Authentic Recordings of Biblical Hebrew 

Thank you! I've been learning both biblical hebrew and Aramaic.

As someone who grew up in a Muslim culture, Yemenite Hebrew interests me profoundly. Because to me, it sounds the closest to Arabic both in pronunciation and melody when reciting the holy texts.

Yemenite jew here, very nice hearing the differences between the ancient pronunciations, my grandparents sounds completely different from the Sanaani pronunciation- but still nice seeing some form of original Yemenite accent ! תודה רבה

Me: "haha, can you imagine the italian hebrew sounding completely stereotypical?" (Recording begins) "Oh..."

It's funnily remarkable that the italian jew has this beautiful opera voice and own manner of singing

I absolutely LOVE this! Only recently I learned of my family's Jewish heritage...I can't learn enough or fast enough! So, thank you for helping me as I learn of who I am and where I came from! I'm so happy I found your channel!

They sound melodic, this is beautiful.

What a great video! Thoroughly enjoyed this! Particularly that of the Yemenite Hebrew & Samaritan. Yes I have a bias as my lineage is half ashkenaz and half Yemenite. I grew up speaking with an Ashkenazi accent. It's so wonderful to hear Hebrew in so many different ways.

מרגש לשמוע את הצדיקים האלה …מנוחתם עדן ,קולם ישמע ויהדהד לעם ישראל עד בוא משיח בן דוד אמן סלה

This is absolutely fascinating! I'm very glad to have access to this kind of content from someone who can actually highlight the differences... Because as a student of Hebrew I always wonder how the prophets and the great people of the past pronounced their words, and I believe that this kinda traces us back to how Hebrew used to be pronounced... thanks a lot for such invaluable content!!

Thank you for making me discover this site! I've always loved Sephardic and Mizrahi pronunciations and now my ears can feast on those recordings!

I am not jewish for a long time ago I was obsessed with the authentic sound of Hebrew, and did a lot of researches on it. Seeing this video now for me is amazing.

The transformation of v into b is a common phenomenon in the history of the Portuguese language

Fascinating. I've always liked the Mizrachi sounds over the Ashkenazi sounds as they seem much less changed from ancient times.

I think the recording from Florence shows a strong influence of Italian, especially the vowels.

This is cool, you can see local influences. Yemenite Hebrew sounds like an Arabic accent. Italian Hebrew sounds like opera.

Thanks alot this was really lovely and hebrew sounds more than what I imagined and it was a soul touch as they recite ❤️

It’s a major pet peeve of mine when people say “Yemenite” when it’s only Sanaani pronunciation. Just because it is the most common pronunciation doesn’t mean it’s the only one.

This is such a truly valuable and beautifully done presentation. I especially feel moved by the photos, which help make clear that each group has its own appearance, clothing, and identity. The voice of the Samaritan means so much to me because the story of the Good Samaritan is my most cherished of all. Thank you for your remarkable work and gift.

Such a great piece of work and video. Such a joy to hear these. Absolutely beautiful.

These recordings are an absolute TREASURE!!!!

11:50 what's also unique about the (Spanish &) Portuguese pronunciation is that they differentiate between the Gimmel with and without the dagesh (dot). Without it's similar to a French 'r' or the modern Hebrew 'khav'. With a dagesh it's the same as modern Hebrew. This is similar to some north African countries, some Yemenite and Babylonian (Iraqi). Additionally, they pronounce the Hé with a dagesh as extending the noun of the preceding letter, i.e. 'Shemah' (her name) would be pronounced as 'Shemaha'. This is called in Hebrew grammar the 'Hé mapiq'.

Great. I enjoyed it. Was learning biblical Hebrew 7 years ago, but gave up due to time constraints. Look forward to starting again.

Congratulations on this wonderful video. I loved listening to it.

Shabbat Shalom from Jamaica 🇯🇲! Plz teach me. Shabbat Shalom

I have been around the Ashkenazi pronunciation my whole life, that's home!!!

You could add a note, the last Ashkenazi reading was not done with the "trup" but the typical Ashkenazi learning sing song still heard today when a Dvar Torah is given. My second comment would be , to add the polish or Hungarian pronunciation.

Totally agree with: Mizrachi sounds over the Ashkenazi sounds as they seem much less changed from ancient times - Ashkenaz means Germany, while Mizrach/Egypt has a very close and crucial Biblical connection to the development, so the names define the proximity to the true sound, in my opinion

incredible to get all of these perspectives. i'm just a beginner in biblical hebrew, but have the aid of ge'ez, amharic, and tigrinya hearing. do you have any guesses as to what could be the original? I would love to hear the djerba island tunisian biblical hebrew hearing. my bet is on them!

