A kamatz katan occurs on a stress non-final syllable. Examples are Tzohorayim, Oniyah, etc. In some cases this occurs because of a shift of the emphasis and reduction of a Cholam. Examples are: Ozno and Tzorchav. For typography I would suggest in Israel the Rinat Israel Siddur. The Sim Shalom siddur also distinguishes the Kamatz Kattan but is more difficult to see for those of us who are no longer teenagers (ie. need reading glasses). For those who want an excellent Tikun, I would recommend "Simanim". Beyond this I do all my own typography and have designed special fonts that distinguish vowels from a dagesh, I show the sheva na and sheva nach, along with kamatz kattan, vav dagush, mapique, etc. I also have standards of color coding to further reduce Hebrew typographical ambiguities. In the event you need further explanation on the Kamatz kattan or other issues, please respond and I will be happy to answer.

The last time I visited Israel, which was recently, I was quizzed by Israeli airport officials on how come I know how to speak Ivrit but I am a U.S. citizen born in the U.S. traveling on a U.S. passport? (My dad is Israeli)

#23 Israel's only exist because of the non-religious Jews that you despise. Without Herzl the foundation of Israel would not have been laid and the survivors of the holocaust would still be refugee or displaced person's camps. While most of the non-religious people serve in IDF and defend the country, many if not most of the religious shirk their national duties. As for the religious people, I seriously question their (and your) knowledge of the Torah, the Siddur, and our heritage. We studied Hebrew, Aramaic, Torah, Talmud, etc. but not like parrot who can only mimic what they heard. We learned to analyze and challenge rather than blindly accepting everything with the "Rabbi's kosher stamp" on it (especially when it can easily be bought). With respect to the Lashon Hakodesh of your Siddur, it too has many mistakes by those who wrote the prayers. 1. In Brich Shmei in the Torah Service the religious say "De-Liba'ee" which is a double definitive (of my the heart) while conservative correct the Aramaic to "De-Libee" meaning "of my heart". 2. Orthodox say "Hashata" during Passover which again is a double definitive (once Heh from Hebrew and kamatz Aleph as the Aramaic definitive). 3. The author of El Adon during the Shabbat morning service was dyslexic and didn't realize that "Semaychim" is actually with a Sin and not a Samech. 4. And Ashrei is missing the line starting with Nun. I can give more examples. And in the Torah their are also problems, albeit, most of the problems relate to nikkud from the Tiberian time when the nikkud was added. So any time you wish to discuss Hebrew, Aramaic etc., I will be happy to show you how little you know and how ridiculous your "Dahti" diatribe is.

It's basically chareidim that speak Yiddish in schools, in Yeshivot and at home, and that's all over the world, unlike Hebrew which is only in Israel or among some yordim at home. As more and more secular Jews are becoming baalei tshuvot and attend chareidi schools, there are more and more who are back to speaking Yiddish.

#33 Clarification - In the Shabbat morning prayer El Adon, the word "Semaychim" is spelled correctly in the prayer but the line resides in the acrostic in the place where the Samech should be.

Yiddish, Ladino, and the other Jewish languages belong in the Galut. Hebrew is the Jewish language - period. If you're so attached to the abomination that is Yiddish I propose you return to Eastern Europe.

Is, in my opinion, corrupting the language. Not only can we hear transliterated phrases such as "Tanoor Bild in" (built in oven), but also literal translations such as "Sheyihiye lecha yom naim" (literal translation from English "have a nice day"). These are terrible and unfortunately the younger generation is quickly absorbing these syntactical errors and transliterations into their every day speech.

that I’m not embarrassed with my ancestors while you are totally ashamed of them. If you consider speaking the language of our holy forefathers an “abomination”, what do you think of last year’s filth parade in Jerusalem? Pure Zionism! Hah? Liyot am chofshi be’artzeinu!

OK, I have some questions for you. The pronunciation you seem to use is the Ashkenazic one. Does the Sephardic pronunciation too make use of Kamatz Katan? I've seen a book on the web called "The Oh's and Ah's of Torah Reading" written by Rivkah Sherman-Gold. Have you heard of the book? If so, have you seen it, and is it helpful? Do you know anyone who has used it? With regard to Hebrew fonts, they are so small, especially on websites and in the newspapers that I've seen. Here we are with a nice and easy to read script and the typsetters decide that they want to imitate publications that use Latin alphabets by making it sooo small. Believe me, I would switch to Ynet Hebrew the minute I see larger Hebrew fonts used in articles. There's just no reason or excuse why these fonts need be so small.

