Do you think tears have the power to wash the pain away? Or alcohol will set me free? Maybe a knife is the key. Because I have tried to be strong fighting the pain on my own but today I can’t go on.
Attention! I made some mistakes on the original post due to how similar the vowel points look on the HTML editor, hopefully enough people will see this on my blog and see that I’ve fixed them. Sorry :(
As a part of thispost about beginning to learn a language, I’d decided to translate 300 basic words and phrases into Hebrew.
Note: all words will be written in defective spelling (ktiv haser) and with vowel points for ease of pronunciation
A hyphen (מָקָף) indicates the preposition / conjunction is immediately attached to the next word, and a dot underneath the hyphen is a dagesh, a bowel point indicating change in pronunciation of ב, כ, פ from the expected mid-word soft pronunciations (v, kh, f) to the hard ones (b, k ,p, respectively).
First Verbs
Verbs are given in their simplest form: 3rd person, male, past tense. modal verbs are exceptional in Hebrew, so they are given in their most common form.
be - no equivalent. The subject and the complement are simply put one after the other in the case of an adj. (which is conjugated according to number and gender), and connected with a 3rd person pronoun conjugated accordingly in case of a noun complement (הוּא/הִיא; הֵם/הֵן)
there is - יֵשׁ, past הָיה
have - יֵשׁ לְ־
(there is to subj.) past הָיָה לְ־
do - עָשָׂה
go - הָלַךְ
want - רָצָה
can - m יָכוֹל / f יְכוֹלָה
need - m צָרִיךְ / f צְרִיכָה
think - חָשַׁב
know - יָדַע
say - אָמַר, הֵגִיד
like - אָהַב (same as love)
speak - דִּבֶּר
learn - לָמַד
understand - הֵבִין
Conjunctions
that (as in “I think that…” or “the woman that…”) - ּשֶׁ־
(i think that…, the woman that… all tenses), הַ־ּ (the woman that… alternative to present tense)
and - וְ־
or - אוֹ
but - אֲבָל
because - in decreasing order of frequency - כִּי, בִּגְלַל שֶׁ־ּ, מִשֹּוּם שֶׁ־ּ, (מִ)כֵּיוָן שֶׁ־ּ, etc.
though -
in decreasing order of frequency - לַמְרוׁת שֶׁ־ּ, עַל אַף שֶׁ־ּ, אַף עַל פִּי שֶׁ־ּ, etc.
so (meaning “therefore”; e.g. “I wanted it, so I bought it”) - אַז, לָכֵן
if - אִם
Prepositions
When used with pronouns, Hebrew prepositions are always conjugated with a specific ending for each pronoun.
of - של
to - אֵל (direction), לְ־ (all other uses tbh)
from - מִ־ּ
in - ְבְּתוֹך (inside),
בְּ־
(in general)
at (a place) -
בְּ־
at (a time) -
בְּ־
with - עִם (with a noun), אֵת (with a pronoun, conjugated as ָאִתִּי, אִתְּך, etc.)
