eventually developed into Mishnaic Hebrew, spoken until the fifth century CE.
The language of the Hebrew Bible reflects various stages of the Hebrew language in its consonantal skeleton, as well as a vocalization system which was added in the Middle Ages by the Masoretes. There is also some evidence of regional dialectal variation, including differences between Biblical Hebrew as spoken in the northern Kingdom of Israel and in the southern Kingdom of Judah. The consonantal text was transmitted in manuscript form, and underwent redaction in the Second Temple period, but its earliest portions (parts of Amos, Isaiah, Hosea and Micah) can be dated to the late 8th to early 7th centuries BCE.
Biblical Hebrew has been written with a number of different writing systems. From around the 12th century BCE until the 6th century BCE the Hebrews used the Paleo-Hebrew alphabet. This was retained by the Samaritans, who use the descendent Samaritan script to this day. However, the Imperial Aramaic alphabet gradually displaced the Paleo-Hebrew alphabet after the exile to Babylon, and it became the source for the Modern Hebrew alphabet. All of these scripts were lacking letters to represent all of the sounds of Biblical Hebrew, although these sounds are reflected in Greek and Latin transcriptions/translations of the time. These scripts originally indicated only consonants, but certain letters, known by the Latin term matres lectionis, became increasingly used to mark vowels. In the Middle Ages, various systems of diacritics were developed to mark the vowels in Hebrew manuscripts; of these, only the Tiberian vocalization is still in wide use.
Biblical Hebrew possessed a series of emphatic consonants whose precise articulation is disputed, likely ejective or pharyngealized. Earlier Biblical Hebrew possessed three consonants which did not have their own letters in the writing system, but over time they merged with other consonants. The stop consonants developed fricative allophones under the influence of Aramaic, and these sounds eventually became marginally phonemic. The pharyngeal and glottal consonants underwent weakening in some regional dialects, as reflected in the modern Samaritan Hebrew reading tradition. The vowel system of Biblical Hebrew changed over time and is reflected differently in the ancient Greek and Latin transcriptions, medieval vocalization systems, and modern reading traditions.
Biblical Hebrew had a typical Semitic morphology with nonconcatenative morphology, arranging Semitic roots into patterns to form words. Biblical Hebrew distinguished two genders (masculine, feminine), three numbers (singular, plural, and uncommonly, dual). Verbs were marked for voice and mood, and had two conjugations which may have indicated aspect and/or tense (a matter of debate). The tense or aspect of verbs was also influenced by the conjunction ו, in the so-called waw-consecutive construction. Unlike modern Hebrew, the default word order for biblical Hebrew was verb–subject–object, and verbs inflected for the number, gender, and person of their subject. Pronominal suffixes could be appended to verbs (to indicate object) or nouns (to indicate possession), and nouns had special construct states for use in possessive constructions.
Nomenclature
The earliest written sources refer to Biblical Hebrew as שפת כנען "the language of Canaan".[4][5] The Hebrew Bible also calls the language יהודית "Judaean, Judahite"[6][5] In the Hellenistic period, Greek writings use the names Hebraios, Hebraïsti[7] and in Mishnaic Hebrew we find עברית 'Hebrew' and לשון עברית "Hebrew language".[8][5] The origin of this term is obscure; suggested origins include the biblical Eber, the ethnonyms Ḫabiru, Ḫapiru, and ˁApiru found in sources from Egypt and the near east, and a derivation from the root עבר "to pass" alluding to crossing over the Jordan River.[5][9] Jews also began referring to Hebrew as לשון הקדש "the Holy Tongue" in Mishnaic Hebrew.[5]