#33 First of all, orthodox Jews were here in Eretz Yisrael hundreds of years before your Zionists and lived beautiful prosperous lives. If not your Zionists who collaborated with the Nazis (see Kastner case) hundreds of thousands of Hungarian Jews would have still been alive. If not your Zionist undemocratic methods of forcing hundreds of thousands of Jews, mainly Sephardim, to go astray against their will, there would have been shomrei Torah umitzvot, truly observant Jews. If not your Zionist kidnapping of thousands of Yemenite children, they would have been thousands more truly observant Jews. If not your Zionists blowing up the S.S. Patria ship, 268 Jewish refugees from Vienna, Prague and Danzig would have still been alive. Regarding the religious people serving in the army, read talkback #5 from one of the greatest journalist, Moshe Grylak: http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3481004,00.html. No need for me to add to that. The Torah consists of PaRD”S (Pirush / Remez / Drush / Sod). There are certain words and nikkud that have hidden meanings which were revealed to the big mekubbalim who know that every word and nikkud is holy of holy. The same applies to the siddur which was created by the Anshei Knesset Hagdolah. Amongst them were prophets, including Mordechai Hatzaddik. It’s not for us earthly midgets to evaluate the sacred words of these Heavenly giants and it’s certainly not for you who has de’ot kozvot.

I'm not embarassed with my ancestors and you have no right to make such absurd comments about me with no evidence to back them up, and without even knowing the person whom you are speaking to. I'm very proud to be a Mizrahi Jew - but that does not mean that I go around speaking Judeo-Farsi or Judeo-Arabic! Hebrew is the national language of the Jewish people - it was 3,300 years ago at Sinai, and it remains so today. What connection does a Hebrew/German/Dutch hybrid have to do with the Hebrews, the Israelites, and then the Jews? The languages of the diaspora belong in the diaspora. Now that we have returned home, we have also returned to the REAL language of the Jewish people - Hebrew. As for "Lhiyot am chofshi beartzeinu" - that we are. Your incessant whining and nonsensical babbling about Yiddish being Lashon haKodesh does not change reality. If you yearn so much for your European ancestors and are repulsed by your ancient MIDDLE-EASTERN ANCESTORS, WHO SPOKE HEBREW, then I suggest again that you go back to Eastern Europe, where you feel so at home.

If you have "the right" to call the language used by thousands of Jews throughout history "an abomination", I have rights too. You did not respond to my question: If you consider speaking the language of our holy forefathers "an abomination”, what do you think of last year’s filth parade in Jerusalem? Pure Zionism! Hah? And regarding the Hebrew language, read my talkback #23 again. There I wrote about the language Lashon Hakodesh which is the holy language we use for praying and Tanach and it's not the same as the modern Hebrew composed by secular Jews. For your knowledge, there are words imported from Galut Yiddish into your “holy Hebrew language”. For instance the word “lefargen” which comes from the Yiddish word “farginen”. Apparently, the Sabra Hebrew needed the old Yiddish to help them. There are many more like that.

Actually Ashkenazit does not distinguish the vocalization of the kamatz and kamatz kattan. Since NO ONE teaches the differences between Ashkenazit and Sepharadit, following is the most important 3 things that one should know: 1. In Ashkenazit the Tav is pronounced S if there is no dagesh (dot) and T if there is a dagesh. In Sepharadit it is ALWAYS pronounced T. NO EXCEPTIONS! 2. In Ashkenzait the patach (horizontal line under letter) is always pronounced "ah" and the kamatz, kamatz kattan, and hataf kamatz are ALWAYS pronounced "ow". In Sepharadit the patach is also ALWAY "ah" but the kamatz is usually pronounced "ah" (i.e. the same as the patach) unless it is a kamatz katan. The rules regarding Kamatz katan are to complicated to go into here at depth but in a thumbnail it is on a stressed non-final syllable. 3. Mil-El vs. Mil-Ra. Ashkenazit uses Mil-El which move the stress in the words away from the end of the word while Sepharadit uses Mil-ra and usually places the emphasis at the end of the word. While this may not be gramatically correct, in Israel if a word is both a name and a concept. The concept is pronounced in Mil-ra while the name is pronounced in Mil-El. For example shaLOM is peace while SHAlom is a male name. yisraEL is the people of Israel while yiRAel is a male name. This is why Sepharadit is very important. shaLOM al yisraEL is peace on Israel and is a beautiful concept. Ashkenazit SHAlom al yisRAel on the other hand are two homosexuals.

