The Order of the Hebrew Alphabet

8/12/2019 The Order of the Hebrew Alphabet

1/4

The Order of the Hebrew AlphabetAuthor(s): C. LeviasSource: Proceedings of the American Academy for Jewish Research, Vol. 4 (1932 - 1933), pp.131-133Published by: American Academy for Jewish ResearchStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3622117.

Accessed: 10/07/2013 19:42

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at.http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of

content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms

of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

.

American Academy for Jewish Researchis collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to

Proceedings of the American Academy for Jewish Research.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 146.95.253.17 on Wed, 10 Jul 2013 19:42:21 PMAll use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=aajrhttp://www.jstor.org/stable/3622117?origin=JSTOR-pdfhttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/stable/3622117?origin=JSTOR-pdfhttp://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=aajr


2/4

THE ORDER OF THE HEBREW ALPHABETC. LEVIAS

It has been shown by Martin Sprengling, who succeeded indeciphering the Sinai inscriptions, that some of the presentnames of the letters must have been introduced at a later time,when in the course of transmission the original pictograms hadbecome unrecognizable; and that such later names have noreference to the original pictures. The possibility that evenoriginally not all names agreed with the pictures was not consid-ered by him. There is also no doubt that the order of the lettersin the alphabet has undergone changes. An answer to thequestion what the original order was, and what the principle ofits arrangement rests on, is dependent on a knowledge of themeanings of the names of the letters. This ascertainment ishere attempted.As a preliminary I am bound to make an excursion intoSemitic phonetics, a subject still in its infancy. From the mate-rial I have gathered in an etymological study based on bicon-sonantalism, now appearing seriatim in the Palestinean quarterlym11~1,under the title pl6wn wrrMn,u, we may learn, 'amongother things, that the Semitic t, k, and q change sometimes onthe one hand to n or u, and on the other hand, to wt. Thus, wemay have in one and the same language, or in the sister languages,double forms, where utand n, or D and , correspond. Moreover,since a _ which results from t or k frequently appears as wtalsoin Aramaic and Hebrew, we get the following equations:

Arabic S' Hebrew Syriac and later Aramaic D;Arabic s2 Hebrew wt Syriac and Aramaic t);Hebrew si Arabic aramaic 0;Hebrew s2 Arabic - Aramaic n;Hebrew s3 Arabic c/x Aramaic n;Aramaic s' Arabic ,- Hebrew t0;Aramaic s2 Arabic ' Hebrew ?).

131

http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp


3/4

Just a few examples for illustration: Hebrew rnwp.Arabict~f: Syriac ilwp., cucumber; Hebrew 'lni, nnl Arabic.A;', ,i;', ,aL. The root of Hebrew nmuia s in Arabic


4/4

ORDER THE OF HEBREW ALPHABET

Lamed. Usually connected with Hebrew -nbp. In Gaonicliterature and Samaritan n:=.Nfin, Aramaic, Arabic li, fish. The original name nahas,Hebrew tn, is preserved in Ge'ez.Samech, Arabic -., fish.Sade, Hebrew and Aramaic 'nI, Ge'ez sadday. It might be

a by-form of nT, hunter, fisher. I prefer to see in it a by-formof y;?, temple. The original name is preserved in the Greek

a/u7rtr,which is a Semitic ',, Hebrew nri., convolute, corre-sponding to the figure of the numeral 8.Qof, Hebrew 'ip, or 1'P, Arabic U5, occiput. CompareAramaic lP-3P,head.

Taw, in, sign.The pictogram of Taw is +, a cross. Taw means here not

simply sign, but the sign of life (see Ez. lx.4, 6). The sign ofthe cross has been since gray antiquity identified with theEgyptian Q, 'anh.,life (see Hastings' Encyclolpedia of ReligionTand Ethics, s.v. Cross). The Teth is but a phonetic variant ofTaw, and its sign is also but a variant of the latter, being across within a circle. It has therefore the same meaning. Now,if we transfer the letters Teth, Yod and Kaf to between Samechand 'Ayin, we see that the letters fall into two groups: The firstgroup, from Alef to Samech describe parts of the world, closingwith Teth, i. e., a blessing for life and happiness. The secondgroup begins with Yod and ends with Shin, describing the partsof the human body to characterize man, the world's inhabitant;again closing with Taw, a blessing or prayer for life and happiness.Habent sua fata literae With the Jews Teth stands for miu,happiness; with the Greeks for Oavaros, death.

133

http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsphttp://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

Documents

The Order of the Hebrew Alphabet