The term Classical Hebrew may include all pre-medieval dialects of Hebrew, including Mishnaic Hebrew, or it may be limited to Hebrew contemporaneous with the Hebrew Bible. The term Biblical Hebrew refers to pre-Mishnaic dialects (sometimes excluding Dead Sea Scroll Hebrew). The term Biblical Hebrew may or may not include extra-biblical texts, such as inscriptions (e.g. the Siloam inscription), and generally also includes later vocalization traditions for the Hebrew Bible's consonantal text, most commonly the early medieval Tiberian vocalization.[citation needed]
History
The archeological record for the prehistory of Biblical Hebrew is far more complete than the record of Biblical Hebrew itself.[10] Early Northwest Semitic (ENWS) materials are attested from 2350 BCE to 1200 BCE, the end of the Bronze Age.[10] The Northwest Semitic languages, including Hebrew, differentiated noticeably during the Iron Age (1200–540 BCE), although in its earliest stages Biblical Hebrew was not highly differentiated from Ugaritic and the Canaanite of the Amarna letters.[11]
Hebrew developed during the latter half of the second millennium BCE between the Jordan and the Mediterranean Sea, an area known as Canaan.[5] The Israelite tribes established a kingdom in Canaan at the beginning of the first millennium BCE, which later split into the kingdom of Israel in the north and the kingdom of Judah in the south after a disputed succession.[12]
The kingdom of Israel was destroyed by the Assyrians in 722 BCE.[12] The kingdom of Judah was conquered by the Babylonians in 586 BCE. The upper classes were exiled into the Babylonian captivity and Solomon's Temple was destroyed.[12][13] Later the Persians made Judah a province and permitted Jewish exiles to return and rebuild the Temple.[12] According to the Gemara, Hebrew of this period was similar to Imperial Aramaic;[14][15] Hanina bar Hama said that God sent the exiled Jews to Babylon because " language is akin to the Leshon Hakodesh".[16]
Aramaic became the common language in the north, in Galilee and Samaria.[13] Hebrew remained in use in Judah; however the returning exiles brought back Aramaic influence, and Aramaic was used for communicating with other ethnic groups during the Persian period.[13] Alexander conquered Judah in 332 BCE, beginning the period of Hellenistic (Greek) domination.[13] During the Hellenistic period Judea became independent under the Hasmonean dynasty, but later the Romans ended their independence, making Herod the Great their governor.[12] One Jewish revolt against the Romans led to the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE, and the second Bar Kokhba revolt in 132–135 led to a large departure of the Jewish population of Judea.[12]
Biblical Hebrew after the Second Temple period evolved into Mishnaic Hebrew, which ceased being spoken and developed into a literary language around 200 CE.[17] Hebrew continued to be used as a literary and liturgical language in the form of Medieval Hebrew, and Hebrew began a revival process in the 19th century, culminating in Modern Hebrew becoming the official language of Israel. Currently, Classical Hebrew is generally taught in public schools in Israel, and Biblical Hebrew forms are sometimes used in Modern Hebrew literature, much as archaic and biblical constructions are used in Modern English literature. Since Modern Hebrew contains many biblical elements, Biblical Hebrew is fairly intelligible to Modern Hebrew speakers.[18]
The primary source of Biblical Hebrew material is the Hebrew Bible.[11][19] Epigraphic materials from the area of Israelite territory are written in a form of Hebrew called Inscriptional Hebrew, although this is meagerly attested.[19][20] According to Waltke & O'Connor, Inscriptional Hebrew "is not strikingly different from the Hebrew preserved in the Masoretic text."[20] The damp climate of Israel caused the rapid deterioration of papyrus and parchment documents, in contrast to the dry environment of Egypt, and the survival of the Hebrew Bible may be attributed to scribal determination in preserving the text through copying.[21] No manuscript of the Hebrew Bible dates to before 400 BCE, although two silver rolls (the Ketef Hinnom scrolls) from the seventh or sixth century BCE show a version of the Priestly Blessing.[21][22][23] Vowel and cantillation marks were added to the older consonantal layer of the Bible between 600 CE and the beginning of the 10th century.[24][nb 1] The scholars who preserved the pronunciation of the Bibles were known as the Masoretes. The most well-preserved system that was developed, and the only one still in religious use, is the Tiberian vocalization, but both Babylonian and Palestinian vocalizations are also attested.[24] The Palestinian system was preserved mainly in piyyutim, which contain biblical quotations.[24]
