This proposal replaces the proposal made to the June 2004 UTC meeting as document L2/04-193 (also available as http://qaya.org/academic/hebrew/Holam.pdf). In this much shorter proposal there is no longer a set of options for consideration, but a single recommendation to the UTC. A separate background document (*** in preparation ***) gives more details of the issues and options discussed during preparation of this proposal.

Background

The Hebrew point HOLAM combines in two different ways with the Hebrew letter VAV. In the first combination, known as Holam Male, the VAV is not pronounced as a consonant, and HOLAM and VAV together serve as the vowel associated with the preceding consonant. In the second combination, known as Vav Haluma, the HOLAM is the vowel of a consonantal VAV. In high quality typography Holam Male is distinguished from Vav Haluma: Holam Male is written with the HOLAM dot above the right side or above the centre of VAV; and Vav Haluma is written with HOLAM above the top left of VAV. The distinction is clear and significant in some texts, dating from the 10th century CE to the present day. In modern printing, the distinction is made in biblical and liturgical texts, in poetry, and in educational materials; indeed in general where it is important to indicate the exact pronunciation of words which may not be familiar to readers. See the samples in the figures below. But in less high quality typography Holam Male and Vav Haluma are not distinguished, and usually both rendered with the HOLAM dot above the centre of VAV. Holam Male is very common in pointed Hebrew texts; Vav Haluma is much less common, especially in modern Hebrew.

Note carefully that this is not a proposal to encode a phonetic distinction which is not made graphically. Rather, it is a proposal to encode a graphical distinction with a 1000 year history. This graphical distinction is made in a significant minority of modern texts, and it must be made when the phonetic distinction needs to be indicated unambiguously.

Unicode does not currently specify how to distinguish between Holam Male, Vav Haluma, and the undifferentiated combination. Several different ways have been used in existing texts, or recommended for use with Unicode Hebrew fonts. To avoid proliferation of ad hoc solutions, it is proposed here that the UTC specify representations for the three cases. UTC agreement is required because the proposed representation involves the use of ZWNJ (i.e. U+200C ZERO WIDTH NON-JOINER).

For further details, see the separate background document.

Proposal

There has been an extensive debate, including at the June 2004 UTC meeting, about how best to distinguish between Holam Male and Vav Haluma in Unicode. A large number of options have been put forward and evaluated; see the separate background document for a list of these proposals and an evaluation of each of them. A consensus has now been reached among a group of users of both biblical and modern Hebrew that the representation proposed here is the most likely to be generally acceptable, and on this basis it is hereby proposed to the UTC.

The proposal is that Vav Haluma should be represented as <VAV, ZWNJ, HOLAM>, whenever there is a potential need to distinguish it from Holam Male. Holam Male should continue to be represented, as in the majority of existing texts, as <VAV, HOLAM>, and this same sequence may be used for a combination of VAV with HOLAM when no distinction between Holam Male and Vav Haluma is intended.

A major reason for preferring this proposal to many other suggestions is that it is least disruptive of existing data. There is a considerable body of existing pointed Hebrew data in which Holam Male is represented as <VAV, HOLAM>, and it would cause considerable disruption to change the representation of this very common letter. In most of this current data Vav Haluma, when it occurs, is represented by the same sequence, but it is very much less common (a little over 1% of the frequency of Holam Male in the Hebrew Bible, probably even rarer in modern Hebrew) and so there is much less disruption in changing its representation. The use of a sequence with ZWNJ, a default ignorable character, rather than a new character also reduces the disruption, because a rendering system which does not recognise <VAV, ZWNJ, HOLAM> as a special sequence, e.g. when a font is applied which does not attempt to distinguish Vav Haluma from Holam Male, should fall back to treating it as identical to <VAV, HOLAM> and so to rendering the two forms identically.

This proposal is based on an understanding of Holam Male and Vav Haluma as respectively more and less connected renderings of the combination of VAV and HOLAM. Indeed Holam Male can be understood, and is implemented in many existing fonts, as a ligature between VAV and HOLAM in which the dot is placed in a different position from its normal one relative to the base character. Because Holam Male is much more common than Vav Haluma, this ligature is taken as the default, but the ligature formation may be inhibited by interpolating ZWNJ, to indicate that the combination is Vav Haluma, in which the HOLAM dot is placed in its regular position relative to the base character.

Nevertheless, there is a small issue with this proposed sequence. This use of ZWNJ is not strictly according to the definitions in The Unicode Standard version 4.0.0, in that ZWNJ is used within a combining charcater sequence, immediately after the base character. According to the (preliminary) minutes of the February 2004 UTC meeting (http://www.unicode.org/consortium/utc-minutes/UTC-098-200402.html) this restriction has been lifted at least partially:

[98-C33] Consensus: Allow U+200D ZERO WIDTH JOINER and U+200C ZERO WIDTH NON-JOINER in combining character sequences. The interpretation of a joiner or a nonjoiner between two combining marks is not yet defined.

The current proposal depends on this consensus in using ZWNJ within a combining character sequence, but not between two combining marks. However, if the UTC, despite its previous consensus, decides not to accept the current proposal because ZWNJ is used within a combining character sequence, an alternative representation is proposed for Vav Haluma in which ZWNJ and ZWJ are used only between combining character sequences: either <ZWNJ, VAV, HOLAM> or <VAV, HOLAM, ZWJ>. These alternatives fit less well with the typographic distinction, but they are still acceptable.

[*** Issues: Should we in fact offer such an alternative? I want to preempt the argument that because what we propose is unacceptable the only alternative is a new character. And can we agree that one alternative is better than the other? I prefer the former, but the latter was I think Mark S's suggestion. ***]

Samples

Figure 1: Holam Male (marked in red) and Vav Haluma (marked in blue) distinguished in ancient and modern editions of the Hebrew Bible - these words are from Genesis 4:13. (If the colours are not visible: In each image, the third base character from the right, with the dot above its right side or its centre, is Holam Male; the third base character from the left, with the dot above its left side, is Vav Haluma.)

Figure 2: Holam Male (left, twice, red, from p.529) and Vav Haluma (right, blue, from p.528) contrasted in Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament, vol.1, reprint by Hendrickson, 1996 (Hebrew words quoted in English text).

Figure 3: Holam Male (right Hebrew word, red) and Vav Haluma (left word, blue) contrasted in Langenscheidt's Pocket Hebrew Dictionary, p.243.

Figure 4: Holam Male (red) and Vav Haluma (blue) distinguished in modern editions of mediaeval Hebrew poetry and midrashic literature.

Figure 5: Holam Male (red) and Vav Haluma (blue) distinguished in modern editions of liturgical texts.