Re: Biblical Hebrew or Modern Hebrew?

David H scripsit:
> But memorizing words with the correct vowel points gets confusing (and
> takes more effort)! But I suppose I should learn them...Do most native
> Israeli speakers even know which words use which vowel points (without
> consulting a dictionary)?
Well, they learn to read and write using vowel points, which get dropped
fairly soon.  After all, they can already speak and understand Hebrew.
In prose, vowels are used for strategic disambiguation (maybe 1-3 per
page on average); in poetry, they're often used in full.

--
John Cowan  cowan@ccil.org  www.reutershealth.com  www.ccil.org/~cowan
Original line from The Warrior's Apprentice by Lois McMaster Bujold:
"Only on Barrayar would pulling a loaded needler start a stampede toward one."
English-to-Russian-to-English mangling thereof: "Only on Barrayar you risk to
lose support instead of finding it when you threat with the charged weapon."