about - עַל
like (meaning “similar to”) - כְּמוֹ, כְּ־
for (warning, this one has several meanings that you need to take care of) - בִּשְׁבִיל (intended to)
before (also as a conjunction) - לִפְנֵי/לִפְנֵי
שֶׁ־ּ
after (also as a conjunction) - אַחֲרֵי/אַחֲרֵי
שֶׁ־ּ
during - תּוֹךְ כְּדֵי
bonus: direct obj. marker - אֵת (used with a defininte noun, conjugated ָאוֹתִי, אוֹתְך but אֶתְכֶם, אֵֶתְכֶן
Question Words
who - מִי
what - מָה
where - אֵיפֹה
when - מָתַי
why - לָמָּה
how - אֵיךְ
how much - כַּמָּה
which - אֵיזֶה
Adverbs
a lot - הַרְבֵּה
a little - קְצַת, מְעַט
well - טוֹב
badly - רַע
only - רָק
also - גַּם
very - מְאֹד
too (as in “too tall”) - מִדַּי (lit. (more) than enough)
too much - יוֹתֵר מִדַּי
so (as in “so tall”) - m כָּזֶה, f כָּזֹאת; or כָּל כַּךְ
so much - כָּל כַּךְ
הַרְבֵּה
more (know how to say “more … than …”) - יוֹתֵר
less (know how to say “less … than …”) - פַּחוֹת
than -
מִ־ּ
as … as … (e.g. “as tall as”) - … כְּמוֹ …
comparative (more, -er) -
יוֹתַר
superlative (most, -est) - הֲכִי
now - עַכְשָׁו, כָּעֵת
then - אַז
here - פֹּה, כָּאן
there - שָׁם
maybe - אוּלַי
always - תָּמִיד
usually - בְּדֶרֶךְ כְּלַל
often -
הַרְבֵּה, לְעִתִּים קְרוֹבוֹת
sometimes - לִפְעָמִים, מְדֵּי פַּעַם
never - אַף פַּעַם (used with neg. verb / copula)
today - הַיּוֹם
yesterday - אֱתְמוֹל
tomorrow - מַחַר
soon - תֵּכֶף
almostֹ - כִּמְעַט
already - כְּבָר
still - עָדַיִן
even - אַפִלּוּ, אַף, גַּם
enough - מַסְפִּיק
Adjectives
the, a (technically articles) - הַ־ּ, no indef. article
this - m הַזֶּה, f הַזֹּאת
that - m הַזֶּה, f הַזֹּאת or
m הָהוּא, f הָהִיא
good - טוֹב
bad - רַע
all - כָּל
הַ־ּ
some - כַּמָּה
no - שׁוּם
any - שׁוּם
many - הַרְבֵּה
few - קְצַת, מְעַט
most - רֹב
הַ־ּ
other - אַחֵר
same - m אוֹתוֹ
הַ־ּ
, f אוֹתָה
הַ־ּ
different - שׁוֹנֶה
enough - מַסְפִּיק
one - m אֶחָד, f אַחַת
two - m שְׁנַיִם, f שְׁתַּיִם
a few - כַּמָּה
first - רִאשׁוֹן
next - הַבַּא (in time), לְיַד, עַל יַד (both in place)
last (meaning “past”, e.g. “last Friday”) - שֶׁעָבַר, הַקּוֹדֵם
last (meaning “final”) - הָאַחֲרוֹן
easy - קָל
hard - קָשֶׁה
early - מֻקְדַם
late - מְאֻחָר
important - חָשׁוּב
interesting - מְעַנְיֵן
fun - כֵּיף, כֵּיפִי
boring - מְשַׁעֲמֵם
beautiful - יָפֵה
big - גָּדֹל
small - קָטַן
happy - שָׂמֵחַ
sad - עָצוּב
busy - עָסוּק
excited - מִתְרַגֵּשׁ, נִרְגָּשׁ
tired - עָיֵף
ready - מוּכָן
favorite - הָאָהוּב עַל …
new - חָדָשׁ
right (meaning “correct”) - (e.g. a right answer) נָכוֹן; (e.g. to have the right answer) צוֹדֵק
* There is no neuter gender (it), so inanimate nouns are referred to by the corresponding male or female third person pronouns and conjugations
** Many speakers these days make no distinction between male and female second and third person pronouns (you, they), so these conjugations are gradually becoming obsolete.
Nouns
Hebrew nouns come in two genders, masculine and feminine, however unlike many other languages, the definite article is identical for all genders and inflections, therefore it is not included.