I wish the mizrahi pronunciations became more mainstream

Hello. Can you please provide links to the cantillations that appear in the video?

Wow this is so interesting! I've always wondered does ancient Hebrew have different dialects and sound variations. Thanks for the upload!

where can I find a Tanakh with the Hebrew and transliteration like this? referencing minute 12:16

On a more basic level: very interesting and thank you!

Could you tell me your thoughts on the Yanuka rav Shlomo Yehuda ty

Anyone have the link to the full recording from the first 10 seconds of the video 0:00 - 0:10?

Very cool. If only there were recordings from 3000 years ago.

In Cantillation, Yemenites omit final syllable stress when the word is conjoined to the next word. This is prescribed by the cantillation system, as can be gleaned from B. Kleiner's study published in 2017 and 2019. Coincidentally, this old Ashkenazi recitation with its shift of emphasis for some words ends up having some of the same rhythm as a Yemenite chant, though the disjunctions are recited as pauses instead of melismas.

Ohh man, your video referencing that great site is sooo valuable. Even if all souls are familiar with hebrew letters (some rab said), this is great. Thnx you!

The different pronunciations reflect the local languages and countries in which the Jews interacted for many generations. For Jews from middle eastern countries and Iran, one can distinctly single out the accent and pronunciation of the local language and dialects, Yemenite, Babylonian/Iraqi, the Maghreb region, etc. The same goes for the Ashkenazi pronunciation, which was influenced by Yiddish, German, and Slavic languages.

This is fascinating! I so want to learn biblical hebrew!!! I recognized the Tohu wa bohu. Rabbi was reciting Genesis 1! Beresheet!

Fascinating! Where can I find more recordings of Rabbi Shalom Kohen? Or more information about him?

Anybody know the name of the first recording? The introduction one i mean.. I'll be waiting. Please reply if you know.

I liked the Italian recital because the guy reciting it can sing and he sounds melodic which I believe the people of Biblical times were very capable of reciting the scriptures melodically.

at 2:26 *are they pronouncing yhwh or omitting it*?

"Sound recording was an exceptional achievement in 1857. Thomas A. Edison (1847-1931) Edison's phonograph was also extraordinary. Not only did it record sounds, it allowed them to be reproduced at will." 👇 Origins of Sound Recording: The Inventors - National Park Service If the Masoretes scribes have already created a Nikkudot system in the pronunciation of Biblical Hebrew, it proves that in their time there was a change in the pronunciation of Biblical Hebrew words and because of that they thought of having a standard before 920 C.E. If recording had been invented in the 19th Century, there would have been a gap of 900 years from their time that there would have been a greater change in pronunciation in speech. The recording from the 19th - 20th century cannot prove what is the original pronunciation especially if the few people being filmed or voice recorded do not have a background reference to their origin. In comparison the 10th century scribes who recognized what the original pronunciation was more credible than 900 years later.

I worked at a business where our customers were from all over the world. I noted that while English speaking people from other countries could communicate, there were differences in our "common" language. Same thing in Hebrew.

The proper pronunciation of tachas/tachat is with the accent on the first syllable. This is seen in printed versions where the cantillation mark is on the first syllable and when it has an etnachta/esnachto or sof pasuk, the patach of the first syllable changes to a kamatz. It's usual in Hebrew for two syllable words when both are vocalized with a patach. It's also the way it's pronounced in modern Hebrew. The fellow from Kovno made other shifts to the penultimate syllable, though, so your point is well taken. It's interesting than he didn't read it with the trop/cantillation. His pronunciation is similar to mine and my father's. Among many Ashkenazim, that accent shift is found during study and often prayer, but for the public reading of the Torah the proper accents are observed. Since he didn't use the cantillation, he was probably not a ba'al korei (one who does the public reading), and, unused to stressing the correct syllable, read with the colloquial accent of study and prayer. Thank you for this.

GREAT VIDEO. I understand for another video that ilatian dialect is a sephardic variant. I hear in this video that the italian cantor said nang'omi (nang'ami) for na'ami instead of na'ongmi, same use of NG' in the word ra'av, he said like raNG'av. But, remember that he is singing and not reading or speaking, when a cantor sing he change same vowels for the note sometimes.

This is a great sample. However the link to the Hebrew Academy is not working.

