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Root א־ל־ם: mute / silence

Roots Atlas 224 · שֹׁרֶשׁ א ל ם · the muteness root
א ל ם
' · l · m
everything to do with being mute, and the silence forced by force
4 words · 1 root · 0 verb-voices

This root has no living verb in everyday Hebrew; it speaks entirely through nouns and adjectives. At its centre is one image: being unable to speak. From it comes אֵלֶם, literary silence, and אִלֵּם, the person who is mute. Then a darker branch grows from the same letters: אַלִּים, violent, and אַלִּימוּת, violence, the force that silences. So one root holds both the one who cannot speak and the force that makes others fall silent. Every word below is verified against pealim, niqqud included.

No binyan is lexicalized for everyday use here; the root lives only as nouns and adjectives. That is itself fitting for a root about the absence of speech. The link from "mute" to "violent" runs through the idea of being silenced by force.

Words born from the root

Same root letters, different noun moulds (mishkalim). The mould tells you the function: who does it, the act of doing it, or the thing produced.

① The silence: unable to speak

אֵלֶם
elem
silence, speechlessness (literary)
אִלֵּם
ilem
mute, unable to speak
קִטֵּל

② The force: violence that silences

אַלִּים
alim
violent
קַטִּיל
אַלִּימוּת
alimut
violence

Decode it yourself

Strip the prefixes, suffixes and vowels. Three consonants remain, and the meaning lives there.