The Hebrew Alphabet and Right-to-Left Script

Meet the Hebrew alphabet

Hebrew is written with an alphabet of 22 letters, and it reads and writes right to left, the opposite of English. There are no capital letters. In everyday Modern Hebrew the vowels are usually not written, so you read unpointed text: just the consonant letters. Let us meet some of them.

The first letters

Each Hebrew letter has a name and a sound. Here are the first few:

Which way do you read?

The biggest change from English is the direction. Compare the two:

Match the letter to its name

Which letter?

Which letter makes the sound b?

• ב Bet
• ד Dalet
• ג Gimel
• ה He

Letters that change at the end

Five letters change shape when they come at the end of a word. These are the final forms, or sofit. For example, the letter Mem is written מ inside a word, but ם at the end. The five letters with final forms are Kaf, Mem, Nun, Pe and Tsadi.

Match the letter to its sound

Final forms?

Select the TWO letters that have a special final form at the end of a word.

• מ Mem
• נ Nun
• ב Bet
• ד Dalet

Reading a whole sentence

Letters exist to build sentences. Hebrew runs right to left, has no capital letters, and in the present it has no word for "is" at all: - אני תלמיד = "I am a student" (said by a male speaker). Two words do the work of three: אני ("I") and תלמיד ("student"), with nothing between them. - יש לי ספר = "I have a book". Hebrew has no verb "to have" either - it says "there is to me", reading right to left: יש, then לי, then ספר.

Read the sentence

In יש לי ספר, "I have a book", which word is furthest to the RIGHT, and so comes first?

• יש
• לי
• ספר
• אני

Alphabet order

Put these four letters into the correct Hebrew alphabet order, the order you would recite them.

• א Alef
• ב Bet
• ג Gimel
• ד Dalet

Complete the facts

The Hebrew alphabet has _____ letters. It is read from right to _____. It has no _____ letters. Five letters have a special _____ form used at the end of a word. When the vowels are not written, the text is called _____.

The Hebrew script

Tap the TWO statements that are TRUE.

• Hebrew is read and written from right to left.
• Five Hebrew letters have a special form at the end of a word.
• Hebrew has capital and small letters, like English.
• The Hebrew alphabet has 26 letters.
• In everyday Hebrew the vowels are always written in.

Use the script

Use what you know about the Hebrew script to answer each question.

• You begin reading a Hebrew word. Which side do you start on?
• The letter Mem falls at the very end of a word. Which form is used?
• You are reading unpointed Hebrew. What is left out compared with pointed text?

Explain the script

In English, explain three ways the Hebrew writing system is different from English. This is written in English and is not auto-marked.

• Describe the direction Hebrew is read and written
• Explain what final forms are, using one letter as an example
• Explain what unpointed Hebrew means
• Say how many letters the alphabet has and whether it has capitals