A few points you missed out from some of the recording's. But I want to look specifically at the Ashkenazi one, he says yainkov or more specifically yainkiv as opposed to Yaakov, that extra "n" may seem out of place to americans or Israeli's but it would seem that this is very much from tradition that even tho they lost the "ayin" or Oinyin that the Samaritan's had they still kept the trace of it in some words like Yaakov I'd assume probably because it's a common name, so even tho over the millennia or two they lost the full pronunciation (probably because it was so different to the native countries they are in) they still kept that word due to using it do often. I'm really curious on the 'ches' and 'hei' like did the Germans cause their "ch" to come into the tongue of the Jews or was 'ches' always In Hebrew (or at least for 2500 years) but the other's lost it because it was so hard for them, and so different from their native languages. I've never seen anything on this, but I'd be very interested if there is anything. Anyway I really enjoyed this video, I hope to check out some more from your channel. Thank you very much!

Extremely interesting and cool video. Thank you deeply for this!

Fascinating, thank you!

Was that a version of L7's Pretend We're Dead at the end of you video? 🤨😆

This is very fascinating. Thank you for sharing.

Good work!

Fascinating. Thank you.

awesome vides! glad to have found this channel!

I didn't realize how unique the modern Hasidic pronunciation is. Where did this come from? (It wasn't shown in the video, but I speak it.)

While you concentrate here on the pronunciation of the words, I found the differences in the way the _trop_ (cantillation) sounds fascinating, too. Imitating the former is easy enough, once you learn the rules. (A quick glance through an _alef beis_ primer can do that.) But learning the _trop_ is quite a bit more involved. (The _Litvak_ skipped the _trop,_ and the Italian wasn't reading _Chumash;_ of course _Rus_ sounds very different.)

amsterdam portuguese pronunciation also differs from modern hebrew quite a lot more than described in the video. Along with the differences from modern hebrew already mentioned, ג without dagesh is pronounced like a (guttural) khaf sound, a he mapiq הּ is pronounced by doubling the preceding vowel, tzere and seghol are pronounced like a french é and close attention is payed to pronouncing the shewa na’ and nah

Looks interesting, Just subscribed!!

Just like Jews all over the world eat different food, we have slightly different culture, whether Sephardi, Italkim, Romaniote, Ashkenazi, Mizrahi. *Am Yisroil Chai!*

The most mind blowing thing is that Yemenite Hebrew sounds like ashkenaz and Sephardic combined

Thank you for sharing this it was very interesting and informative

Wow 😲 super interesting. Thanks 🙏🙏

In some of few of the recordings the pronunciation of צ differs from modern Hebrew as well, sounding more like s or th.

You should do another video like this and add the Kavkazi Jews. There is a video of them on RU-vid it is a very old recording of mountain Jews. They also recited Hebrew with the Arabic pronunciations like the yemenites. Amazing.

Do Litvish pronounce וֺ as ay as in may?

This is really cool!

YHWH BLESS THESE PEOPLE

תודה! מצויין

Beautiful. Thank you for sharing.

Are there any recordings of someone actual pronouncing the tetragrammaton?

So, I'm trying to learn the language, but there are so many instances but the different pronunciations make it so hard. Even apart from different dialects... just listening to the same person pronounce the same words completely differently (even in the same conjugation). Is tree "ets" or "eyts" or "aiets" or "rayts?" I dunno. Is this letter a "Tav" or a "Tev" or a "tuf?" Is "Good" "Tov" or "Tuv" or "Toiyv." The vowels make such a difference, yet so many just kinda pile them in there. This is difficult.

Very intereting video!

As Yemeni Jew this is exactly how we recite

How can I learn different taamin?

The Yemenite reading here is very influenced by Arabic, which does explain his pronunciation of gimel and qop. His melodic reading is also very reminiscent of how Muslims read the Qur'an.

Thanksfor this very interesting and informative video. I just would like to suggest a correction: at 7:17 the "daleth" without dagesh is pronounced as the Arabic equivalent ذ "dhaal", not like ث (tav without dagesh) "thaa".

It is reasonable and somewhat self evident that all the respective dispersed and segregated communities were being affected by the land place language where these Jewish communities maintained their domicile. Thus we hear the influence of Yiddish in the pronunciation of Hebrew of the Lithuanian community. And thus we hear the influence of Arabic with the "wa" pronunciation in the Hebrew of Iraqi Jews. The most unique of all the communities, I find, in this regard and perhaps having a true link to the last Judean pronunciation is the Italian Jewish Hebrew.

