Reading Genesis 1:1 aloud

Reading by syllables

You now have the letters, the vowel points, and shewa and dagesh. Let us put them to work on the first verse of the Bible.

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

Genesis 1:1

A long Hebrew word is hard to read in one go, so cut it into syllables. A syllable begins with a consonant and carries one vowel, which means that, as a rule of thumb, the number of vowel points is the number of syllables. A sounded shewa counts as a short syllable. בָּרָא has two vowel points, so it has two syllables: בָּ·רָא, "ba·ra", "he created". It occurs 53 times in the Old Testament. The final א is silent; it just rests after the vowel.

אֱלֹהִים has three syllables, אֱ·לֹ·הִים, "e·lo·him", and means "God". It occurs about 2,600 times, so it is among the words you will see most. The first vowel, ֱ, is short and light, but it still makes a syllable. We will come back to this word in the next lesson.

בְּרֵאשִׁית is בְּ·רֵא·שִׁית, "be·re·shit". The shewa in the first syllable is sounded ("e"), and the א in the middle is silent, only seating the vowel ֵ. The word looks like a single unit, "in the beginning", but it is really בְּ ("in") joined to a noun meaning "beginning".

הַשָּׁמַיִם is הַ·שָּׁ·מַ·יִם, "ha·sha·ma·yim", four syllables, "the heavens". The dot inside the ש is the doubling dagesh you met in the last lesson; here it follows הַ, the word "the", which has its own lesson later. The noun inside it, שָׁמַיִם, occurs about 420 times. Last, הָאָרֶץ is הָ·אָ·רֶץ, "ha·a·retz", "the earth".

Stress, maqqef and sof pasuq

Hebrew words are usually stressed on the last syllable: ba-RA, e-lo-HIM, be-re-SHIT. There are common exceptions. הַשָּׁמַיִם is stressed on the second to last, ha-sha-MA-yim, and so is הָאָרֶץ, ha-A-retz. For now, remember "usually the last syllable, and a number of common words the one before it". Your ear will sort it out as you read.

Besides the vowel points, words carry other small marks. The ones that usually sit one per word, like the ֖ in בְּרֵאשִׁ֖ית, are accent marks. They were made for chanting the text, and there are many kinds. For reading aloud you can ignore them, and this course mentions them only when it must.

Two marks do matter. The maqqef (־) is a short raised hyphen between words. It ties a word to the next one, and the two are usually read as one word. Genesis 1:1 has none, but 1:4 does.

אֶת־הָאוֹר is read together, "et-ha-or", and כִּי־טוֹב is one unit as well. The other mark is the sof pasuq (׃), two dots one above the other at the end of a verse, as in הָאָרֶץ׃. It does the work of a full stop.

Reading a line of the 원어 panel

For each word the panel shows the same things in the same order: the Hebrew form, the Latin transliteration, the meaning, a lexicon number (an H followed by digits, such as H1254) and the grammar labels. Here is word 5 of Genesis 1:1.

הַשָּׁמַיִם (hashamayim) the heavens | Particle · Definite article (Hebrew) / Noun · Common · Masculine · Plural · Absolute

Why so many labels? One written Hebrew word can hold several parts. Here הַ is the article and שָׁמַיִם is the noun, so the panel lists both. In the same way בְּרֵאשִׁית is a preposition בְּ plus a noun, and וְאֵת is the conjunction וְ ("and") plus the object marker אֵת. The labels themselves, such as particle, common, plural and absolute, come in later lessons. For now it is enough to know that one word may have two parts.

One last reminder: the play button (בְּרֵאשִׁית) uses a modern Hebrew voice, while this course teaches the standard academic pronunciation. They are close but not the same, so use the button as a sample.

Summary

Cut each word into syllables by counting vowel points, and stress the last syllable unless you know better. A maqqef joins two words, a sof pasuq ends the verse, and the other accent marks can be ignored when you read aloud. Genesis 1:1 then reads: bereshit bara elohim et hashamayim ve-et ha-aretz. Go slowly at first. If you can read it word by word from right to left, you have done what this lesson asks.

Words in this lesson

• בָּרָאbarato create53 times in the OT
• אֱלֹהִיםelohimGod2,598 times in the OT
• שָׁמַיִםshamayimheaven421 times in the OT

Practice