# No Vowels In Hebrew And Arabic **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [September 5, 2007, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-vowels-in-hebrew-and-arabic/418065 "2007-09-05T00:36:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![ernesto](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/c2a13f/32.png) [@ernesto](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ernesto)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 12:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-vowels-in-hebrew-and-arabic/418065/1 "2007-09-05T00:36:50Z")
I have been reading a lot of secular study about the Koran and the Bible and Torah and I often see, the meanings of the text can be somewhat changed because then the Hebrews and Arabs didn’t use vowels in their writing. Why not? I mean how hard is it to write a vowel? Were other languages like this? And I read that Arabic now uses marks over consenants to indicate vowels but does Hebrew? thanks ---
**Author:** ![beowulff](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beowulff/32/542_2.png) [@beowulff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beowulff)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-vowels-in-hebrew-and-arabic/418065/2 "2007-09-05T00:55:11Z")
Herbrew has vowels, but they are considered “training wheels.” Experts don’t need them. ---
**Author:** ![brossa](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/brossa/32/3040_2.png) [@brossa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brossa)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 1:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-vowels-in-hebrew-and-arabic/418065/3 "2007-09-05T01:31:13Z")
But how do I know whether the law forbids me from dealing in bts (beets) or bts (boots) or bts (baits) or bts (obits) or bts (bats), etc? ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 1:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-vowels-in-hebrew-and-arabic/418065/4 "2007-09-05T01:36:26Z")
Arabic, like Hebrew and other Semitic, tends to consists of word roots that are three letter consonants, and the vowels change depending on the inflection. Wikipedia is a good place to start. [Semitic Languages.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semitic_languages) > [@](#): > > Morphology: triliteral roots > > All Semitic languages exhibit a unique pattern of stems consisting of “triliteral” or consonantal roots (normally consisting of three consonants), from which nouns, adjectives, and verbs are formed by inserting vowels with, potentially, prefixes, suffixes, or infixes. > > For instance, the root k-t-b, “write”, yields in Arabic: > > ``` > kataba كتب means "he wrote" > kutiba كتب means "it was written" masculine > kutibat كتبت means "it was written" feminine > kitābun كتاب means "book" > kutubun كتب means "books" > kutayyibun كتيب means "booklet" dimunitive > kitābatun كتابة means "writing" > kātibun كاتب means "writer" masculine > kātibatun كاتبة means "writer" feminine > kuttābun كتاب means "writers" > katabatun كتبة means "writers" > maktabun مكتب means "desk" > maktabatun مكتبة means "library" > maktūbun مكتوب means "written" or "postal letter" > > ``` ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 1:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-vowels-in-hebrew-and-arabic/418065/5 "2007-09-05T01:47:35Z")
Even in English it’s not too hard to read without vowels. From the OP: ’ hv bn rdng ’ lt f sclr std abt th Krn nd th Bbl nd Trh ---
**Author:** ![Bagistan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ea5d25/32.png) [@Bagistan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bagistan)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 1:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-vowels-in-hebrew-and-arabic/418065/6 "2007-09-05T01:48:09Z")
Doesn’t the amount of vowels in spoken English minus the available vowel letters equal a greater number than the total amount of vowels in Arabic? If so, get to the letter drawing board! And no ligatures; æ is cheating. ---
**Author:** ![Indistinguishable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/90ced4/32.png) [@Indistinguishable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Indistinguishable)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-vowels-in-hebrew-and-arabic/418065/7 "2007-09-05T01:49:26Z")
[QUOTE=John Mace] Even in English it’s not too hard to read without vowels. From the OP: ’ hv bn rdng ’ lt f sclr std abt th Krn nd th Bbl nd Trh [/QUOTE] That’s actually really hard for me to read. If I hadn’t read the OP, I wouldn’t be able to make much sense of it at all. Not that this implies anything about Hebrew or Arabic; I’m just saying I don’t think such a system would work well for English. ---
