3.11 Quiescent Aleph

Quiescent Aleph is silent. It is neither a consonant nor a vowel

• When you see an Aleph with no vowels, it is acting as a silent letter
• English has silent letters also, like the ‘p’ in receipt - the Quiescent Aleph works the same way
• In terms of syllabification, the Aleph is neither a vowel nor a consonant, so it doesn’t count at all - it is just an extra letter
• We often encounter Quiscent Alephs in verbs, so we will have much more to say about the Quiescent Aleph when we get to Unit III