Since the alphabet was not perfectly adapted to the phoneme system and since phonological change has covered ancient phonology, the sound system cannot be reconstructed with certainty. The system below avoids some of the more fanciful reconstructions such as ejective/glottalized consonants, which can be safely excluded.
place manner |
labial | dental | palatal | velar | glottal |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| stop voiceless | p | t | k | ʔ | |
| pharyngealized | tˁ | q | |||
| voiced | b | d | g | ||
| fricative voiceless | s | x | h | ||
| voiced | z ~ ʣ | ɣ | |||
| affricate voiceless | ʦ | ʧ | |||
| nasal | m | n | |||
| liquid | l / r | ||||
| semivowel | j | w |
The Masoretic vowel system is the following:
| i / iː | u / uː | |
| eː | oː | |
| ɛ/ ɛː | ə | ɔ |
| a / aː |
There are said to be three vowel quantities: long, short and interrupted.
The Masoretic vocalization is, first of all, an instruction for pronunciation. It is improbable that it represents the phoneme system.