**Author:** ![Zsofia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/7bcc69/32.png) [@Zsofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zsofia)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 2:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-vowels-in-hebrew-and-arabic/418065/8 "2007-09-05T02:11:30Z")
[QUOTE=John Mace] Arabic, like Hebrew and other Semitic, tends to consists of word roots that are three letter consonants, and the vowels change depending on the inflection. Wikipedia is a good place to start. [Semitic Languages.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semitic_languages) [/QUOTE] Forget vowels - Arabic clearly doesn’t even possess enough squiggles! (Seriously, I tried to Rosetta Arabic once and gave up because more and different squiggles are clearly required.) ---
**Author:** ![susan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/susan/32/17537_2.png) [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 3:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-vowels-in-hebrew-and-arabic/418065/9 "2007-09-05T03:23:23Z")
Yes, Hebrew uses vowel marks. When there’s the possibility of misinterpretation, the vowels are used. They’re often used in poetry and kid’s books. My dictionaries, Talmud, and prayerbook have them. The Dead Sea scrolls as pictured on the cover of the books I have do not. Hebrew is very regular compared to English. The changes in the consonant stem tell you very clarly the part of speech, and the vowels are usually easy to infer. ---
**Author:** ![Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ccd318/32.png) [@Paul\_in\_Qatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paul_in_Qatar)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-vowels-in-hebrew-and-arabic/418065/10 "2007-09-05T04:04:42Z")
Of course we got vowels. Three of them. That’s what the little dots are. ---
**Author:** ![si\_blakely](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d9b06d/32.png) [@si\_blakely](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/si_blakely)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 7:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-vowels-in-hebrew-and-arabic/418065/11 "2007-09-05T07:35:51Z")
[QUOTE=Shoshana] Yes, Hebrew uses vowel marks. When there’s the possibility of misinterpretation, the vowels are used. They’re often used in poetry and kid’s books. My dictionaries, Talmud, and prayerbook have them. The Dead Sea scrolls as pictured on the cover of the books I have do not. Hebrew is very regular compared to English. The changes in the consonant stem tell you very clarly the part of speech, and the vowels are usually easy to infer. [/QUOTE] But as you note, the vowel marks were added somewhat later by scribes, and do not form part of the original hebrew texts. Si ---
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 10:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-vowels-in-hebrew-and-arabic/418065/12 "2007-09-05T10:24:01Z")
[QUOTE=Paul in Saudi] Of course we got vowels. Three of them. That’s what the little dots are. [/QUOTE] Not necessarily - a lot of the dots in Arabic are part of the consonants, right? They differentiate between consonants with the same basic shape. e.g. **ب** ‎ is a b sound, whereas **ت** is a t; and **ج** is a g whereas **خ** ‎ is an h (roughly). ---
**Author:** ![Kyla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/eada6e/32.png) [@Kyla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kyla)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 11:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-vowels-in-hebrew-and-arabic/418065/13 "2007-09-05T11:02:53Z")
In addition to the points already made, a couple vowels in Hebrew _are_ actually written. The yud (the Hebrew equivalent to a y) is a written vowel, and so is the vav - although since it can make three different sounds (v, oo, and oh), that’s not always particularly helpful. My Hebrew is pretty shitty, but after a couple years of studying it, even I could figure out what vowel sounds were supposed to go where most of the time. It helps that Hebrew words are generally much shorter than English words, so there isn’t a lot of room for mistakes. ---