Classification
| Proto-Semitic | Hebrew | Aramaic | Arabic | Examples | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hebrew | Aramaic | Arabic | meaning | ||||
| */ð/ *ḏ | */z/ ז | */d/ ד | */ð/ ذ | זָהָב זָכָר |
דְּהָב דְּכָר |
ذَهَب ذَكَر |
'gold' 'male' |
| */z/1 *z | */z/ ז | */z/ ز | מֹאזְנָיִם זְמָן |
מֹאזְנָיִן זְמָן |
مَوَازَيْن زَمَن |
'scale' 'time' | |
| */s/ *s | */s/ ס | */s/ س */ʃ/ ش |
סַכִּין סַהַר |
سِكِّين شَهْر |
'knife' 'moon/month' | ||
| */ɬ/ *ś | */s/ שׂ | */ʃ/ ش | עָשָׂר | عَشْر | 'ten' | ||
| */ʃ/ *š | */ʃ/ שׁ | */ʃ/ שׁ | */s/ س | שָׁנָה שָׁלוֹם |
שָׁנָה שְׁלָם |
سَنة سَلام |
'year' 'peace' |
| */θ/ *ṯ | */t/ ת | */θ/ ث | שָׁלוֹשׁ שְׁתָּיִם |
תְּלָת תְּרֵין |
ثَلاث اِثْنان |
'three' 'two' | |
| */θʼ/1 *ṱ | */sˤ/1 צ | */tˤ/ ט | */ðˤ/ ظ | צֵל צָהֳרָיִם |
טְלָה טֹהֶר |
ظِلّ ظُهْر |
'shadow' 'noon' |
| */ɬʼ/1 *ṣ́ | */ʕ/ ע | */dˤ/ ض | אֶרֶץ צָחַק |
אֶרַע עֲחַק |
أَرْض ضَحِكَ |
'land' 'laughed' | |
| */sʼ/1 *ṣ | */sˤ/ צ | */sˤ/ ص | צָרַח צַבָּר |
צְרַח צַבָּר |
صَرَخَ صَبْر |
'shout' 'water melon like plant' | |
| */χ/ *ḫ | */ħ/ ח | */x~χ/ خ | חֲמִשָּׁה צָרַח |
חַמְשָׁה צְרַח |
خَمْسة صَرَخَ |
'five' 'shout' | |
| */ħ/ *ḥ | */ħ/ ح | מֶלַח חָלוֹם |
מֶלַח חֲלָם |
مِلْح حُلْم |
'salt' 'dream' | ||
| */ʁ/ *ġ | */ʕ/ ע | */ɣ~ʁ/ غ | עוֹרֵב מַעֲרָב |
עוֹרָב מַעֲרָב |
غُرَاب غَرْب |
'raven' 'west' | |
| */ʕ/ *ʻ | */ʕ/ ع | עֶבֶד שֶׁבַע |
عَبْد سَبْع |
'slave' 'seven' | |||
Biblical Hebrew is a Northwest Semitic language from the Canaanite subgroup.[28][29]
As Biblical Hebrew evolved from the Proto-Semitic language it underwent a number of consonantal mergers parallel with those in other Canaanite languages.[25][30][31][nb 2] There is no evidence that these mergers occurred after the adaptation of the Hebrew alphabet.[32][nb 3]
As a Northwest Semitic language, Hebrew shows the shift of initial *?pojem= to /j/, a similar independent pronoun system to the other Northwest Semitic languages (with third person pronouns never containing /ʃ/), some archaic forms, such as /naħnu/ 'we', first person singular pronominal suffix -i or -ya, and /n/ commonly preceding pronominal suffixes.[30] Case endings are found in Northwest Semitic languages in the second millennium BCE, but disappear almost totally afterwards.[30] Mimation is absent in singular nouns, but is often retained in the plural, as in Hebrew.[30]
The Northwest Semitic languages formed a dialect continuum in the Iron Age (1200–540 BCE), with Phoenician and Aramaic on each extreme.[30][33] Hebrew is classed with Phoenician in the Canaanite subgroup, which also includes Ammonite, Edomite, and Moabite.[30] Moabite might be considered a Hebrew dialect, though it possessed distinctive Aramaic features.[33][34] Although Ugaritic shows a large degree of affinity to Hebrew in poetic structure, vocabulary, and some grammar, it lacks some Canaanite features (like the Canaanite shift and the shift */ð/ > /z/), and its similarities are more likely a result of either contact or preserved archaism.[35]
Hebrew underwent the Canaanite shift, where Proto-Semitic /aː/ tended to shift to /oː/, perhaps when stressed.[30][36] Hebrew also shares with the Canaanite languages the shifts */ð/ > /z/, */θʼ/ and */ɬʼ/ > /sʼ/, widespread reduction of diphthongs, and full assimilation of non-final /n/ to the following consonant if word final, i.e. בת /bat/ from *bant.[30] There is also evidence of a rule of assimilation of /y/ to the following coronal consonant in pre-tonic position, shared by Hebrew, Phoenician and Aramaic.[37]