If you are having problems with reading Hebrew newspapers/publications, I would recommend that you install Firefox. Under View you can easily change the font size to any size you feel comfortable with. Now you can switch to YNET in Hebrew without problems. Enjoy. p.s. See www.firefox.com

First of all you URL is a dead link. Secondly, taking 1 individual and trying to villainize all Zionists is absurd. Are we then to conclude that all followers of Gur are child molestors? We know of Moslems and Arabs who were recently honored for saving Jews during the holocaust. Does this mean ALL arabs and Moslems risked their lives to save Jews? Absolutely not. If we look at the ranks of how many Zionist fought with the partisans and risked their lives to save Jews, that would be more valid since it is based on a very large number of people clearly identified with the Zionist movement. You can find monuments all over Israel for Zionists who devoted and risked their lives for the Jewish people. Look at the fighters at the Warsaw Ghetto and others who fought with the partisans. They were largely non-religious (including a great aunt of mine). Please give me a list of religious people who are honored for fighting against the Nazis. Your list will be very small. On the other hand I remeber debating Arabs on the middle east crisis and they managed to cite Deir Yassin and Abu Ghosh while trying to magnify 2 incidents into a hundred. You on the other hand with your Arab logic blow 1 incident into a thousand! I really begin to wonder what the difference is between the religious Jewish and Moslem extremists. It seems it is only the sewing pattern they use for making the burqas that you make your women wear. p.s. I see that you are not able to parrot any stock answers for the quotes from siddur etc. that I cited. and your level of knowledge is obviously not sufficient to responsd by yourself.

#44 Well, the book I'm using stresses Sephardic pronunciation, and that is the one I use. It's a shame that the diffeerences are not mentioned anymore. I remember the first book going over some of the differences, which at least let you know that they exist. Only later on with other books did I learn of the other differences. Though I'd like to thank you for going over them. Also, I recall, that the name of the letters sometimes come out differently. Only later on did I learn that some people still use the old names for letters. Ex. tau - tav yud - yod kuf - kof #45 Thank you very much for the tip. I'll look into it. I can't wait. Then it will be a matter of setting keyboard for talkbacks in Hebrew!! Happy Hannukah you all.

Believe me it is my pleasure. There are a number of things that one must realize while learning a language. First, as a child one has the "ear" to learn the subleties of pronunciation but not the intellectual capacity to "understand" the language. Later on one developes the intellectual capacity but no longer has the "ear". Hebrew is an amazing beautiful, almost scientifically laid out language but like any living language it has external influences and evolution going on. I remember the lesson of Avshalom Kor in Israel on the media - absolute brilliance. When one achieves a certain level of Hebrew, then they can truly appreciate the sheer eloquence of certain writers in the Torah such as Yeshayahu, some of the writers of the Haskalah, and some of the modern writers. There are also speakers such as Yitzchak Navon and Abba Even whose use of the language was sublime. On the other hand there are far too many who only know enough to pronounce the words and nothing more. The name of letters are a few small but not really significant differences. I am not even sure if it is related to Sepharatit/Ashkenzit or geographic background. Speakers of certain European countries would confuse the "oo" sound and the "ee" sound. Hungarian Jews can't differenciate the Hev, Chet, and Chaf. Other totally mess up the vowels with strange variations. Within the constructs of the language there are "Hif'il" and "Hof'al" which are just stylistic differences of the same construct (active causative). I can think of so many things to say that there is not enough time or space here. I would suggest: 1. Identifying beautiful expressions from the Torah, Mishna, and Talmud that are part of today's language and so wonderfully express some concept. 2. Understand the functional of relationships of the 7 Classic Constructs and the largely unknown other constructs (i.e. A'fel, Taf'el, Maf'el, and Shaf'el). Then add the adjective/adverb forms, etc. 3. Understanding the effects of Aramaic on Hebrew as a result of the Babylonia exile. This forever changed the writing system and Hebrew language. 4. Learn the linguistic and cultural inter-relationships with other Semitic languages (e.g. Aramaic and Arabic). It is an amazing subject. Unfortunately there are not that many people who explore this amazing subject. Elie

As in most synagogues around the world, the people know how to vocalize the words but have no clue or appreciate of the substance of their prayers. In one such synagogue they had a cantor with an amazing voice and a wonderful choir. The cantor taught the choir to sing after him the last few "catch words" of each line with beautiful harmony. During Tfilat Geshem the cantor sang: Livracha V'Lo Lik'lala The choir sang: :L'k'lala The Cantor sang: Le'Sova V'lo LaraZon. The choir sang: La'raZon The Cantor sang" L'chaYim V'lo La'mavet. The choir sang: La'mavet.