Rabbi Binyamin Yuhanan - Biblical Hebrew Part 3

good evening today we are continuing our learning of biblical hebrew this is class number three and we are on page 10 of the first hebrew primer and the today's topic is the the last five letters and two vowels since there are 22 letters of the hebrew alphabet that means we already covered 17 letters so we have the last five letters number one is sadi sounds and in some communities they pronounce it as se like a like a russian say or in some communities they pronounce it more like a set like persians and buharians it's very similar to a sin but we will pronounce it as russian nuts next slide is khuf khof and the difference between kuf and kath is that koof is more guttural and therefore the proper pronunciation would be hof as opposed to cough is a is a simple letter like um russian or english k um but cough for more advanced students is more gathering and the third light is and as i mentioned before reish has various pronunciations depending where you are coming from um in russia and that's the rage that i use uh it's pronounced as a russian or rage in the united states english speakers they pronounce it like english are rage they don't say but rather rage and in israel they probably take it from yiddish speaking they say it more like a sound regis uh but we're going to use the russian sound that that sounds like the more correct one okay and the the next letter is shin if the dot is on the right side or sen if the dot is on the left side so the way to remember it is the the the right hand of shma so when we say shma we cover our um eyes with the right hand and that's why it's shet ma so she ma shin has the dot on the right hand just like we cover our eyes with right hand and sin with a dot on the left side is like a regular s sun sound okay and the final letter of the hebrew alphabet is tough as in tall and here since we're following the safari pronunciation they are not differentiating whether the top has a dot inside or not ashkenazim would say it differently if it with the dot they would say te without the dot they would say se sifarim pronounce both te and ten now there are some sephardim that do differentiate between tough with a dagesh with a dot and without with the dagesh they would pronounce it as t sound and without the dagesh they would pronounce it as a th in english the sound with a dage or fed without and this helps us to explain why in english strangely whenever they spell transliterate a word that has a sound in it they spell it with th like beth israel beth israel why beth israel and that is because uh beth israel is spelled with a tough without the dagesh and so according to the the safari pronunciation in some communities they would say beth israel so the english beth is the exact transliteration of the safari pronunciation however for simplicity we're going to use the standard safari pronunciation that you let's say tough t for both tough with the dagesh and without the dagesh to make it simple now the two vowels that we are going to learn make the o sound and that can be either with a a dot on top of a of a consonant or it can be a valve with a dot on top both of them make an o sound and the second vowel is the o sound as an zoo um and that can also be written in two different ways either with three dots under a letter like a letter or with a valve with a dot next to it so the two sounds that we're adding the two vowels that we're adding is are o and okay some um notes one through five shin and sin are the same letter in torah it is written the same way the torah doesn't have uh dots and therefore both shin and sin are the same letter and whoever is the torah needs to know how to pronounce it correctly shin is pronounced shay as in shape and sin is pronounced as son note two tough and tet again in sephardi pronunciation tough and ted are both pronounced the same way te as in tall note 3 kof and kaf are both both pronounced the same way k is in kitty and again this is for beginners for more advanced hof is more guttural than cuff sin and samar are both pronounced the same way se as in son and note 5 the new vowel o appears to the left of the letter and may be written in two ways as a dot on top of the valve appearing to the left of the consonant or as a dot to the upper left of the consonant so remember two ways of writing or sound the sound is the same whether the vowel has a valve with a dot on top or just a dot on the left top of the letter for example odd and odd spelled differently pronounced the same note 6 the second vowel may be written in two ways as the letter v with a dot in the middle appearing to the left of the consonant or as three dots underneath a consonant both have the same sound for example root root spelled differently pronounced the same now on page 11 note 7 the vav is not a vowel and a consonant at the same time so sometimes it it may be confusing that you have to pay attention vav is a consonant but in this case it is used as a vowel when a verb functions as a vowel and is sounded as or or it does not have the sound of as in vine so even though it's a valve with a with a dot on top we don't say vo we say the sound of the consonant consonant before and only the um vowel or is pronounced with the dot in the center the valve sounds like ooh as in pool with a vowel under it the valve sounds like a v in vine with a vowel sound for example for example veil or vet or v va or v so again sometimes the the vav is a consonant with its own vowel and sometimes vav is just another way of writing vowels or or ooh when a dot or appears next to a shin the dot from shin usually combines with the vowel which means since shin already has a vowel on the right side the the or sound of the previous letter may combine with the dot of shin and so you will only see one dot but it will serve as both the o sound for the previous letter and as a dot for shin for example your chev you can either write it with a you'd with a dot on top which makes sound yo and then a shin with a dot on the right side which makes it shin with its own vowel uh two dots underneath which makes the sound che yo chev or you can write it with just one dot combining both dots into one since they're next to each other and you will read it as your chev again and the the the way to know it is you look at the letter before if it doesn't have any vowels that means that the same vowel um that the same dot is used for its vowel as well as the shin's uh dot another example is moshe moshe can be spelled with