Column #44. Contents of this weekly column are (mostly) based on the sefer: EIM LAMIKRA HASHALEIM, by R' Nissan Sharoni, Ashdod, a guide to correct pronunciation of Hebrew, specifically in davening and Torah reading.

Four follow-up comments on PATACH G’NUVA, as presented last week.
One, if you were to use a KUF sound instead of the HEI (or ALEF or YUD) in various names of G-d, such as KEIL KAH, ELOKIM, ELOKEINU, then the name with the PATACH G’NUVA would be pronounced ELO-AK, not ELOKA. This was the main point in last week’s column. It’s really important.
Another example used for the PATACH G’NUVA under a HEI (with a MAPIK) was GA-VO-AH, meaning tall. Not GAVOHA. (Maybe less important because it isn’t one of G-d’s names.) A TT reader called to mention the feminine version of GAVO-AH, which will nicely confuse things. But don’t worry — you can handle it. A tall man is GAVO-AH and a tall woman is G’VOHA. The word is spelled GIMMEL with a SH’VA NA, VET with a CHOLAM (with or without the VAV), and then two HEIs, the first one with a KAMATZ GADOL under it and the second one without any- thing. So the first HEI is pronounced HA (or HAW in Ashkenazis) and the second HEI is silent.

The third point is that the PATACH G’NUVA we’ve known and loved under the CHET (as in apple, wind, and the cinders of the furnace that brought about Plague #6, Boils - PI-ACH), and the one under the HEI we’ve been (re)introduced to (as in ELO-AK and GAVO-AH), can also be found under an AYIN. Most Ashkenazim can forget all about this, because in the word for week, for example, SHAVU-A, it really doesn’t matter if we pronounce the PATACH before or after we pronounce the AYIN, since we don’t pronounce the AYIN. But for those who do, as a gutteral sound of a soft NG that sticks to the palate after it leaves the throat, it does make a difference. Let’s use % as the symbol for the sound of an AYIN. Then the word for week is SHA-VU-A%, not -%A. The best I can recommend is go over to your favorite S’faradi or Teimani and ask him (or her) to pronounce SHAVU’A or RAKI-A% for firmament (sky).

Finally, we must add that which was presented in one of the early columns of this series concerning PATACH G’NUVA. All of the above, and the com- ments from last week, related to the (correct) Ashkenazi pronunciation — which is to place an imaginary ALEF before the letter with the PATACH under it and “allow” the ALEF to steal the PATACH.

S’fardim and Teimanim do it differently. They put a W sound or a Y sound (depending upon the vowel under the letter before the one with the PATACH G’NUVA). So TAPU-ACH sounds like TA-PU-WACH. SI-ACH sounds like SI-YACH. MIZ-BEI-YACH. RU-WACH. GAVO-WAH. ELO- WAH. MAG-BI-AH, to lift, is MAG-BI-YAH for S’fardim and Yemenites. Similarly, SHAVU-WA% and RAKIYA%.

For Ashkenazim, this week’s sedra is NO’ACH; for S’fardim, it’s NOWACH. But it is not NOCHA for anyone.

Just to finish off this week’s column, let us add the same thing that the author of EIM LAMIKRA HASHALEM added at the end of the PATACH G’NUVA chapter. He says that there really is one more example of a stolen vowel and letter with the culprit being an imaginary ALEF. And that is a connective VAV that becomes a SHURUK. Moshe and Shlomo is not MOSHE V’SHLOMO, but USHLOMO. It is as if there is an ALEF before the SHURUK, pronounced U, and the VAV’s sound is lost (has been stolen).

By the way, it became USHLOMO because the SHIN of SHLOMO has a SH’VA under it and you cannot have two consecutive SHVAs at the beginning of a word. SHLOMO and MOSHE is U’MOSHE (not V’) because a VAV before BET, VAV, MEM, and PEI generally SHURUKs. <mtc>

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