# Vowel rules for noun possessives - רמה --> רמתו



## JerB

Hi,
For noun possessives, isn't the vowel 2-before-stress reduced to sheva? דָּבָר word  --> דְּבָרוֹ his word, or שָׂפָה language --> שְׂפָתוֹ his language.
So why for the word רָמָה level, it’s רָמָתוֹ his level ( instead of רְמָתוֹ ) ?
Is there a rule I am missing? Thanks.


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## arielipi

אותיות האח רע לא מקבלות שווא בראש מילה או משהו כזה.
או בסוף מילה.
אבל זה קשור לזה.


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## Haskol

I've never noticed that before, but what arielipi says makes sense. Sometimes ר is considered one of the גרוניות, along with אהחע. They don't get a shva na, and many times avoid getting any shva. Resh is erratic in that sometimes it acts like a gronit, and sometimes not.


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## Drink

I don't think that is the case here. In the rare case that ר can't take a shva na, it would get a chataf vowel instead, but there is no chataf vowel here. The reason the vowel does not reduce is because only vowels that were historically short get reduced to shva. In this case, רמה is derived from the hollow root ר-ו-ם, and so the qamatz on the ר is derived from a historically long-a, which is rare because in most other cases long-a became long-o. But hollow roots are one of the only cases where long-a remains long-a and does not reduce.


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## JerB

I agree with Drink, I don’t think it’s related to ר being considered גרונית part of the time (eg when it rejects a דגש). I don’t know of any case where ר can’t take a sheva (na or nach, it does not make a difference: a גרונית cannot take either and will instead convert it to a compound sheva, a hataf-vowel, which is always na and never nach), does that really exist?

In my understanding, the criterium to know if the vowel is reduced to a sheva, or not touched at all, is whether the syllable is open or closed, i.e. whether the vowel is long or short.

Example (which also serves as an example of a word identical to רמה but with a real גרונית instead of ר):

The word אָמָה “handmaid” becomes אֲמָתוֹ “his handmaid”, as expected because אָ is an open syllable i.e. with a long vowel qamats so its vowel is reduced (and by the way, as expected א takes a chataf patach instead of a sheva, but it never retains the qamats, so why would ר do that?).

But the word אַמָּה “forearm” has a דגש closing the first syllable אַמ (the דגש doubles the מ so the word is really אַממָה), i.e. making its vowel short (patach instead of qamats), so it becomes אַמָּתוֹ “his forearm”, the vowel (patach) is not reduced at all (it’s not אֲמָּתוֹ).

The problem is that there is no דגש in רָמָה, the first syllable is רָ which is open, with a long vowel qamats, so why doesn’t it become רְמָתוֹ as in the many similar cases ?

Drink, I am intrigued by your explanation – where does that discussion of “historically long-a/long-o” and “hollow roots are one of the only cases where long-a remains long-a” come from? I don’t see anything about that in Gesenius but I find it interesting. However I don’t see where it fits into the preceding criterium which to my knowledge is the orthodox way of seeing things. 

And in any case, your explanation that רמה comes from the ע׳׳ו root ר־ו־ם is the reason why רָ doesn’t reduce, would mean that all words coming from an ע׳׳ו or ע׳׳י root which have a qamats as its first vowel (instead of holam which is the more common occurrence from your what you say) do not reduce. Is that true? דין “judge” does come from the root ד־ו־ן and in fact it does not reduce (דַּיָינוֹ “his judge”) but again in this case the preceding criterium works : דין = דַּיָּן has a דגש in the yod, so it doesn’t reduce for the same reason that אַמָּה “forearm” above doesn’t reduce. So I am not sure how your explanation fits with the official grammar rules but it's intriguing, could you elaborate?


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## Drink

JerB said:


> Drink, I am intrigued by your explanation – where does that discussion of “historically long-a/long-o” and “hollow roots are one of the only cases where long-a remains long-a” come from? I don’t see anything about that in Gesenius but I find it interesting. However I don’t see where it fits into the preceding criterium which to my knowledge is the orthodox way of seeing things.



I have never read Gesenius's grammar, so I don't know what he discusses and what he doesn't. But I have read a wide variety of things on the history of Hebrew and other Semitic languages. Proto-semitic long-a usually became a long-o in Hebrew. Arabic generally preserves most Proto-Semitic vowels, so I will use that as a basis for comparison. This can be seen in the word שָׁלוֹם: *šal*ā*m- > *šal*ō*m- > šāl*ō*m (compare Arabic سلام, sal*ā*m-). However in certain situations (and it is unclear what the conditions were), this did not happen. The most typical example is the pattern qaṭṭāl, usually associated with professions. For example גַּמָּל, gamm*ā*l, "camel driver" (compare Arabic جمال, jamm*ā*l-). Another example of when this happens is the past tense and active participle of hollow roots. For example, קָם, q*ā*m (compare Arabic قام, q*ā*m-). In the past tense, when the vowel is closed, it is also shortened: קַמְתִּי, q*a*mtī (compare Arabic قمت, qamtu).