Typical Canaanite words in Hebrew include: גג "roof" שלחן "table" חלון "window" ישן "old (thing)" זקן "old (person)" and גרש "expel".[30] Morphological Canaanite features in Hebrew include the masculine plural marker -ם, first person singular pronoun אנכי, interrogative pronoun מי, definite article ה- (appearing in the first millennium BCE), and third person plural feminine verbal marker ת-.[30]
Eras
Biblical Hebrew as preserved in the Hebrew Bible is composed of multiple linguistic layers. The consonantal skeleton of the text is the most ancient, while the cantillation and modern vocalization are later additions reflecting a later stage of the language.[19] These additions were added after 600 CE; Hebrew had already ceased being used as a spoken language around 200 CE.[38] Biblical Hebrew as reflected in the consonantal text of the Bible and in extra-biblical inscriptions may be subdivided by era.
The oldest form of Biblical Hebrew, Archaic Hebrew, is found in poetic sections of the Bible and inscriptions dating to around 1000 BCE, the early Monarchic Period.[39][40] This stage is also known as Old Hebrew or Paleo-Hebrew, and is the oldest stratum of Biblical Hebrew. The oldest known artifacts of Archaic Biblical Hebrew are various sections of the Tanakh, including the Song of Moses (Exodus 15) and the Song of Deborah (Judges 5).[41] Biblical poetry uses a number of distinct lexical items, for example חזה for prose ראה 'see', כביר for גדול 'great'.[42] Some have cognates in other Northwest Semitic languages, for example פעל 'do' and חָרוּץ 'gold' which are common in Canaanite and Ugaritic.[43] Grammatical differences include the use of זה, זוֹ, and זוּ as relative particles, negative בל, and various differences in verbal and pronominal morphology and syntax.[44]
Later pre-exilic Biblical Hebrew (such as is found in prose sections of the Pentateuch, Nevi'im, and some Ketuvim) is known as 'Biblical Hebrew proper' or 'Standard Biblical Hebrew'.[39][40] This is dated to the period from the 8th to the 6th century BCE. In contrast to Archaic Hebrew, Standard Biblical Hebrew is more consistent in using the definite article ה-, the accusative marker את, distinguishing between simple and waw-consecutive verb forms, and in using particles like אשר and כי rather than asyndeton.[45]
Biblical Hebrew from after the Babylonian exile in 587 BCE is known as 'Late Biblical Hebrew'.[39][40] Late Biblical Hebrew shows Aramaic influence in phonology, morphology, and lexicon, and this trend is also evident in the later-developed Tiberian vocalization system.[46][nb 4]
Qumran Hebrew, attested in the Dead Sea Scrolls from ca. 200 BCE to 70 CE, is a continuation of Late Biblical Hebrew.[40] Qumran Hebrew may be considered an intermediate stage between Biblical Hebrew and Mishnaic Hebrew, though Qumran Hebrew shows its own idiosyncratic dialectal features.[47]
Dialects
Dialect variation in Biblical Hebrew is attested to by the well-known shibboleth incident of Judges 12:6, where Jephthah's forces from Gilead caught Ephraimites trying to cross the Jordan river by making them say שִׁבֹּ֤לֶת šibboleṯ ('ear of corn')[48] The Ephraimites' identity was given away by their pronunciation: סִבֹּ֤לֶת sibboleṯ.[48] The apparent conclusion is that the Ephraimite dialect had /s/ for standard /ʃ/.[48] As an alternative explanation, it has been suggested that the proto-Semitic phoneme */θ/, which shifted to /ʃ/ in most dialects of Hebrew, may have been retained in the Hebrew of the trans-Jordan[49][nb 5] (however, there is evidence that שִׁבֹּ֤לֶת's Proto-Semitic ancestor had initial consonant š (whence Hebrew /ʃ/), contradicting this theory;[48] for example, שִׁבֹּ֤לֶת's Proto-Semitic ancestor has been reconstructed as *šu(n)bul-at-.[50]); or that the Proto-Semitic sibilant *s1, transcribed with šin and traditionally reconstructed as */ʃ/, had been originally */s/ while another sibilant *s3, transcribed with sameḵ and traditionally reconstructed as /s/, had been originally /ts/;[51] later on, a push-type chain shift changed *s3 /ts/ to /s/ and pushed s1 /s/ to /ʃ/ in many dialects (e.g. Gileadite) but not others (e.g. Ephraimite), where *s1 and *s3 merged into /s/.
