Rules for Pronunciation

This page describes the rules of pronunciation, as used by the Amsterdam Portuguese community. See references below.
An extensive listing of the pronuniation, including all exceptions in the reading can be found in Hochmát Shelomóh (intro and annotations.), ISBN 0-933676-37-9

Some browsers do not show the punctuation correctly, therefore you can find all, including the hyperlinks to the recordings, in this pdf file.

List of Transliteration to Dutch (in development) (HRP)

Language use and expressions among Amsterdam Portuguese Jews (JBS)

Rules for pronunciation of letters.

For ease of reading, Hebrew words are transliterated in this site, based on http://www.jewfaq.org/alephbet.htm. 

Recording of the letters (JBS; the ק is by mistake pronounced in the recording as Kuf,  this should be Kof), the Cholam is missing.
Recording of two verses which contain all letters: שמות טז-טז and דברים ד-לד  recorded by (JBS) 

Rules for Pronunciation of vowels.

Recording of the examples (JBS)

אָ אַ אֲ	A
אֳ	O
אֶ	I
אֵ	I
אִי אִ	I
אֻ וּ	U
וֹ אֹ	O		Like in hope
אְ	Uh/silent

Rules for Pronunciation of special vowels.

Recording of the examples (JBS)

Vowels	Pronunciation	Example
	a
	o
	aha
אַהּ	aha
	ehe
	a
	Sheva is silent
	i
°	u
	Sheva is silent (see note)

Note: see Hochmat Shelomoh page 39 note b): “when the article הַ (ה הידיעה) is followed by a consonant without a Dagesh so that it makes a single syllable, the Sheva remains silent”. The second case, article הַ with a Meteg, is not mentioned by Pereira. This may imply that according to his opinion the Meteg is irrelevant and that is indeed in line with the oral tradition of our generation.

מנחת שי is very clear about this, see e.g. לחם הבכורים, שער המאריך צא:
… כי המאריך (מתג) הבא כתנועה קטנה אינו מניע השוא שאחריו…
Our “golden standard”, the Chumash Piza, doesn’t show the difference between the silent and non-silent Sheva, as in the 18^th century printing technology it wasn’t possible to show this.
We see that תיקון איש מצליח and תיקון סימנים follow this logic.

Unfortunately not all scholars share this opinion. Rabi Breuer writes in his book טעמי המקרא on page 197 that
“השוא הבא אחרי געיה (מתג) הוא תמיד נע”. See also “our” Koren edition, which disagrees with the Meteg rule and prints it as a שוא נע.
Mind that this Koren edition writes that it is “כמנהג ק״ק תלמוד תורה אמסטרדם”. This however is correct only for the prayers and the division of the Parashot, but not for the punctuation and cantillations (ניקוד וטעמי המקרא) of the Torah text. So it has no relevance in this context.

In 1956, Mr Jacq. Pais, the teacher of our community, made a booklet to teach the children Hebrew reading. The first 8 pages have Hebrew words transliterated to Dutch. Below I bring some examples. It shows how to pronounce the letters and the vowels for Dutch speakers.

Although the booklet’s name is “שפה ברורה”, it was referred to as  “koe doet boe boe”, the last line of the first page, see last example below.

Recording of the examples (JBS)

Sheva rules.

A short summary of the shuva rules:

Sheva Na rules, as formulated by R’ Eliyahu Bachur (16th cent.). It 

1)    occurs under the first letter of a word; 

2)    is the second of two Shevas in the middle of a word; 

3)    occurs after a long unaccented vowel; 

4)    occurs under a letter which has a Dagesh; 

5)    occurs between identical letters. 

All other Shuvas are Nach (‘silent’). The letters begad kefat normally receive a Dagesh at the beginning of a word or in the middle of a word after a Shuva Nach