Now let's take a look at reduction to shva. The unstable vowels in Proto-Hebrew were the short open vowels. They either lengthened to become long open vowels (when not more than one syllable before the stress), or they reduced to shva (when more than one syllable before the stress, note that in the construct form it is as if the next word is stressed). For example שָׂפָה: *ś*a*pat- > ś*ā*fā, but construct form שְׂפַת-, ś*ə*faṯ- and suffixed form שְׂפָתוֹ, ś*ə*fāṯō (compare Arabic شف, š*a*fa/š*a*fat- and suffixed شفته, š*a*fatuhu). Historically short closed vowels do not reduce, for example פָּרָשׁ: *parrāš- > p*ā*rāš, construct פָּרַשׁ-, p*ā*raš-, and suffixed פָּרָשׁוֹ, p*ā*rāšō. Historically long open vowels do not reduce either, for example עוֹלָם: *ʕ*ā*lam- > *ʕ*ō*lam- > ʕ*ō*lām, construct עוֹלַם-, ʕ*ō*lam-, and suffixed עוֹלָמוֹ, ʕ*ō*lāmō (compare Arabic عالم, ʕālam- and suffixed عالمه ʕālamuhu). Likewise the historically long vowel in רָמָה does not reduce either: *r*ā*mat- > r*ā*mā, construct רָמַת-, r*ā*mat-, and suffixed רָמָתוֹ, r*ā*māṯō. The reason it seems unusual is because רָמָה is an unlikely case where the long-a that remained long-a occurs in a syllable that would otherwise have been reduced. I haven't looked for this myself, but I'm sure that if you find any other examples where a noun is derived from the feminine singular active participle of a hollow root, then its vowel will not reduce either.

You can also consider Aramaic, where the long-a to long-o did not happen, so the non-reducing qamatz is much more common. For example עָלַם, ʕ*ā*lam instead of *עֲלַם, *ʕ*ă*lam; and עָלְמָא, ʕ*ā*ləmā instead of *עַלְמָא, *ʕ*a*lmā.



JerB said:


> And in any case, your explanation that רמה comes from the ע׳׳ו root ר־ו־ם is the reason why רָ doesn’t reduce, would mean that all words coming from an ע׳׳ו or ע׳׳י root which have a qamats as its first vowel (instead of holam which is the more common occurrence from your what you say) do not reduce. Is that true? דין “judge” does come from the root ד־ו־ן and in fact it does not reduce (דַּיָינוֹ “his judge”) but again in this case the preceding criterium works : דין = דַּיָּן has a דגש in the yod, so it doesn’t reduce for the same reason that אַמָּה “forearm” above doesn’t reduce. So I am not sure how your explanation fits with the official grammar rules but it's intriguing, could you elaborate?



What I meant by the hollow root is that the long vowel takes the place of the missing consonant. In דַּיָּן, the consonant is not missing, so it does not matter that the root is otherwise hollow. By coincidence, however, דַּיָּן does happen to belong to the profession pattern I mentioned above, but you are correct that it makes no difference anyway because the vowel is not expected to reduce in any case.


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## JerB

Gesenius is public domain and available for free at http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Gesenius'_Hebrew_Grammar . Interestingly Gesenius does mention (§9q), but only in passing, your explanation that long-o (holam or holam-vav) often came from an original long a.

In general, my understanding is that the masoretic vocalization tried (and almost succeeded) in capturing all historical phenomena in a fixed, summarized description, so that looking at the official masoretic vocalization of a word (including דגש and מֶתֶג) describes the word completely and so determines all its possible morphological transformations (which vowels are reduced in construct and plural and gender, the stress, the syllable divisions, etc).

According to the current description of hebrew grammar, I think פרש is a somewhat different case: you mention parrāš (double r) as the origin of פָּרָש “horseman” so it is likely a case (similar to one mentioned by Genesius §93xx, search for “93xx” in en.wikisource.org/wiki/Gesenius%27_Hebrew_Grammar/93 ) of an original פַּרָּש (patach) where the ר rejects the דגש (this behavior of ר is common with gutturals) and the preceding patach is lengthened to qamats as a result, which gives פָּרָש (Genesius mentions the equivalent example עַרִּיץ = עָרִיץ “tyrant”). Such a vowel-lengthened-because-of-דגש-rejection is always unchangeable (Gesenius §25e), just like the regular unchangeable vowels, i.e. the vowels accompanied by a vowel letter (holam-vav, tsere-yod etc, Gesenius §25b). But contary to other vowel sounds, the unchangeably long “a” is not indicated by a vowel letter (it is in Arabic, says Gesenius §9a, where it is indicated by א), so the masoretic vocalization does not indicate for sure if a qamats is unchangeable or not (although it is mostly reduceable), but does it for the other vowel sounds.