everything - הַכֹּל
something - מָשֶׁהוּ
nothing - כְּלוּם
everyone - כֻּלָּם
someone - מִישֶׁהוּ
no one - אַף אֶחָד / אַחַת (used in negation)
(name of the language you’re studying) - עִבְרִית
English - אַנְגְּלִית
thing - דָּבָר
person - בֵּן אָדָם (lit. son of Adam)
place - מָקוֹם
time (as in “a long time”) - זְמַן
time (as in “I did it 3 times”) - פַּעַם
friend - חָבֵר
woman - אִשָּׁה
man - אִישׁ
money - כֶּסֶף
country - מְדִינָה
(name of your home country) - ישְׂרָאֵל
city - עִיר
language - שָׂפָה, לָשׁוֹן
word - מִלָּה
food - אֹכֶל
house - בַּיִת
store - חָנוּת
office - מִשְׂרַד
company - חֵבְרָה
manager - מְנָהֵל
coworker - קוֹלֶגָה
job - עֲבֹדָה
work (as in “I have a lot of work to do”) -
עֲבֹדָה
problem - בַּעֲיָה
question - שֶׁאֱלָה
idea - רַעֲיוֹן
life - חַיִּים
world - עוֹלָם
day - יוֹם
year - שָׁנָה
week - שָׁבוּעַ
month - חֹדֶשׁ
hour - שָׁעָה
mother, father, parent - אֵם, אַב, הוֹרֶה/הוֹרָה
daughter, son, child - בַּת, בֵּן, יֶלֶד/יָלְדָה
wife, husband - אִשָּׁה, בַּעַל
girlfriend, boyfriend - חָבֵרָה, חָבֵר
More Verbs
work (as in a person working) - עָבַד
work (meaning “to function”, e.g. “the TV works”) - עָבַד
see - רָאָה
use - הִשְֹתַּמּשׁ
should - הָיָה צָרִיךְ
believe - הֶאֱמִין
practice - הִתְאַמֵּן (practice a skill), פָּעַל (practice one’s beliefs)
seem - נִרְאָה, נִדְמָה
come - בָּא
leave - עָזַב
return - חָזַר
give - נָתַן
take - לָקַח
bring - הֵבִיא
look for - חִפֵּשׂ
find - מָצַא
get (meaning “obtain”) - הֵשׂיג
receive - קִבֵּל
buy - קָנָה
try - נִסָּה
start - הִתְחִיל
stop (doing something) - הִפְסִיק
finish - סִיֵּם, גָּמַר
continue - הִמְשִׁיךְ
wake up - הִתְעוֹרֵר
get up - קָם
eat - אָכַל
happen - קָרָה
feel - הִרְגִּישׁ
create (aka “make”) - יָצַר, עָשָׂה
cause (aka “make”) - גָּרַם
לְ־
meet (meeting someone for the first time) - פָּגַשׁ, נִפְגַּשׁ
meet (meaning “to bump into”) - פָּגַשׁ
meet (an arranged meeting) - נִפְגַּשׁ
ask (a question) - שָׁאַל
ask for (aka “request”) - בִּקֵּשׁ
wonder - תָּהָה
reply - הֵגִיב
mean - אָמַר
read - קָרַא
write - כָּתַב
listen - הִקְשִׁיב
hear - שָׁמַע
remember - זָכַר
forget - שָׁכַח
choose - בָּחַר
decide - הִחְלִיט / הֶחֱלִיט
be born - נוֹלַד
die - מֵת
kill - הָרַג
live - חַי
stay - נִשְׁאַר
change - שִׁנָּה (for someone to change something), הִשְׁתָּנָּה (for something to change itself)
help - עָזַר
send - שָׁלַח
study - לָמַד
improve - שִׁפֵּר (for someone to improve something), הִשְׁתַּפֵּר (for somthing to improve itself)
hope - קִוָּה
care - הָיָה
לְ־ אִכְפַּת (word or word, there-was to-subj. care)
Phrases
hello - שָׁלוֹם
goodbye - שָׁלוֹם / לְהִתְרָאוֹת
thank you - תּוֹדָה
you’re welcome - אֵין בְּעַד מָה, עַל לֹא דָּבָר
excuse me (to get someone’s attention) - סְלִיחָה
sorry
- סְלִיחָה
it’s fine (response to an apology) - זֶה בְּסֶדֶר
please - בְּבַקָּשָׁה
yes - כֵּן
no - לֹא
okay - אוֹקֵיִי, בְּסֶדֶר, סַּבָּבָּה (slang)
My name is _____ - קוֹרְאִים לִי _____
What’s your name? אֵיךְ קוֹרְאִים לְךָ/לָךְ?
