Hebrew Nuggets is an article series that introduces beginners to Hebrew letters, Hebrew vocabulary and spiritual insights from the Hebrew tradition.
Revised: 29-Sept.-2015
“Hallelujah” is the English form of a Hebrew word. The Hebrew word הללויה (ha·le·lu·YAH) is spelled with five consonants and four vowel symbols. However, we have already learned one of the consonants, the י (yod), and three of the vowels, ַ (pa·TAḤ), וּ (shu·RUK) and ָ (ka·MATS). Also, two of the five consonants in ha·le·lu·YAH are duplicated. Altogether, then, we only need to learn two new consonants and one new vowel to read the long Hebrew word ha·le·lu·YAH.
The first letter in the word הללויה is ה (he’). It is the Hebrew “h” sound, the fifth letter in the Hebrew alphabet. In our system of transliteration, he’ is transliterated “h.”
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- [1] יה (yah) appears 24 times as a separate word in Scripture (Exod. 15:2; 17:16; Ps. 68:5,19; 77:12; 89:9; 94:7,12; 102:19; 115:17,18; 118:5,14,17,18,19; 122:4; 130:3; 135:4; 150;6; Isa. 12:2; 26:4; 38:11 [twice]). ↩
- [2] This translation is known as the Septuagint, often abbreviated "LXX.” ↩
- [3] See Encyclopedia Judaica (16 vols.; ed. Cecil Roth and Geoffrey Wigoder; Jerusalem: Keter, 1971-1972), 7:1199-1200. ↩
