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<div dir="ltr">Dear Mr. Topas,
<div dir="ltr">The answer to your question does not lie in any grammar book yet written, all of which are based on the printed text of the T’NaKh. </div>
<div dir="ltr">But the T’NaKh existed for a little b’h time before printing was invented, and the Ben Asher school of Masoretes became acknowledged as the most careful. They had many differences with other school (e.g. they punctuated “b’yisrael,” whereas
other groups punctuated it as “bisrael”).</div>
<div dir="ltr">Aharon Ben Asher, the latest and greatest of the family, was developing a system of using the vowels to reflect very small differences in how words are pronounced, for instance when the sh’wa is pronounced and when it is silent. One way he did
that was to use a Chatham vowel instead of a plain sh’wa. </div>
<div dir="ltr">The Masorah shows that sometimes the sh’wa was pronounced after the prefix “u-“ although most of the time it is not. They show when it is, Aharon Ben Asher and some other members of his school used the chataph vowel. </div>
<div dir="ltr">So the direct shottbandwer to your query is: to show that the sh’wa undervthe shin is not silent but rather pronounced. </div>
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<div class="null" dir="auto">On July 1, 2018 at 4:51:29 PM EDT, Henry Topas via Mesorah <mesorah@lists.aishdas.org> wrote:<br class="null">
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<div dir="ltr" class="null">In yesterday's kriat hatorah, the phrase "kum balak u'sh'ma" is vowelized in many seforim as "kum balak u'sha'mah with a chataf patach in place of the sh'va. The Minchas Shai also draws one's attention to the same situation in Va'etchanan
on the phrase "k'rav atah u'sh'mah or u'sha'mah" and in Daniel "Hatei .....aznecha u'sh'ma".
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<div class="null">My understanding was always that the vav ha-chibur changes to the shuruk when followed by a consonant vowelized by a sh'va (or if followed by either vet, vav, mem or phay)</div>
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<div class="null">If the shuruk at the beginning of the word is a given, why would the chataf patach be an option instead of the shva?</div>
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<div class="null">Thank you,</div>
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<div class="null">Henry Topas</div>
<div class="null">Dollard des Ormeaux, Montreal</div>
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