Nice to meet you. - נָעִים לְהַכִּיר
How are you? - מָה שְׁלוֹמְךָ/שְׂלוֹמֶךְ?, מָה קוֹרֶה?
I’m doing well, how about you? אֲנִי בְּסֶדַר, מָה אִתְּךָ/אִתָּך?
Could you repeat that? אַתָּה/אַתְּ יָכוֹל/יְכוֹלָה לַחְזֹר עַל זֶה?.
Could you speak more slowly, please? אַתָּה/אַתְּ יָכוֹל/יְכוֹלָה לְדַבֶּר יוֹתֵר לְאַט?
Well (as in “well, I think…”) - not really one word as in English. טוֹב can be said, but oftentimes simple filler sounds are used (אֶמממ, אֶההה, etc.)
Really? - בֶּאֱמֶת?
I guess that … - -אֲנִי מֵנִיחַ/מְנִיחָה שֶׁ.
* It’s hot. (talking about the weather) - חַם.
* It’s cold. (talking about the weather) - קַר.
* As these are one word sentences, they’re rarely said as is, usually coupled with a preposition indicating who or what is cold. (E.g. I’m cold - קַר לִי; It’s cold outside - קַר בָּחוּץ
In order to learn a language, the very first thing you need to know is reading it. This is a basic step in all language studies. Hopefully you’ll start conquering that by the end of this lesson :)
The Hebrew alphabet… isn’t an alphabet. Technically speaking, it’s an “‘abjad” (an acronym of the first four letters of the Arabic ‘abjad), although it is commonly called an alphabet (as I’ll continue calling it for simplicity’s sake). Characteristic of Semitic languages (to which Hebrew belongs, among Arabic and many others, extinct and alive), the ‘abjad’s main characteristic is (almost) complete lack of vowels. Every letter stands for a consonant, and vowels are simply omitted. It’s equivalent to writing English “lk ths.”
While using an ‘abjad-like system with English is quite hellish, the case for Hebrew is quite different. Due to its relatively simple vowel system and unique Semitic grammar and morphology (how words are formed and act in a sentence), using an ‘abjad is actually quite a reasonable choice for Hebrew. Oversimplifying, Hebrew words are comprised of a root and a template, each contribute meaning to the final word. The root is comprised of (usually three) consonants, and the template describes the vowels, prefixes and suffixes you insert between and around the consonants.
The Letters
The Hebrew alphabet, called הָאַלֶף־בֵּית/אָלֶפְבֵּית הָעִבְרִי ha’álef-bét ha’ivrí, is comprised of 22 letters.
The first, most important fact is that Hebrew is read from right to left.
Note: the names aren’t all that important to learning the letters. Simply learning their pronunciation is enough at this point.
Five of the letters, for historical reasons, have two different forms - a word-initial and -medial form, and a separate final form. These are marked with a 1 on the table.
As you might have noticed, some letters have multiple pronunciations, and some of these overlap with one another. This was caused by many changes that happened to the language’s phonology over the years since the alphabet was created (some 3,000 years ago in its earliest forms).
The most notable of these letters are the בֶּגֶ״ד כֶּפֶ״ת* béged kéfet letters, marked with a 2. These days, for historical reasons**, only three letters actually change their pronunciation depending on their position in a word–ב bet, כ kaf, פ pe–and they are the only ones marked on the list, pronounced as /b~v/, /k~kh/, /p~f/, respectively. Generally speaking, for native words, at the beginning of a word and directly after a consonant (with no vowel in-between), they are pronounced with their ‘hard’ pronunciation (/b/ /k/ /p/), and in all other positions with their ‘soft’ pronunciation (/v/ /kh/ /f/). Loanwords do not follow these rules, and are pronounced as they are in the original language.
*Acronyms and initialisms, as well as Hebrew letter names and numerals, are marked by the Hebrew punctuation mark ״, called גֵּרְשַׁיִם gershayim, and placed before the last letter of the phrase. It is similar looking to the Latin quotation mark, and is often confused with it even by native speakers, but nonetheless different.
