Reply To: Are you makpid on ע ?

Yes, I can assure you there is no J sound in Hebrew. It should be completely obvious that gimel and daleth with and without a dagesh have the same relationship as do the similar pairs: beth-bheth, kof-khof, pe-phe, and tau-thau. Their sounds cannot be completely different from each other. In each case the sound is essentially the same, but the dagesh-less form is softer and the dagesh form is harder. Thus Daleth without a dagesh is like a Greek delta, or like the consonant in “the”, “there”, and “though”. Or, as Yehuda Halevi wrote, like the sound of a bee buzzing.