Hebrew as spoken in the northern Kingdom of Israel, known also as Israelian Hebrew, shows phonological, lexical, and grammatical differences from southern dialects.[52] The Northern dialect spoken around Samaria shows more frequent simplification of /aj/ into /eː/ as attested by the Samaria ostraca (8th century BCE), e.g. ין (= /jeːn/ < */jajn/ 'wine'), while the Southern (Judean) dialect instead adds in an epenthetic vowel /i/, added halfway through the first millennium BCE (יין = /ˈjajin/).[30][nb 6][53] The word play in Amos 8:1–2 כְּלוּב קַ֫יִץ... בָּא הַקֵּץ may reflect this: given that Amos was addressing the population of the Northern Kingdom, the vocalization *קֵיץ would be more forceful.[53] Other possible Northern features include use of שֶ- 'who, that', forms like דֵעָה 'to know' rather than דַעַת and infinitives of certain verbs of the form עֲשוֹ 'to do' rather than עֲשוֹת.[54] The Samaria ostraca also show שת for standard שנה 'year', as in Aramaic.[54]
The guttural phonemes /ħ ʕ h ʔ/ merged over time in some dialects.[55] This was found in Dead Sea Scroll Hebrew, but Jerome attested to the existence of contemporaneous Hebrew speakers who still distinguished pharyngeals.[55] Samaritan Hebrew also shows a general attrition of these phonemes, though /ʕ ħ/ are occasionally preserved as .[56]
Orthography
| Name | Paleo-Hebrew | Block | Samaritan | Phonetic value (Pre-Exilic)[57][58] (IPA) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Aleph | 
|
א | ࠀ | [ʔ] |
| Beth | 
|
ב | ࠁ | [b], [β] |
| Gimel | 
|
ג | ࠂ | [ɡ], [ɣ] |
| Daleth | 
|
ד | ࠃ | [d], [ð] |
| He | 
|
ה | ࠄ | [h] |
| Waw | 
|
ו | ࠅ | [w]/wᶹ |
| Zayin | 
|
ז | ࠆ | [z̄] |
| Heth | 
|
ח | ࠇ | [ħ] or [χ] |
| Teth | 
|
ט | ࠈ | [tˤ] |
| Yodh | 
|
י | ࠉ | [j] |
| Kaph | 
|
כ, ך | ࠊ | [k], [x] |
| Lamedh | 
|
ל | ࠋ | [l] |
| Mem | 
|
מ, ם | ࠌ | [m] |
| Nun | 
|
נ, ן | ࠍ | [n] |
| Samekh | 
|
ס | ࠎ | [s] |
| Ayin | 
|
ע | ࠏ | [ʕ] or [ʁ][59][60] |
| Pe | 
|
פ, ף | ࠐ | [p], [ɸ] |
| Tsade | 
|
צ, ץ | ࠑ | [sˤ] |
| Qoph | 
|
ק | ࠒ | [qˁ] |
| Resh | 
|
ר | ࠓ | [ɾ], [r] |
| Shin | 
|
ש | ࠔ | [ʃ] or |
| Taw | 
|
ת | ࠕ | [t], [θ] |
The earliest Hebrew writing yet discovered, found at Khirbet Qeiyafa, dates to the 10th century BCE.[2] The 15 cm x 16.5 cm (5.9 in x 6.5 in) trapezoid pottery sherd (ostracon) has five lines of text written in ink in the Proto-Canaanite alphabet (the old form which predates both the Paleo-Hebrew and Phoenician alphabets).[2][3] The tablet is written from left to right, suggesting that Hebrew writing was still in the formative stage.[3]
The Israelite tribes who settled in the land of Israel used a late form of the Proto-Sinaitic Alphabet (known as Proto-Canaanite when found in Israel) around the 12th century BCE, which developed into Early Phoenician and Early Paleo-Hebrew as found in the Gezer calendar (c. 10th century BCE).[61][62] This script developed into the Paleo-Hebrew script in the 10th or 9th centuries BCE.[63][64][65] The Paleo-Hebrew alphabet's main differences from the Phoenician script were "a curving to the left of the downstrokes in the "long-legged" letter-signs... the consistent use of a Waw with a concave top, x-shaped Taw."[63][nb 7] The oldest inscriptions in Paleo-Hebrew script are dated to around the middle of the 9th century BCE, the most famous being the Mesha Stele in the Moabite language (which might be considered a dialect of Hebrew).[22][34] The ancient Hebrew script was in continuous use until the early 6th century BCE, the end of the First Temple period.[66] In the Second Temple Period the Paleo-Hebrew script gradually fell into disuse, and was completely abandoned among the Jews after the failed Bar Kochba revolt.[64][67] The Samaritans retained the ancient Hebrew alphabet, which evolved into the modern Samaritan alphabet.[64][67]
