In two previous Sunday essays, I have introduced the Hebrew alphabet and looked at the first five letters. Here we look at the next five, waw, zayin, het, tet and yod.
6. Waw
The sixth letter in Hebrew is waw . In modern Hebrew it is vav; the w sound has evolved into a v. Although this vowel makes a w (Biblical Hebrew) or v sound (modern Hebrew) it also can take on certain vowel sounds in some settings.
Hebrew writing is an abjad writing system, in which the Hebew letters supposedly only represent consonants. Still, the need for some vowel symbols apparently creeps in and occasionally waw represents a vowel sound. In order to describe vowel sounds, Hebrew has additional niqqud symbols that are optional and are placed under consonants. I will look at niqqud later.
The script forms are:
Waw naturally enough represents a hook and the word vav in Hebrew is "hook", drawn below.
Wah is used in Biblical Hebrew as a prefix, usually representing "and".
7. Zayin
The seventh letter is zayin, pronounced to rhyme with Brian. It makes a "z" sound.
8. Het
The eighth letter is het.
9. Tet
The ninth letter is tet, making a "t" sound.
10. Yod
The tenth letter is yod, which is half-size, in the upper half of the line. It makes a "y" (yuh) sound.
Resources
In addition to the Hebrewpod101 video, Christian publisher Zondervan has a channel which includes this lecture in Hebrew. I am also using this text on basic Hebrew, Read Hebrew in 22 Days or Less by Seltzer, Lizorkin-Eyzenberg and Shir.
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