In the case of רָמָה, the letter מ could take a דגש without problem so that argument does not apply: is there an orthdox hebrew grammar explanation for the non reduction of the qamats ? This “long-a that remained long-a” historical explanation… does the standard masoretic vocalization capture this explanation in some way ? I.e., are there rules of the standard masoretic vocalization (which is supposed to be a complete snapshot of all vocalization phenomena) predicting that this qamats will not be reduced? It does not make things easier that there are intermediate cases, for example (Gesenius §93xx) the qamats in שָׁבוּעַ “week” does not reduce for plural שָֽׁבוּעוֹת (there is a מתג two syllables before stress) but does reduce for construct שְׁבוּעַ- … (source: ravmilim.co.il and Even Shoshan from Babylon’s software, although they don’t have the מתגs), idem סָרִיס “eunuch”, qamats reduces in construct סְרִיס- but not plural סָֽרִיסִים , idem פָּרִיץ “villain”, construct פְּרִיץ- but plural פָּֽרִיצִים . But maybe these are just exceptions. I’d like to know if רמה is also just an exception or if there is a rule of masoretic vocalization I am not aware of.

By the way, if there are sources that you know of and think would be of use to me or others on the forum, could you cite them? Thanks. I mention Even Shoshan, ravmilim, Gesenius above but for example, do you know of an official source (Academy of the hebrew language maybe?) to know the standard vocalization of any word in modern Hebrew?


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## Drink

JerB said:


> By the way, if there are sources that you know of and think would be of use to me or others on the forum, could you cite them? Thanks. I mention Even Shoshan, ravmilim, Gesenius above but for example, do you know of an official source (Academy of the hebrew language maybe?) to know the standard vocalization of any word in modern Hebrew?



The only "official" source of information on Biblical Hebrew is the Bible itself. I use Even Shoshan and trust that it accurately represents the vowels of words that occur in the Bible (whenever there are unusual alternative spellings/vocalizations, they are always listed).

Regarding פָּרָשׁ, our explanations are in agreement. If that is not clear, I apologize for leaving out some of the details that I thought were obvious.



JerB said:


> In general, my understanding is that the masoretic vocalization tried (and almost succeeded) in capturing all historical phenomena in a fixed, summarized description, so that looking at the official masoretic vocalization of a word (including דגש and מֶתֶג) describes the word completely and so determines all its possible morphological transformations (which vowels are reduced in construct and plural and gender, the stress, the syllable divisions, etc).



The masoretic vocalization indicates nothing more than the pronunciation of a particular word in a particular context. It gives only the vowels and the cantillation, and usually the stress is indicated by the placement of the cantillation mark. Everything else you mention is not indicated at all, there is no morphological information, no gender, no syllable divisions, or anything else like that. Of course, most of those things can be inferred by the vowels, by surrounding words, or by other uses of a different form of the same word.



JerB said:


> Such a vowel-lengthened-because-of-דגש-rejection is always unchangeable (Gesenius §25e), just like the regular unchangeable vowels, i.e. the vowels accompanied by a vowel letter (holam-vav, tsere-yod etc, Gesenius §25b). But contary to other vowel sounds, the unchangeably long “a” is not indicated by a vowel letter (it is in Arabic, says Gesenius §9a, where it is indicated by א), so the masoretic vocalization does not indicate for sure if a qamats is unchangeable or not (although it is mostly reduceable), but does it for the other vowel sounds.



Vowels accompanied by a vowel letter never had anything to do with morphology until modern times. Hebrew was written without vowels, so vowel letters were used to aid reading. When the masoretes later added vowels, they did not make any changes to the consonants. If the vowel letter was there, the result was holam-vav, tsere-yod, etc. and when the vowel letter was not there, the result was a plain holam, tsere, etc. Unchangeable vowels do not always have vowel letters; for example, the pa'al active participle usually does not have a vav in the Bible. And on the other hand, in post-Biblical times (Mishnaic Hebrew, for example) changeable vowels are frequently spelled with vowel letters; for example, you find spellings like אוֹמֶץ or חוֹשֶׁךְ or בּוֹקֶר. The case is similar in Arabic as well. In the Quran, words with long vowels are not always spelled with vowel letters, even thought in Modern Arabic, the vowel letters are required.

Regarding שָׁבוּעַ and סָרִיס, I can only say that they are probably just strange exceptions.

