Page:Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar (1910 Kautzsch-Cowley edition).djvu/66

 The names of the vowels are mostly taken from the form and action of the mouth in producing the various sounds, as ; (of the mouth), also  (=),  (cf. the Arab, );  (also ) ; , according to others , i.e. of the mouth (also  ). also denotes a slighter, as and  (also ) a firmer, compression or contraction of the mouth. takes its name from its form. So  is another name for Qibbûṣ.

Moreover the names were mostly so formed (but only later), that the sound of each vowel is heard in the first syllable ( for, for ,  for ); in order to carry this out consistently some even write , ,.

2. As the above examples show, the vowel sign stands regularly under the consonant, after which it is to be pronounced,, , , , &c. The called   alone forms an exception to this rule, being pronounced before the consonant,   (wind, spirit). The (without ) stands on the left above the consonant;  (but ). If, as a vowel letter, follows a consonant which is to be pronounced with , the point is placed over its right arm, thus , ; but e.g. , since here begins a syllable.

No dot is used for the Ḥolem when (of course without ) is pronounced after  or before. Hence (hating),  (to bear),  (not ); but  (a watchman). When precedes the, the dot is placed over its right arm, e.g.  (he treads with the feet),  (those who carry).

In the sign, the may also be a consonant. The is then either to be read  (necessarily so when a consonant otherwise without a vowel precedes, e.g., lending) or , when a vowel already precedes the , e.g.  (iniquity) for. In more exact printing, a distinction is at least made between and  (i.e. either  or, when another vowel follows the,  Since 1846 we have become acquainted with a system of vocalization different in many respects from the common method. The vowel signs, all except , are there placed above the consonants, and differ almost throughout in form, and some even as regards the sound which they denote: {Babylonian â/ā mark} = , , {Babylonian ă/è mark} = tone-bearing  and , {Babylonian ê/ē mark} = , , {Babylonian î mark} = , {Babylonian ô/ō mark} = , , {Babylonian û mark} = . In an unsharpened syllable {Babylonian toneless ă/è mark} = toneless  and , and also Ḥaṭeph Pathaḥ; {Babylonian toneless ĕ mark} = toneless  and Ḥaṭeph Seghôl; {Babylonian ĭ mark} = , {Babylonian ŭ mark} = , {Babylonian ŏ mark} = , and Ḥaṭeph Qameṣ. Lastly in toneless syllables before Dageš, {Babylonian ă mark} = , {Babylonian ĕ mark} = , {Babylonian i mark} = , {Babylonian ŭ mark} = , {Babylonian  mark} =. Šewâ is {Babylonian Šewâ mark}. The accents differ less and stand in some cases under the line of the consonants. Besides this complicated system of the Codex Babylonicus (see below) and other MSS., there is a simpler one, used in Targums. It is still uncertain whether the latter is the foundation of the former (as Merx, xi, and Bacher,  1895, p. 15 ff.), or is a later development of it among the Jews of South Arabia (as Praetorius,  1899, p. 181 ff.). For the older literature on this, as it is called, see A. Harkavy and H. L. Strack, , St. Petersb. and Lpz., 1875, parts i and ii, p. 223 ff. A more thorough study of the system was made possible by H. Strack’s facsimile edition of the (St. Petersb., 1876, la. fol.) of the year 916, which Firkowitsch discovered in 1839, in the synagogue at Tschufutkale in the Crimea. The MS. has been shown by Ginsburg (, Berlin, 1899, p. 149, and, pp. 216 ff., 475 f.) to contain a recension of the Biblical text partly Babylonian and partly Palestinian; cf. also Barnstein,, London, 1896, p. 6 f. Strack edited a fragment of it in , St. Petersb. 1875. Cf. also the publication by A. Merx, quoted above,, and his , Berlin, 1888; G. Margoliouth, in the xv. 4, and M. Gaster, ibid.; P. Kahle,, Lpz. 1902, with the valuable review by Rahlfs in. 1903, no. 5; Nestle, 1905, p. 719 (Babylonian {Babylonian ă/è mark} = . According to the opinion formerly prevailing, this Babylonian punctuation exhibits the system which was developed in the Eastern schools, corresponding to and contemporaneous with the Western or Tiberian system, although a higher degree of originality, or approximation to the original of both systems of punctuation, was generally conceded to the latter. Recently, however, Wickes,, Oxford, 1887, p. 142 ff, has endeavoured to show, from the accents, that the ‘Babylonian’ punctuation may certainly be an Oriental, but is by no means the Oriental system. It is rather to be regarded, according to him, as a later and not altogether successful attempt to modify, and thus to simplify, the system common to all the Schools in the East and West. Strack,  1879, p. 124, established the probability that the vowels of the superlinear punctuation arose under Arab influence from the vowel letters  (so previously Pinsker and Graetz), while the Tiberian system shows Syrian influence.

A third, widely different system (Palestinian), probably the basis of the other two, is described by A. Neubauer, vii. 1895, p. 361 ff., and Friedländer, ibid., p. 564 ff., and 1896, p. 86 ff.; C. Levias,, xv. p. 157 ff.; and esp. P. Kahle, ‘Beitr. zu der Gesch. der hebr. Punktation,’ and in 1901, p. 273 ff. and in (see above), chiefly dealing with the Berlin MS. Or. qu. 680, which contains a number of variants on the biblical text, and frequently agrees with the transcriptions of the LXX and Jerome. ).