Interesting and informative clip and the recordings are beautiful and priceless. Some notes: 1. While you showed a wide variety of pronunciations of Jews from Islamic countries and accordingly, the pronunciations of Ashkenazic Jewry probably has less of a variety, but it is too bad you didn't include the Galicianer/Chasidic pronunciation - where they pronounce ברוך אתה as "booreekh atu"; i.e. the קמץ as "oo" as in "tooth", the שורוק as an "ee" as in "teeth" and the חולם as an "ay" as in "play". 2. I would call your "American Ashkenazi" accent an "American Modern Orthodox Ashkenazi" accent, since the "American Misnagde Charedi" accent has one noticeable difference, the חולם pronounced as an "oy" - my guess, taken from the German dipthongs "eu" and "äu" and used to distinguish from the "aw" or "oh" of a קמץ. 3. My guess is that the Yemenite Hebrew pronunciation does not include the Modern Hebrew vowel of "eh" since Arabic only has three vowels ("ah", "oo" and "ee") though the Yemenite pronunciation DOES include the צירי. The Yemenite pronunciation also mirrors Arabic in בגד כפת, though the Yemenite pronunciation includes the "p" and "v" sounds in the "ו" and "פ" with a dagesh. Some Yemenites pronounce "ג" without a dagesh as "gh" (the Arabic ﻍ) and the "ג" with a dagesh as "j". The letters of "ד", "כ" and "ת" without a dagesh are "kh", "d" and "th" - as in "thing" (the Arabic د, ﺥ and ﺙ) and the letters of "ד", "כ" and "ת" with a dagesh are "k", "th" - as in "this" and "t" (the Arabic ﺫ, ﻙ and ﺕ). 4. My guess is that Ashkenazic pronunciation changed the ת without a dagesh from "th" to "s" due to the fact that German has no "th" sound. (See second 32 of this clip ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-0MUsVcYhERY.html). 5. The Amsterdam Portuguese pronunciation of "המערה" as "המנארה" is interesting and may have had something to do with the Yiddish pronunciation of יעקב as יענקב and the nickname Yanki? 6. My guess is that Modern Hebrew was built on the fact that there are no similar pronunciations in German, Polish and Russian to the Arabic (ﺡ, ﺙ, ﺫ, ص, ض, ط, ظ, ع, ﻍو,و and ﻕ). As a result, "ו" and "ב" without a dagesh became the same, as did "ת" and "ט" as did "ח" and "כ" without a dagesh, "כ" with a dagesh and "ק", as well as "ג", "ד" and "ת" whether with or without a dagesh.

Ah, it seems like most of my comments have been filtered as spam. Can you please check them?

Do you guys memorise the Torah or just read it from the paper? The guy reading in the video seems to be following along on a screen, is that Rabbis too? they read from the paper?

Do modern-day Mizrahis sound closer to the pre-Israel pronunciation of Hebrew, or has the modern pronunciation prevailed more or less?

I don't speak Hebrew, but I got a strange feeling when the first 3 spoke it was like listening to Palestinian, Yemeni and Iraqi Arabic!

Thank you its fascinating

In the Shomroni reading I did hear the ב without the dot it's like v. Also, he has proper ח though it is not as strong as modern Hebrew. I believe is reading is influenced by Arabic. The ה when it is at the beginning of the word sounds like el which is probably an Arabic influence for example instead HaHetzroni he read El Hetzroni

Sorry to ask this, but wouldn't Samaritan pronunciation be more authentic than yemenite?

Modern Hebrew can sound cloying at times. Wonderful to hear a different way of approaching Hebrew

I'm confused as why the samaritan was compared to adonay, surely its equivalent is hashem?

Fascinating

Beautiful ❤🙏

great video

Amazing, shkoah

When I listened Ashkenazi pronunciation I can hear the influence of pronunciations from Russian and Lithuanian languages.))) Which is very beautiful.))) Very beautiful and interesting video indeed. Thank you.))))

Greta video. Idk why, but I pretty sure that the word תהום should be read as Tehom even in ashcenzi, since it start with a ת

great work bruv

Reminds me of Aramaic so much!

The Iraqi rabbi are reading niqqudot the Tiberiades way. I might be wrong, but the Iraqi tradition is to read the niqqudot the babylonic way like the Yemenites do, as it was before in Babylonia and Palestine after the destruction of the second Beith Hamikdash.