I still maintain that רָמָה is not an exception, but perfectly regular for the reasons I have already explained. For some more evidence, I have found only three other roots of the same pattern (i.e. nouns derived from the feminine singular active participle of hollow pa'al roots) that occur in the Bible: בָּמָה and קָמָה both occur in the construct states with unreduced vowels (בָּמַת- and קָמַת-) and the latter also occurs in the plural construct with an unreduced vowel (קָמוֹת-). It is a strange coincidence that both of these roots also have מ as the third root letter. The third one I found is סָרָה, but it does not occur in any form other than the one I just gave.


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## JerB

JerB said:
			
		

> official source (Academy of the hebrew language maybe?) to know the standard vocalization of any word in modern Hebrew?





			
				Drink said:
			
		

> The only "official" source of information on Biblical Hebrew is the Bible itself.


 
That’s why I wrote “modern hebrew”…

Although I am not sure I entirely agree even for Biblical Hebrew… But I am not here to attack you and I thank you for your interesting insights on these questions !



			
				Drink said:
			
		

> The masoretic vocalization indicates nothing more than the pronunciation of a particular word in a particular context





			
				Drink said:
			
		

> Vowels accompanied by a vowel letter never had anything to do with morphology until modern times.


 … again, not sure I agree entirely : what the Masoretes and their successors did is not just add dots and lines, corresponding to their learned-by-heart pronunciation of every passage, to the manuscripts : they did devise a whole grammatical logic behind them (written about more and more later on), their inquiry, rationalization and understanding of Biblical Hebrew language mechanics (even if the biblical text sometimes deviated from it), and it did include things like unchangeable vowels, according to the majority opinion:

In a preface to the 1910 edition of Gesenius:
“Our duty, however, is to represent the language in the form in which it has been handed down to us by the Masoretes; *and that this form involves a distinction between unchangeable, tone-long, and short vowels, admits in my opinion of no doubt*.”

The text does not exist completely in vaccum so it’s not really the “only official source” (this is kind of a Karaite statement, dismissing the whole tradition outside of the literal text !), the manuscripts contain many examples of the same words written differently, and the whole accepted grammatical logic and rationalization of the language, handed down by rabbinnical tradition since the Masoretes and before, has decided which of these instances are the orthodox ones, conforming to this “striving after uniformity” on the part of the Masoretes that Gesenius mentions, and which of these instances are considered non-canonical exceptions. Just like the Bible itself is not the “only official source” on Jewish Law, there is also what was handed down by rabbinnical tradition, the Oral Law.

The Masorete’s and their successors’ work was also “harmonizing” (as the word is used in one of the prefaces of Gesenius 1910 edition), they strived to devise the language mechanics and language logic which worked for the majority of cases, even if there were always exceptions. They did not add or remove letters even when they were vowel-letters, but that’s the point, their understanding was precisely that if the vowel-letter was there (or there most of the time), it meant the vowel was unchangeable (eg holam-vav) and was a different vowel than the invisible one with the same basic sound, o in this case.

But for now I concerned with correct modern hebrew, and I don’t know of any source which in particular mentions the stress of words in addition to their vocalization (which can be sometimes but not always inferred from short/long vowel considerations eg in segolates)… Do you know any?


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## Drink

I'm fairly sure that official Modern Hebrew tries to follow the morphology of Biblical Hebrew as much as possible. I guess the Academy is the only "official" source, but I don't think they have an official dictionary of the vowels of every word. As far as I know, the Even Shoshan dictionary is pretty authoritative.

When I say that the Bible is the only official source of information on Biblical Hebrew, I don't mean that oral tradition holds no value, but that the Bible itself overrides the oral tradition. The oral tradition is important because it tells us how to interpret the Bible, but the oral tradition cannot say, for example, that שֹׁמֵר/שׁוֹמֵר "should" be spelled with a vav, when in the vast majority of cases it is spelled without a vav. Anyway, I don't think the Mishnah or Talmud ever tries to make claims such as the one you quoted from Gesenius. Gesenius himself was not a Talmudic scholar or anything even remotely close to one, and I'm going to have to disagree with him in that I don't think the masoretes tried in any way to indicate the distinction between changeable and unchangeable in their vocalization. I don't mean to disagree that the masoretes took grammar into account when vocalizing texts, but the vocalization itself does not _directly_ record any of the grammar. As I said before, there are many words in the Bible whose _usual_ spelling lacks a vowel letter for an unchangeable vowel.

Caveat: The presence of a vowel letter in Biblical Hebrew does seem to indicate that the vowel is unchangeable and the masoretes may have realized this (this is probably due to the fact that at the time the Bible was written, the vowels that later became changeable long vowels were probably still short and only long vowels were ever written with vowel letters), but the converse is most certainly not true (i.e. the lack of a vowel letter does not necessarily indicate that the vowel is changeable).


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