Rabbi Bension Kohen or haKohen (; born in

Djerba Djerba (; , ; ), also transliterated as Jerba or Jarbah, is a Tunisian island and the largest island of North Africa at , in the Gulf of Gabès, off the coast of Tunisia. Administratively, it is part of Medenine Governorate. The island h ...

Tunisia Tunisia, officially the Republic of Tunisia, is a country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It is bordered by Algeria to the west and southwest, Libya to the southeast, and the Mediterranean Sea to the north and east. Tunisia also shares m ...

, died 1999 in

Jerusalem Jerusalem is a city in the Southern Levant, on a plateau in the Judaean Mountains between the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean and the Dead Sea. It is one of the List of oldest continuously inhabited cities, oldest cities in the world, and ...

) was a writer of literature on

Hebrew grammar Hebrew (; ''ʿÎbrit'') is a Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic language family. A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages, it was natively spoken by the Israelites and remained in regular use as a first language until ...

and

literature Literature is any collection of Writing, written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially novels, Play (theatre), plays, and poetry, poems. It includes both print and Electroni ...

. He was the author of ''Sfath Emeth'', a work on the pronunciation of the

Hebrew alphabet The Hebrew alphabet (, ), known variously by scholars as the Ktav Ashuri, Jewish script, square script and block script, is a unicase, unicameral abjad script used in the writing of the Hebrew language and other Jewish languages, most notably ...

Lineage

In the introduction to his work, Kohen provides a purported lineage going back over a dozen generations of

kohanim Kohen (, ; , ، Arabic كاهن , Kahen) is the Hebrew word for "priest", used in reference to the Aaronic priesthood, also called Aaronites or Aaronides. They are traditionally believed, and halakhically required, to be of direct patriline ...

born at Djerba. Among his claimed patrilineal ancestors are Rabbi (d. 1848), himself an author of multiple works on Hebrew grammar. Citing a similar lineage table from ''Heritage of Yehoyada HaKohen'' (), Kohen claims to trace the family back to Yitzchak HaKohen the Elder, who had emigrated from Israel to Djerba at the Second Temple Destruction.

Sfath Emeth

Kohen's flagship work, the ''Sfath Emeth'', was first printed in Jerusalem in 1987. The work purports to present the "authentic" pronunciation of the 22 Hebrew letters based on

Geonic ''Geonim'' (; ; also Romanization of Hebrew, transliterated Gaonim, singular Gaon) were the presidents of the two great Talmudic Academies in Babylonia, Babylonian Talmudic Academies of Sura Academy , Sura and Pumbedita Academy , Pumbedita, in t ...

literature and the work of Hebrew grammarians such as Rav

Saadya Gaon Saʿadia ben Yosef Gaon (892–942) was a prominent rabbi, gaon, Jewish philosopher, and exegete who was active in the Abbasid Caliphate. Saadia is the first important rabbinic figure to write extensively in Judeo-Arabic. Known for his works o ...

, Rabbi Yitzhak ben Shlomo Yisraeli and the

Radak ''Cervera Bible'', David Kimhi's Grammar Treatise David Kimhi (, also Kimchi or Qimḥi) (1160–1235), also known by the Hebrew acronym as the RaDaK () (Rabbi David Kimhi), was a medieval rabbi, biblical commentator, philosopher, and grammarian ...

Table of pronunciation

Rabbi Kohen's research led him to produce a table of pronunciation. The table was published (with minor variations from what is listed below) on page 150 of ''Sfath Emeth'':

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kohen, Bension 20th-century Tunisian rabbis Kohanim writers of Rabbinic literature Year of birth uncertain Jewish grammarians Linguists of Hebrew Grammarians of Hebrew People from Djerba Jews and Judaism in Djerba Israeli Orthodox rabbis Tunisian emigrants to Israel 1999 deaths

Lineage

Sfath Emeth

Table of pronunciation

See also

References