two dots one as a vowel for me more and one is as a dad for shin more she or moshe can be spelled with one dot um functioning both as a vowel for more me or and now next exercise are look-alike letters starting from right to left alif and sadi look similar alef and sadi the top of it of both letters is the same a diagonal line with another diagonal shorter diagonal on top except that aleph has a leg that is vertical inside he has a leg that is horizontal head and kaf look very similar except that the tough has a tail and head is just straight iron and saudi look very similar except that the right side of iron is connected all the way to its lower leg whereas the right side of sadi goes till the middle of the letter ayan and sadi and the next two similar letters are resh and dali reish is curved rounded and dalid is more um perpendicular two lines that are perpendicular okay now check up words which are english words with hebrew spelling starting from right to left top line note second one coat rule coca cola second line show again um ashkenazim would would add a a sound to it show sephardium would not they would pronounce it just as show next one is su sin with a u sound su tut betsy betsy now reading practice um line one on page so so again second line cove code cout cab cove this word cove with a koof and two valves the first valve is a vowel for cough second valve is as a consonant and it doesn't have any vowels which means at the end of the word is just the sound itself cave keys cuckoo third line wrote roof roof on both sides so what is it is it a shin or sin and the answer is that it's a shin with a dot on the right side with a vowel or on its left side so it's pronounced as sho sha sheet shove line 5. yes so sorry if we go back to line 3 the last the last two words re at the end and even ashkenazim only said an a sound everyone pronounce it as re the last word we pronounce it as re and ashkenazim pronounce it as rei i see oh i see so is this is this the reason when we had one of the examples the english word t it get i think it had poof and it's pronounced he so that's the reason because it's for the ashkenazi yes yes that's why in the checkup words the first word on the right is note but in hebrew we would pronounce as not because uh ashkenazim also add a w sound to the o sound o okay again we're going to practice according to the standard safari pronunciation now line five su soul soul line six tech line seven my vet la mut next word a little bit hard ever dodd now we go to page 12. the five final letter forms as we mentioned that some letters are written differently whether they appear in the middle of the word or if they appear at the end of the word we call them and the letters or in hebrew they're called sophiet sophie memsophil nunsofi pesophil sadisofit or in yiddish they're called and the letters and the haf and the mem and the noon and the fae and the tsari so there are five letters in hebrew that have a different shape when they're written at the end of the word the regular and final forms of the letter are still the same letter and they are pronounced the same way so half written as a in the middle of the word is like a c turned upside down uh turned around c half but when it is and the letter the sophie the leg of half is lowered so that signifies a stop when the letter is like this so you continue when the letter puts its foot down that's it that's the time to stop that's the end of the word and the same with the noon noon is like this but the final noon puts it put puts its foot down and it's just a long stick same with a fae fei looks like this depending how you see me um and then the final phase puts its foot down and that side is the same thing the the the foot is horizontal and the final side he put it puts its foot down to show that it's a stop and man is the only one that's not exactly like that we call it a open man where there is a little slit in its foot and a closed man and that's the final ma'am to say that that's it you finished the circle you ended the word that's the end of the word that's the end the the final men okay and we have some examples on line one for letter half shah zakhar is used for letterman line two ma me regular mem is used whether at the beginning of the word or middle middle of the word m yom final letter is used line three na r ba na letter noon is used at the beginning of the word or middle of the word is regular uh men then final noon is used and it looks like a long stick line four for letter f regular and and kaf the final fae is used line five sadiq futsadi at the beginning of the word or matzah sadi at the in the middle of the word regular side is used and rats final sardi is used now a note about final half the final form half is usually written with two dots inside it and sometimes it's the two dots are omitted and we know that the two dots are there because that's the rule in hebrew at the end of the word if a letter doesn't have any vowels it means that it has two dots that's that means that it's just the sound of the consonant sometimes vowel commas the ah sound like a little t appears inside the final form okay now reading practice on the bottom of page 12 line one la cache here you have to be careful to pronounce the youth not ma which is a common mistake but rather ma yim because you'd uh is a consonant and cannot be omitted it does have its own sound um and line three on page 12 now on page 13 we have a summary of similar letters summary of possible pitfalls here's a review of all the look-alike letters in the alphabet noon and gimmel dalit half and noon could be confused vet and half that has a tail at the end and at the bottom and half is uh rounded uh left and sadie on the second line nun and half you should analyze these letters review them so that you can recognize exactly what letter it is and not to get confused noon and half hey head and tough three letters that look this similar and again hey has a split in its uh side side is just uh like a door frame and tough has a tail on the bottom like a foot zion valve and you'd mem and ted third line reish and dalid you'd known the final mem which is a closed box and the summit which is a circle sadie and ein here's a review of all the letters that sound alike they're written differently but they sound alike starting on the right top vav ver vet and vav both sound is even though safari make iron more guttural but for beginners they're both silent khof and kaf again for beginners they sound the same for more advanced