small details. Much kabbalistic and mystical significance is also attached to it because of its gematria value as ten, which is an important number in Judaism, and its place in the name of God. Yiddish In Yiddish, the letter yod is used for several orthographic purposes in native words: Alone, a single yod י may represent the vowel or the consonant . When adjacent to another vowel, or another yod, may be distinguished from by the addition of a dot below. Thus the word Yidish 'Yiddish' is spelled ייִדיש. The first yod represents []; the second yod represents [] and is distinguished from the adjacent [] by a dot; the third yod represents [] as well, but no dot is necessary. The digraph יי, consisting of two yods, represents the diphthong []. A pair of yods with a horizontal line (pasekh) under them, ײַ, represents the diphthong [] in standard Yiddish. The digraph consisting of a vov followed by a yod, וי, represents the diphthong []. Loanwords from Hebrew or Aramaic in Yiddish are spelled as they are in their language of origin. Arabic yāʼ The letter is named (). It is written in several ways depending on its position in the word: It is pronounced in four ways: As a consonant, it is pronounced as a palatal approximant , typically at the beginnings of words in front of short or long vowels. A long usually in the middle or end of words. In this case it has no diacritic, but could be marked with a kasra in the preceding letter in some traditions. A long In many dialects, as a result of the monophthongization that the diphthong underwent in most words. A part of a diphthong, . Then, it has no diacritic but could be marked with a sukun in some traditions. The preceding consonant could have no diacritic or have sign, hinting to the first vowel in the diphthong, i.e. . As a vowel, yāʾ can serve as the "seat" of the hamza: Yāʾ serves several functions in the Arabic language. Yāʾ as a prefix is the marker for a singular imperfective verb, as in "he writes" from the root K-T-B ("write, writing"). Yāʾ with a shadda is particularly used to turn a noun into an adjective, called a nisbah (). For instance, (Egypt) → Miṣriyy (Egyptian). The transformation can be more abstract; for instance, mawḍūʿ (matter, object)