**You might have noticed that ‘historically’, ‘for historical reasons’, etc. are somewhat a trend in this lesson. Hebrew is an incredibly old language, about 5,000 years old in fact, riddled with old tales and tradition. During that period it changed a lot, it even died for 2,000 years and came back to haunt us in the last 150. Despite this, the Hebrew writing system as we know it today was tailored (albeit not perfectly) for Hebrew as it was spoken some 2,500 years ago, and remained relatively unchanged during that whole period. Therefore, there are a lot of peculiarities in the Hebrew alphabet that we simply do not have time to cover, stemming from the complicated history of the language.
There are also a handful of letters which, for historical reasons, are still pronounced the same.
אalef + ע áyin (+ הhe) = ‘ (glottal stop) or none (ה he only as none)
soft בbet + וvav = /v/
חchet + soft כkaf = /ch/*
טtet + תtav = /t/
hard כkaf + ק qof = /k/*
סsámekh + שׂsin = /s/
*I still transcribe hard כ kaf and ק qof, as well asח chet and soft כ kaf
differently
(/k/ vs /q/, /ch/ vs /kh/)
because, well, it’s easier than the other homophones.
To form a word, simply string together letters - the vowels magically appear in your head!
ספר (séfer) - book
ספר (sapár) - barber, hairdresser
ספר (sipér) - (he) told, (he) cut hair
ספר (supár) - (passive of above verb)
ספר (sper) - spare (English loanword)
…Yeah, that’s easier said than done.
See, in general with the ‘abjad system, all words pronounced with the same consonants are written exactly the same, which can create a heck of a lot of homographs, words written the same but pronounced differently. This problem has been cleverly solved using אִמּוֹת קְרִיאָה - ‘imót kri’á (literally mothers of reading). These are letters in Hebrew that serve a double function as a consonant and a vowel, marked with a 3 on the table. Noticed the letters ו vav and י yod have multiple pronunciations?
In many words, vowels (especially /i/, /o/ and /u/) are marked using one of these letters to reduce the number of homographs. For example, the words listed earlier are usually written:
ספר (séfer) - book
ספר (sapár) - barber, hairdresser
סיפר (sipér) - (he) told, (he) cut hair
סופר (supár) - (passive of above verb)
ספייר (sper) - spare (English loanword)
These letters can be conveniently memorized using the acronym אֶהֶוִ״י ‘eheví.
Interestingly enough, Yiddish, written with the same 22 letters, uses these letters (and some more) to create a full alphabet, where each and every vowel in a word is written, as well as the consonants. But we aren’t learning Yiddish here.
Learning when and where to put ‘imót kri’á comes with time, as it is often up to the reader where to put them. The style of writing I’ll beteaching with is called כְּתִיב חֲסֵר ktiv chasér, or ‘lacking spelling,’ where the bare minimum of ‘imót kri’á are used, and all vowels are indicated using vowel points, נִקּוּד niqúd, explained in the next section. This style is often used in children’s books and Biblical inscriptions; ktiv chasér is historically the only way Hebrew was written. This is in opposition to כְּתִיב מָלֵא ktiv malé, ‘full spelling,’ where ‘imót kri’á are used and vowel points aren’t; this is the style of writing virtually every modern Hebrew text is written in.
This might seem all confusing at this point, but let me assure you it isn’t. Once you wrap your head around it and start reading more and more of the language, you just instinctively know how a word is read off the bat. Context is usually more than enough to settle any ambiguities in how to read a word.
Vowel Points
Vowel points, נִקּוּד niqúd, are the diacritics used in Hebrew to indicate the vowels of a word, to complement the ambiguous ‘abjad system. These are the little dots and lines around each letter in previous examples.
Hebrew has five vowels: /a/ /e/ /i/ /o/ /u/ - pronounced almost identically to those in Spanish and Greek, to name a few. However, it has 13 different vowel points. Historically, and still in some traditional readings of the Bible, each mark had a different pronunciation, but in Modern Hebrew a lot of them merged with one another.