By the end of the First Temple period the Aramaic script, a separate descendant of the Phoenician script, became widespread throughout the region, gradually displacing Paleo-Hebrew.[67] The oldest documents that have been found in the Aramaic Script are fragments of the scrolls of Exodus, Samuel, and Jeremiah found among the Dead Sea scrolls, dating from the late 3rd and early 2nd centuries BCE.[68] It seems that the earlier biblical books were originally written in the Paleo-Hebrew script, while the later books were written directly in the later Assyrian script.[64] Some Qumran texts written in the Assyrian script write the tetragrammaton and some other divine names in Paleo-Hebrew, and this practice is also found in several Jewish-Greek biblical translations.[64][nb 8] While spoken Hebrew continued to evolve into Mishnaic Hebrew, A number of regional "book-hand" styles were put into use for the purpose of Torah manuscripts and occasionally other literary works, distinct from the calligraphic styles used mainly for private purposes.[69] The Mizrahi and Ashkenazi book-hand styles were later adapted to printed fonts after the invention of the printing press.[69] The modern Hebrew alphabet, also known as the Assyrian or Square script, appears a descendant of the Aramaic alphabet.[67]
The Phoenician script had dropped five characters by the 12th century BCE, reflecting the language's twenty-two consonantal phonemes.[65] The 22 letters of the Paleo-Hebrew alphabet numbered less than the consonant phonemes of ancient Biblical Hebrew; in particular, the letters ⟨ח, ע, ש⟩ could each mark two different phonemes.[70] After a sound shift the letters ח, ע could only mark one phoneme, but (except in Samaritan Hebrew) ש still marked two. The old Babylonian vocalization system wrote a superscript ס above the ש to indicate it took the value /s/, while the Masoretes added the shin dot to distinguish between the two varieties of the letter.[71][72]
The original Hebrew alphabet consisted only of consonants, but the letters א, ה, ו, י, also were used to indicate vowels, known as matres lectionis when used in this function.[65][73] It is thought that this was a product of phonetic development: for instance, *bayt ('house') shifted to בֵּית in construct state but retained its spelling.[74] While no examples of early Hebrew orthography have been found, older Phoenician and Moabite texts show how First Temple period Hebrew would have been written.[73] Phoenician inscriptions from the 10th century BCE do not indicate matres lectiones in the middle or the end of a word, for example לפנ and ז for later לפני and זה, similarly to the Hebrew Gezer Calendar, which has for instance שערמ for שעורים and possibly ירח for ירחו.[73] Matres lectionis were later added word-finally, for instance the Mesha inscription has בללה, בנתי for later בלילה, בניתי; however at this stage they were not yet used word-medially, compare Siloam inscription זדה versus אש (for later איש).[73] The relative terms defective and full/plene are used to refer to alternative spellings of a word with less or more matres lectionis, respectively.[73][nb 9]