**Author:** ![Noone\_Special](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/noone_special/32/2863_2.png) [@Noone\_Special](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Noone_Special)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 11:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-vowels-in-hebrew-and-arabic/418065/14 "2007-09-05T11:32:24Z")
[QUOTE=Kyla] In addition to the points already made, a couple vowels in Hebrew _are_ actually written. The yud (the Hebrew equivalent to a y) is a written vowel, and so is the vav - although since it can make three different sounds (v, oo, and oh), that’s not always particularly helpful. My Hebrew is pretty shitty, but after a couple years of studying it, even I could figure out what vowel sounds were supposed to go where most of the time. It helps that Hebrew words are generally much shorter than English words, so there isn’t a lot of room for mistakes. [/QUOTE] Further to this, the _Aleph_ often acts as a “ah” sound, esp. at the beginning of words. The _heh_ at the end of a word is almost always silent, and designates that the previous consonant has either an “ah” or an “eh” sound following it… basically, Hebrew is not **vowel-less** but merely “semi-voweled,” to coin a term. And yes, _sometimes_ it’s mildly confusing, but far less than would happen if there were no vowels at all, and less still than would happen in an Indo-European language (because of the use of three-letter, identifiable roots, and because of how words are built) ---
**Author:** ![Kyla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/eada6e/32.png) [@Kyla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kyla)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 11:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-vowels-in-hebrew-and-arabic/418065/15 "2007-09-05T11:52:40Z")
[QUOTE=Noone Special] Further to this, the _Aleph_ often acts as a “ah” sound, esp. at the beginning of words. The _heh_ at the end of a word is almost always silent, and designates that the previous consonant has either an “ah” or an “eh” sound following it… basically, Hebrew is not **vowel-less** but merely “semi-voweled,” to coin a term. [/QUOTE] Geez, I can’t believe I forgot aleph. Also, ayn. ---
**Author:** ![OldGuy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/3bc359/32.png) [@OldGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OldGuy)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 1:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-vowels-in-hebrew-and-arabic/418065/16 "2007-09-05T13:44:12Z")
[QUOTE=Noone Special] The _heh_ at the end of a word is almost always silent, and designates that the previous consonant has either an “ah” or an “eh” sound following it. [/QUOTE] This seems like a really strange way to describe things. It would seem to me the _heh_ is not silent, but has either an “ah” or and “eh” sound. ---
**Author:** ![Noone\_Special](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/noone_special/32/2863_2.png) [@Noone\_Special](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Noone_Special)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-vowels-in-hebrew-and-arabic/418065/17 "2007-09-05T13:49:21Z")
[QUOTE=OldGuy] This seems like a really strange way to describe things. It would seem to me the _heh_ is not silent, but has either an “ah” or and “eh” sound. [/QUOTE] The letter _heh_ is, properly speaking, the equivalent of English (aspirated) Aitch… in the rare cases it **isn’t** silent at the end of the word, it sounds like “hah,” not like “ah.” In most words, the final _heh_ simply acts as a visual (and grammatical!) cue that the preceding letter takes a vowel rather than a _schwa_. ---
**Author:** ![Ludovic](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/7ab992/32.png) [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-vowels-in-hebrew-and-arabic/418065/18 "2007-09-05T14:19:56Z")
[QUOTE=John Mace] Even in English it’s not too hard to read without vowels. From the OP: ’ hv bn rdng ’ lt f sclr std abt th Krn nd th Bbl nd Trh [/QUOTE] m n r lngg stln r vwlz ---
**Author:** ![Yllaria](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yllaria/32/3452_2.png) [@Yllaria](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yllaria)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-vowels-in-hebrew-and-arabic/418065/19 "2007-09-05T16:41:15Z")
[QUOTE=Ludovic] m n r lngg stln r vwlz [/QUOTE] Made my day. ---
**Author:** ![chappachula](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/d2c977/32.png) [@chappachula](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chappachula)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2007, 6:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-vowels-in-hebrew-and-arabic/418065/20 "2007-09-05T18:12:19Z")
A less confusing way to look at Hebrew is to realize that although only the consonents are written down, you can never have 2 consonants adjacent to each other–there there is always one vowel pronounced between each 2 consonants. The rules of grammar tell which which consonant has to be pronounced between the 2 letters you see written down. So a word may have be written with 3 letters --but those 3 represent 5 sounds. You alternate between the sound of a consonant and the sound of a vowel, Consonant,…vowel…,consonant,… vowel,… consonate. The rules of grammar are rigid, like a mathematical formula, so you always know which vowel to add. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/no-vowels-in-hebrew-and-arabic/418065.md?page=2)