The final form of מ mem, ם, is used as a placeholder here.
Make no mistake, the two vowels marked with an asterisk are in fact the same vowel. For now, know that in most cases it is pronounces as /a/. The /o/ pronunciation is rare, only in certain templates of words, and distinguishing between them is out of the scope of this lesson. For now, the only common word that uses the /o/ pronunciation is כָּל kol, meaning ‘all’.
Short and long vowels are only traditional nomenclature - in practice, all vowels in each row are pronounced with the same length. תְּנוּעוֹת חֲטוּפוֹת tnu’ót chatufót are stlightly different, but nonetheless pronounced the same. Note that the some long vowels use ‘imót kri’á intrinsically.
דָּגֶשׁ Dagésh:
The point on the bottom left, the דָּגֶשׁ dagésh, is an interesting topic. However, the only relevant point to this lesson is that it distinguishes between hard (with dagesh) and soft (without) pronunciations of בֶּגֶ״ד כֶּפֶ״ת béged kéfet letters.
שְׁוָא Shva:
There are two types of shva: נַע na’ ‘moving’ - indicating an /e/, and נַח nach ‘still’ - indicating no vowel. Distinguishing between them is way out of the scope of this lesson, so for now the only way to tell them apart is through experience and transliterations.
שִׁי״ן Shin Points:
You might have noticed the rogue ש shin at the bottom of the table there. ש shin is different to other letters with double pronunciations, as it had always had two different pronunciations. Therefore, it got a different point to distinguish between the two: a dot on the right spoke of the ש shin indicates the common /sh/ pronunciation - שׁ, and a dot on the left spoke indicates the rarer /s/ pronunciation - שׂ. Each pronunciation is subsequently called שִׁי״ן יְמַנִית shin yemanít ‘right שִׁי״ן’ and
שִׁי״ן שְֹמָאלִית shin smalít ‘left שִׁי״ן’.
All word-final letters have no vowel, unless marked otherwise. Most letters cannot even take a vowel mark at the end of a word. Exceptionally, ה he, ח chet, final ך kaf, ע áyin, ת tav, in certain circumstances do take vowel marks.
ש shin must always have either a left or a right point, but no other vowel mark.
Practice!
Try reading these basic Hebrew words, then look at the answer key at the end to see if you were right.
I have suffered greatly, but I bring you my overview. Since this was about phrases, I’m going to structure it differently - and go over the phrases one by one.
Greetings
The simplest way to say hello is שלום - pronounced “shalom,” it literally means peace (insert ”in Hebrew we don’t say “hello” we say “peace” and I think that’s beautiful” joke here, there’s a lot of that in Hebrew). My fellow Jewish ppl (and… most people with half a decent amount of cultural literacy) will recognize the word from the common Saturday greeting שבת שלום (Shabbat Shalom)
You can, of course, greet with the time of day, as you can in English. These follow a fairly easy-to-follow format: X tov, where X is the time of day
בוקר טוב means “good morning” and it’s pronounced “boker tov”
ערב טוב means “good evening” and it’s pronounced “erev tov” (this is easy to remember if you’re Jewish/converting!!! Lots of things use the word ערב)
לילה טוב means “good night” and it’s pronounced “lyla tov”
I’m putting “welcome” here because it is often used as a form of greeting. Welcome in Hebrew is a fucking cluster fuck from hell without proper instruction and I cried a lot.
There are four forms of Welcome. I’m sure this is common for most things, but usually in Duolingo we aren’t introduced to all of them at once I cried
These all mean literally something along the lines of “blessing is the one who comes” which is nice and almost makes up for Duolingo’s bad form in teaching this
Singular Masculine form of welcome - so you are addressing one (1) man/person who wishes to be addressed in the masculine form - is ברוך הבא, pronounced “baruch haba”.
