The sound of patach in Weingreen's book

Classical Hebrew morphology and syntax, aspect, linguistics, discourse analysis, and related topics
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Moses Gummadi
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Joined: Mon Sep 13, 2021 10:15 am

The sound of patach in Weingreen's book

Post by Moses Gummadi »

I am used to pronouncing both patach and qamatz by the same quality of sound, but discovered that both Weingreen and Practico give the sound of patach as in "had", "bad", etc. I didn't notice earlier because I skimmed over them in Weingreen since I already knew (so I thought). Blueletter Bible seems to follow this - https://www.blueletterbible.org/lexicon ... v/wlc/0-1/ (click the speaker icon under "pronunciation)

Question: Where did Weingreen get it from? It sounds like Arabic to me. Are there any Jewish communities who pronounce patach as Weingreen suggests?
Moses Gummadi
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Jason Hare
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Re: The sound of patach in Weingreen's book

Post by Jason Hare »

The older Yemenite tradition certainly pronounced patach differently to how Israelis pronounce it.

For Israelis, patach and kamats have the same sound.

For Yemenites, patach and segol both sounded like something between the a in father and the a in bad. They have the same sound. Additionally, kamats sounds like an open o, something similar to British law (not American law).

I'm far from an expert on Yemenite Hebrew, but I've done some listening to it. It certainly sounds closer to Arabic.

I wouldn't use Weingreen as the model for my pronunciation. I've also heard some American teachers (even seminary instructors) who pronounce patach like the a in apple (which sounds REALLY bad).
Jason Hare
Tel Aviv, Israel
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