The Hebrew Bible was presumably originally written in a more defective orthography than found in any of the texts known today.[73] Of the extant textual witnesses of the Hebrew Bible, the Masoretic text is generally the most conservative in its use of matres lectionis, with the Samaritan Pentateuch and its forebearers being more full and the Qumran tradition showing the most liberal use of vowel letters.[75] The Masoretic text mostly uses vowel letters for long vowels, showing the tendency to mark all long vowels except for word-internal /aː/.[74][nb 10] In the Qumran tradition, back vowels are usually represented by ⟨ו⟩ whether short or long.[76][77] ⟨י⟩ is generally used for both long and (אבילים, מית), and final is often written as יא- in analogy to words like היא, הביא, e.g. כיא, sometimes מיא.[76][77] ⟨ה⟩ is found finally in forms like חוטה (Tiberian חוטא), קורה (Tiberian קורא) while ⟨א⟩ may be used for an a-quality vowel in final position (e.g. עליהא) and in medial position (e.g. יאתום).[76] Pre-Samaritan and Samaritan texts show full spellings in many categories (e.g. כוחי vs. Masoretic כחי in Genesis 49:3) but only rarely show full spelling of the Qumran type.[78]
Presumably, the vowels of Biblical Hebrew were not indicated in the original text, but various sources attest to them at various stages of development. Greek and Latin transcriptions of words from the biblical text provide early evidence of the nature of Biblical Hebrew vowels. In particular, there is evidence from the rendering of proper nouns in the Koine Greek Septuagint (3rd–2nd centuries BCE[79]) and the Greek alphabet transcription of the Hebrew biblical text contained in the Secunda (3rd century CE, likely a copy of a preexisting text from before 100 BCE[nb 11]). In the 7th and 8th centuries CE various systems of vocalic notation were developed to indicate vowels in the biblical text.[80] The most prominent, best preserved, and the only system still in use, is the Tiberian vocalization system, created by scholars known as Masoretes around 850 CE.[24][81] There are also various extant manuscripts making use of less common vocalization systems (Babylonian and Palestinian), known as superlinear vocalizations because their vocalization marks are placed above the letters.[24][81][nb 12][nb 13] In addition, the Samaritan reading tradition is independent of these systems and was occasionally notated with a separate vocalization system.[81][82][nb 14] These systems often record vowels at different stages of historical development; for example, the name of the Judge Samson is recorded in Greek as Σαμψών Sampsōn with the first vowel as /a/, while Tiberian שִמְשוֹן /ʃimʃon/ with /i/ shows the effect of the law of attenuation whereby /a/ in closed unstressed syllables became /i/.[83] All of these systems together are used to reconstruct the original vocalization of Biblical Hebrew.
At an early stage, in documents written in the paleo-Hebrew script, words were divided by short vertical lines and later by dots, as reflected by the Mesha Stone, the Siloam inscription, the Ophel inscription, and paleo-Hebrew script documents from Qumran.[84] Word division was not used in Phoenician inscriptions; however, there is no direct evidence for biblical texts being written without word division, as suggested by Nahmanides in his introduction to the Torah.[84] Word division using spaces was commonly used from the beginning of the 7th century BCE for documents in the Aramaic script.[84] In addition to marking vowels, the Tiberian system also uses cantillation marks, which serve to mark word stress, semantic structure, and the musical motifs used in formal recitation of the text.[85][86]
While the Babylonian and Palestinian reading traditions are extinct, various other systems of pronunciation have evolved over time, notably the Yemenite, Sephardi, Ashkenazi, and Samaritan traditions. Modern Hebrew pronunciation is also used by some to read biblical texts. The modern reading traditions do not stem solely from the Tiberian system; for instance, the Sephardic tradition's distinction between qamatz gadol and qatan is likely pre-Tiberian.[87] However, the only orthographic system used to mark vowels is the Tiberian vocalization.
Phonology
The phonology as reconstructed for Biblical Hebrew is as follows: