Yemenite Hebrew Language

Yemenite Hebrew has been extensively studied by scholars, many believing that Yemenite Hebrew contains the most ancient phonetic and grammatical features of Hebrew. This assessment was also stated by: Judaeo-Yemenite Studies - Proceedings of the Second International Congress, Ephraim Isaac & Yosef Tobi, Princeton University. Scholarly research suggests that Yemenite Hebrew is one of the closest forms of Hebrew to how it was spoken in ancient times. This is evidenced in part by the fact that Yemenite Hebrew preserves a separate sound for every consonant except for sāmeḵ (ס) and śīn (שׂ‎), which are both pronounced "s."  These consonant sounds had already merged in ancient times. The Yemenites have gained much praise in the Jewish community because of their strick application of laws of grammar, not compromising on their language.

While some scholars believe that the phonology on Yemenite Hebrew may have possibly been influenced by Yemeni Arabic, other scholors and rabbis, including Rabbi Yosf Qafih and Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook, hold the widely accepted view that Yemenite Hebrew was not influenced by Yemeni Arabic and that there is evidence that shows that this form of Hebrew more likely influenced Yemeni Arabic than the other way around. This Yemenite Arabic was also spoken by Yemenite Jews but is very distinct from the liturgical Hebrew and the conversational Hebrew of their communities. Among various other things, Rabbi Qafih notes that the Yemenite Jews spoke Arabic with a distinct Jewish flavor, inclusive of pronouncing many Arabic words with vowels foreign to the Arabic language, for example, the Qamats ( קָמַץ) and Tseri (צֵירִי‎). This can suggest that Yemenite Hebrew was not only uninfluenced by Arabic, but it influenced the pronunciation of Arabic by the Jews because of their unwavering stickness to Hebrew grammar and language.