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← Aleph               Bet               Gimel →
Phoenician	Hebrew	Aramaic	Syriac	Arabic
	ב		ܒ	ﺑ,ﺏ
Phonemic representation:				b
Position in alphabet:				2
Numerical (Gematria/Abjad) value:				2

Bet, Beth, or Vet is the second letter of many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician, Aramaic, Hebrew ב Syriac ܒ and Arabic alphabet bāʼ ﺏ. Its value is a voiced bilabial plosive, IPA /b/.

This letter's name means "house" in various Semitic languages (Hebrew: bayit, Arabic: bayt), and appears to derive from a Middle Bronze Age picture of a house by acrophony.

The Phoenician letter gave rise to the Greek Beta, Latin B, and Cyrillic Б, В.

Contents 1 Hebrew Bet / Vet 1.1 Variations on written form/pronunciation: 1.1.1 Bet with the dagesh 1.1.2 Bet without the dagesh (Vet) 1.2 Significance of ב, mystical and otherwise 2 Syriac Beth 3 Arabic bāʼ

Phoenician alphabet (1050 BCE–unknown)

𐤀    𐤁    𐤂    𐤃    𐤄    𐤅

𐤆    𐤇    𐤈    𐤉    𐤊    𐤋

𐤌    𐤍    𐤎    𐤏    𐤐

𐤑    𐤒    𐤓    𐤔    𐤕

Semitic abjads · Genealogy

Hebrew alphabet (1000 BCE–present)

א    ב    ג    ד    ה    ו

ז    ח    ט    י    כך

ל    מם    נן    ס    ע    פף

צץ    ק    ר    ש    ת

History · Transliteration Niqqud · Dagesh · Gematria Cantillation · Numeration

Syriac alphabet (200 BCE–present)

ܐ    ܒ    ܓ    ܕ    ܗ    ܘ

ܙ    ܚ    ܛ    ܝ    ܟܟ    ܠ

ܡܡ    ܢܢ    ܣ    ܥ    ܦ

ܨ    ܩ    ܪ    ܫ    ܬ

Arabic alphabet (400 CE–present)

ﺍ    ﺏ    ﺕ    ﺙ    ﺝ    ﺡ

ﺥ    ﺩ    ﺫ    ﺭ    ﺯ     س

ﺵ    ﺹ    ﺽ    ﻁ    ﻅ    ﻉ

ﻍ    ﻑ    ﻕ    ﻙ    ﻝ

ﻡ    ﻥ    ه‍    ﻭ    ﻱ

History · Transliteration Diacritics · Hamza ء Numerals · Numeration

v • d • e

The Hebrew letter represents two different phonemes: a "b" sound (/b/) (bet) and a "v" sound (/b/) (vet). The two are distinguished by a dot (called a dagesh) in the centre of the letter for /b/ and no dot for /v/.

This letter is named bet and vet, following the modern Israeli Hebrew pronunciation, bet and vet (/bɛjt/), in Israel and by most Jews familiar with Hebrew, although some non-Israeli Ashkenazi speakers pronounce it beis and veis (/bejs/), and some Jews pronounce it beth and veth (/beθ/). It is also named beth, following the Tiberian Hebrew pronunciation, in academic circles.

Main article: Hebrew phonology

Name	Symbol	IPA	Transliteration	Example
Vet	ב	/v/	v	vote
Bet	בּ	/b/	b	boat

When the Bet has a "dot" in its center, known as a dagesh, then it represents /b/. There are various rules in Hebrew grammar that stipulate when and why a dagesh is used.

When this letter appears as ב without the dagesh ("dot") in its center then it represents a voiced labiodental fricative: /v/.

Bet in gematria symbolizes the number 2.

As a prefix, the letter bet may function as a preposition meaning "in", "at", or "with".

Bet is the first letter of the Torah. As Bet is the number 2 in gematria, this is said to symbolize that there are two parts to Torah: the Written Torah and the Oral Torah.

Rashi points out that the letter is closed on three sides and open on one; this is to teach you that you may question about what happened after creation, but not what happened before it, or what is above the heavens or below the earth.

In set theory, the beth numbers stand for powers of infinite sets.

In the Syriac alphabet, the second letter is ܒ — Beth (ܒܝܬ). It is one of six letters that represents two associated sounds (the others are Gimel, Dalet, Kaph, Pe and Taw). When Beth has a hard pronunciation (qûššāyâ) it is a [b]. When Beth has a soft pronunciation (rûkkāḵâ) it is traditionally pronounced as a [v]. However, in eastern dialects, the soft Beth is more often pronounced as a [w], and can form diphthongs with its preceding vowel. Whether Beth should be pronounced as a hard or soft sound is generally determined by its context within a word. However, wherever it is traditionally geminate within a word, even in dialects that no longer distinguish double consonants, it is hard. In the West Syriac dialect, some speakers always pronounce Beth with its hard sound.

Beth, when attached to the beginning of a word, represents the preposition 'in, with, at'. As a numeral, the letter represents the number 2, and, using various systems of dashes above or below, can stand for 2,000 and 20,000.

The letter is named bāʼ, and is written is several ways depending in its position in the word:

Position
Isolated	Initial	Medial	Final
ب	بـ‍	ـبـ	ـب

Bāʼ-kasra (بِـ, /bi/) is used as a prefix in Arabic approximately meaning "with".