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What is ayin in the Hebrew alphabet?
Summary The sixteenth letter of the Hebrew alphabet is called “Ayin” (pronounced ” ah -yeen”). Like Aleph, Ayin has no sound of its own, but usually has a vowel associated with it. In modern Hebrew, the letter Ayin can appear in three forms:
Is Ayin untransliterated in English?
Like Aleph, Ayin is often untransliterated in English. The letter Ayin is the 16th letter of the Aleph-Bet, having the numeric value of 70. The pictograph for Ayin looks something like an eye, whereas the classical Hebrew script (Ketav Ashurit) is constructed of a Yod (with a descending line) and embedded Zayin.
Is there an ayin in front of the U in Arabic?
In Arabic, the presence of ayin in front of u can sometimes be inferred even if it is not rendered separately, as the vowel quality is shifted towards o (e.g. Oman عمان ʿUmān, Omar عمر ʿUmar, etc.) Maltese, which uses a Latin alphabet, the only Semitic language to do so in its standard form, writes the ayin as ⟨ għ ⟩.
What is the Unicode character for ayin?
In Unicode, the recommended character for the transliteration of ayin is ʿ (U+02BF) “modifier letter left half ring” (a character in the Spacing Modifier Letters range, even though it is here not used as a modifier letter but as a full grapheme). This convention has been adopted by ISO 233-2 (1993) for Arabic and ISO 259-2 (1994) for Hebrew.
It is said that Ayin “sees” but does not speak, and therefore represents the attitude of humility (or anavah). Anavah begins with an Ayin, as does the word for service (avodah) and yoke (ol). On the other hand, Ayin can represent idolatry (avodah zara) as well as slavery (avedut), both of which are born out of the heart of envy.
What is the sixteenth letter of the Hebrew alphabet called?
The sixteenth letter of the Hebrew alphabet is called “Ayin” (pronounced ” ah -yeen”). Like Aleph, Ayin has no sound of its own, but usually has a vowel associated with it.