Mazalogy · Hebrew letter reference in English
Yod: Hebrew letter forms and values
Identify Yod י, compare standard, ordinal and reduced-letter values, and check יהי in its cited Hebrew source.
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A repeated Yod must be counted twice
| Form | Character | Unicode code point | Unicode 17.0 name |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ordinary Yod | י | U+05D9 | HEBREW LETTER YOD |
Yod / Yud. Reading cue: y as a consonant; it also participates in vowel spelling.
Yod is the tenth letter and the last whose standard value equals its alphabet position. In a printed word it can be easy to overlook because its glyph is small. Compare י with the longer ו before copying a low-resolution image.
The source word יהי contains Yod, Heh and another Yod. Read both occurrences even though the same letter appears twice. The word’s repetition is part of its spelling, not a duplicate character for software to remove.
One letter, three explicit values
| Standard | Ordinal | Reduced letters |
|---|---|---|
| 10 | 10 | 1 |
Each Yod contributes 10 in standard and ordinal counting and 1 in the reduced-letter method. The two Yods in יהי therefore contribute 20, 20 and 2 before Heh is added. Removing a vowel point changes none of those contributions; removing a written Yod does.
יהי: let there be
Pointed source form: יְהִי · reading cue: yehi. Genesis 1:3 · Mechon Mamre.
This is the word immediately before אור in the verse. The example isolates that word rather than silently calculating the entire phrase.
| Reading position | Written letter | Base letter | Standard | Ordinal | Reduced letters |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | י | י | 10 | 10 | 1 |
| 2 | ה | ה | 5 | 5 | 5 |
| 3 | י | י | 10 | 10 | 1 |
| Word total | 25 | 25 | 7 | ||
Standard: 10 + 5 + 10 = 25 · Ordinal: 10 + 5 + 10 = 25 · Reduced letters: 1 + 5 + 1 = 7
Its group in the Gra version of Sefer Yetzirah
Yod י is among the twelve simple letters / elementals listed in Gra 5:1: הוזחטילנסעצק. Keep this textual classification distinct from the alphabet position and the arithmetic columns above.
Study the source in a guided introduction · Read about textual versions
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Sources, dates and conventions
Prepared by Mazalogy with AI assistance. Characters, source-word spellings and calculation rules were checked against the sources and the calculator on . Reading cues introduce the cited chart; pronunciation varies by community. Source attribution does not imply outside review or endorsement.
- Unicode 17.0 · Hebrew, section 9.1: direction, points and final forms
- Unicode 17.0 · NamesList: Hebrew character names and code points
- Chabad · The Hebrew Alphabet: letter chart, sounds and values
- GalEinai · Four Methods for Doing Gematria: distinguish counting conventions
- Sefer Yetzirah · Gra version 5:1, the twelve simple letters
- Mechon Mamre · Genesis 1:3, Hebrew text with JPS 1917 English
English reference edition. Numerical examples retain final forms and actual vowel letters while ignoring pronunciation marks. Final forms keep base-letter values in all three methods. Reduced letters are added without reducing the completed word total again.