kof is more guttural head half and final half and again for more advanced hat is gathering half for help distinguishing some similar looking hebrew letters from one another look for the following is the letter narrow or square for example versus does the letter extend above the line like lamid or below the line like are the corners rounded or squared with an overhang half is rounded and bet is more square and now exercises first comes the written exercise that you should do at home write the last 13 letters of the hebrew alphabet and the five final letters 10 times each write each first without vowels than with the vowels except for the final letters as you write say the sound aloud be sure to include all the possible vowels that you have learned so this should take some time and here you're practicing your writing skills you're also practicing saying the words the sounds and the the letters and uh you're practicing the vowels as well very good exercise takes time do it on your own and exercise two practice reading the following words aloud be careful not to confuse the letters that look alike but sound differently and in this exercise they actually put all the potential letters that look alike and we have to differentiate them now one dom ram notice the difference between dallad and rish dam ram number two number three gas gun number four tesha and hoddish tough can be confused with the head okay number five sus and sus sound the same written differently number six cave can the two letters cuff and and and the proof sound the same written differently and the two letters vav and noon look similar but pronounced differently cov and can number seven the final cuff might be confused with final noon eight let's differentiate between iron and of the final saudi ear and let's number 10 kana bana are similar and finally number 15 means she was means she lived so um different meaning can also be a sound and and now which means an animal now we turn to page 14 exercise three the following hebrew letters form english words and they have no meaning in hebrew so it's just english words spelled in hebrew find the english word in the list below that matches each hebrew form so i'm gonna read them and you yourselves uh practice it and connect it to the english word this way you'll make sure you're reading it correctly again uh there will be some words that are going to be hard to figure out because they wrote it according to ashkenazi pronunciation for example ad odd number one ad number two seed number three shits number four sin five yacht six goat goat seven dos eight bed nine pad ten lawn eleven head twelve oats some of these is going to be hard because ashkenazim added sound for example an 11 they would pronounce as hate hate we say het in 13 they would say name we say nem 14 red 15 net 16 10 17 bis 18 tar 19 2 20 ooze 21 cave 22 death 23 red 24 lume 25 car 26 meet 27 zoom 28 key now exercise 4 read the names of the letters in the hebrew alphabet aloud they're listed in alphabetical order so here we have all the aleph bet and they are written not only at the first letter but they're written out as the full name of each letter the initial letter of each word will tell you which letter is being named write all the forms of all the letters in the hebrew alphabet and copy the correct letter name next to each other so we'll read it and then at home you have to write the letter and its name the letter and its name alef ted exercise five read the following combinations and write out the two that sound alike or for the quick exercise right now you can just circle them with a pencil line one maroon manos modem so which two two words sound alike but to spell differently more demon modem one is spelled with a vowel e with a hude one is spelled e without the u the second one is spelled vowel or with a uh or and one is spelled or without a vowel they both sound modi modim but written differently line two no ten go el gefen go nev no fell go nev so the two words go nev and gonev one is spelled fully with both vowels o and e with the or spelled with a vav and a spelled with the extra you'd that's one difference and the second difference is the first word word gone is spelled with a vet second word gone is spelled with both sound the same gone line three yo the word yahada and yahada sounds similar again fusifadim we would say yahad gatheral and not gatra and also the vowels are different but we pronounce them the same line four and the two words erev and iref sound similar but again for sephardim the first one will be erev the second one will be guttural airf with the iron line five razon derek so the two words are similar and they sound the same spelled differently one is spelled with both vowels or spelled with a vav and one has only one uh or sound with a vav this the first one is without the valve just or do and the final letter in the first one is tet the the the next one is tough but both are pronounced the same dorot and line six sepher so the first word sephir and the last word sephir are spelled differently but pronounced the same one is spelled with the summit one is spelled with the sin and one has an extra you for its vowel now we go to page 15. we're doing a lot of exercises this page is the last page for this chapter chapter 2 so let's try to finish this page and you will have to review all the exercises that we do review them during the week and also do the exercises that we skip that are written exercise 6 on page 15. the following are all real hebrew words read them aloud until you can read them easily line one elif line three it's line four rahats line five line 6 [Music] [Applause] soft the third lane the third word from the the end and the sephardi would pronounce it as an ashkenazim pronounce it as a in and in in israelis might also say in odd milvado but again according to safari proper pronunciation it's in line 10 10 so far even a exercise seven is a written exercise to write the first four lines of exercise six if you need extra practice you can write out the entire exercise six and now a little um story it's an english story spelled in hebrew letters read and enjoy funny story just for practice with this we finished today's lesson hashem next week we're gonna go to chapter three and we're gonna actually start um the the um the grammar okay thank you for listening don't forget to do all the exercises review all the exercises we did and do all the exercises that we skipped thank you for learning with us all the best should have success you