Transliteration schemes

I've adopted and adapted the following transliteration schemes for the two primary languages in which the Bible was originally written, Hebrew for the Old Testament (Tanakh) and Greek for the New Testament (B'rit Chadashah). By using these schemes, I won't have to always resort to the actual Hebrew and Greek letters to share the way words were written in the original languages; I can accomplish fairly well the same thing with common English letters and symbols. The trick in a good transliteration scheme is to represent each letter in their alefbet or alphabet with an independent symbol and retain the sound of the letter both as an independent letter and as part of a word. These are the best I could develop. Giving credit where credit is due, I started with the transliteration schemes of PC Study Bible V5's Interlinear Bible and expanded upon those schemes. While good, PC Study Bible doesn't quite nail the pronunciation, particularly with the vav and the bet (Vet). Also, there were nuances of the vowel pointing that gave me trouble.

Pay particular attention to the symbols that represent the "silent" letters of the Hebrew alefbet and the shva. I will do my best to be consistent with the symbol used for the sake of being able to go backwards in transliteration to the original Hebrew word. The alef is represented with an open-single-quote (‘), the `ayin with a grave (`), and the shva with a close-single-quote (’). This may be hard to keep consistent because of the font. When typing with single quotes, for instance 'this phrase,' one can see that the open and close single quotes are generalized for interchangeability and are thus indistinguishable. I should be able to keep the `ayin separated from the alef, but there could be confusion between the alef and the shva. If worse comes to worse, I may decide in the future to go to a double-quote (") for the shva. I'll think on it....

Transliteration Scheme for Hebrew:

The Hebrew alefbet:

Letter  Letter name          Transliteration             Transliteration at beginning of word

a alef                               ‘                                  (nothing and next letter is capitalized)

b B vet, bet                     V, b                             B

g gimmel                         g                                  G

d dalet                             d                                  D

h hei                                h                                  H

w vav                                v                                  V

z zayin                             z                                  Z

j chet                              ch (as in “loch”)         Ch

f tet                                 T                                 TT

y yud (or yod)                  y                                  Y

k i K I khaf, kaf           kh, k                            Kh, K

l lamed                            l                                   L

m < meim                        m                                 M

n / nun                             n                                  N

s samech                          c                                  C

u ayin                               `                                   ` (and next letter is capitalized)

p [ P Š fei, pei              f, p                               P

x J tsaddai                      ts                                 Ts

q qoph                             q                                  Q

r reish                             r                                   R

v c shin, sin                  sh, s                             Sh, S

t T tav, (thav)                t, (th)                            T, (Th)

Vowel pointing (using gimmel for example):

Letter with pointing        Transliteration   Pronunciation

g* qamets                          aa                      gaw

g^ patach                           a                        gah

g] chireq                           i                         ghee

yg]] chireq with yud          iy                       ghee

g} tsere                             ee                       gay

yg} tsere with yud             eey                    gay

g\ segol                            e                        geh

{g cholem                         o                       go

og cholem with vav         ow                    go

g* qamets chatuf               aa                     gaw

g% qibbuts                         u                       goo

Wg shureq                         uw                    goo

g= shva                             ’ or nothing       g’ or g-

Transliteration Scheme for Greek:

The Greek alphabet:

Letter    Letter name     Transliteration  Pronunciation

A a    alpha                A a                   “ah” as in “father”

B b    beta                  B b                   “b” as in “boy”

G g    gamma             G g                   “g” as in “girl” (never as “g” in “gem”)

D d    delta                 D d                  “d” as in “dog”

E e    epsilon              E e                   “eh” as in “bed”

Z z    zeta                   Z z                   “z” as in “zebra”

H h    eta                    Ee ee                “ay” as in “day”

Q q    theta                 Th th                “th” as in “thin” (never as “th” in “this”)

I i     iota                    I i                     “ee” as in “bee”

K k    kappa                K k                  “k” as in “kite”

L l    lambda              L l                    “l” as in “light”

M m   mu                     M m                 “m” as in “me”

N n    nu                     N n                   “n” as in “night”

X x    xi                       X x                   “x” as in “box” (never as “x” in “xylophone”)

O o    omicron            O o                  “o” as in “hot”

P p    pi                      P p                   “p” as in “pig”

R r    rho                     R r                   “hr” as in “rhino”

S s "  sigma (stigma)  S s s                 “s” as in “sun”

T t    tau                    T t                    “t” as in “table”

U u    upsilon              U u                   “oo” as in “moon” (never as “uh” in “umbrella”)

F f    phi                    F f                    “f” as in “fish”

C c    chi                    Ch ch               “ch” as in “loch” (never as “ch” in “chat”)

Y y   psi                    Ps ps                “ps” as in “tops”

W w   omega              Oo oo              “o” as in “oboe”

Rough breathing            H h                   “h” as in “hurry”

Smooth breathing          (nothing)           (ignored)

In the Messiah's love,

Retrobyter