Singular Feminine form of welcome - so you are addressing one (1) woman/person who wishes to be addressed in the feminine form - is ברוכה הבאה, pronounced “barucha haba’a”
Masculine Plural form of welcome - also used for addressing a mixed gender group of people, or when no one in particular is being addressed, is ברוכים הבאים, pronounced “bruchim haba’im”
Feminine Plural form of welcome is ברוכות הבאות, pronounced “bruchot haba’ot”
Goodbye is the same word as for “see you later” and it’s להתראות, pronounced “lehitra’ot”
Pleasantries
There are many ways to say “how are you”. I thought I was confused by the many ways to say this. I had not yet realized how bad “welcome” would be, and thus, I now find “how are you” to be a piece of cake. I’m sure I’ll say the same about welcome in the future but right now I’m really bitter.
The formal way of saying how are you literally means “what is your peace”. It is spelled מה שלומך and is pronounced one of two ways - “mah shlomcha” when addressing a masculine individual and “mah shlomeych” when addressing a feminine individual
An informal way of saying how are you literally means “what is heard” and is spelled מה נשמע and is pronounced “ma nishma”
A way of informally saying how are you or something like “what’s happening” or “what’s up” is מה קורה (which literally means what’s happening) and is pronounced “ma korey”
We learned words for “good” (טוב) “bad” (רע)and “sad” (עצוב) already, which could be used in combination with אני (”I”) to answer that question. Now we’ve learned בסדר, pronounced b’seder, which means fine. It literally means “in order,” aka everything is in order/nothing is wrong, which is really neat because I know the word סדר from Judaism, obviously.
Maybe is אולי, pronounced “oolay”. Idk where else to put it so it’s going here.
You also can ask “are you okay” with אתה or אה and בסדר - so אתה בסדר and variations thereupon means “are you okay”
This is apparently rarely used even though Duolingo taught it
Most people use הכל בסדר which means “everything alright” which can be both a statement and a question
Please (and also… you’re welcome? sometimes?) is בבקשה and pronounced “bevakasha”
You’re welcome is אין בעד מה and is pronounced “eyn ba’d ma” - it probably literally means something along the lines of “it was nothing”
Thank you/Thanks is תודה and it’s pronounced “todah”. To say “thank you very much,” you say תודה רבה - pronounced “todah rabah”. רבה literally means “great” which is cool to learn cause it’s used in a lot of Jewish things (like Hoshanah Rabah).
Sorry/excuse me (a word, I’m told, which is rarely said in Israel) is סליחה, pronounced slicha
To say good luck, you literally say בהצלחה - which means “(may you go) in/with success” and is pronounced behatslacha
To say congratulations, you say מזל טוב. It is not pronounced MAzel tov. It is pronounced maZAL tov. This is Hebrew, not Yiddish. Fun fact, it also means “you’ve had good luck!” in literal translation.
Have fun/Enjoy comes in three forms, to torture me, specifically.
תהני, pronounced “tehani”, singular feminine
תהנו, pronounced “tehanu”, plural
תהנה, pronounced “tehane”, singular masculine
There are two ways to say “bon appetit/enjoy your meal”
בתאבון is pronounced “beteavon”
בתיאבון is pronounced “beteavon”
Apparently you can use either and how you spell it depends on preference
Introductions
To say “my name is”, you say קוראים לי (pronounced korim li) followed by your name. So, I would say קוראים לי מהח (I think that’s how I’d transliterate my name. Ironic that the pronunciation is actually clearer in Hebrew letters than in English ones since my name is Scottish and has a “ch” in it that no one uses…). Literally it means something like “call me [name]”.
You can also say, apparently, [name]השם שלי הוא, according to some of the exercises, which literally means “The name of me is X”. It is very disconcerting that it uses one of the words for G-d, HaShem. I know HaShem means the name, but like, it seems to really just be used to mean G-d. You’d pronounce it “hashem sheli hoo”.
To speak/speaks is מדבר for singular masculine, pronounced “medaber”. For feminine, it’s מדברת, pronounced “medaberat”.As you do.
English is אנגלית, pronounced “anglit”, and Hebrew is עברית, pronounced “ivrit”
So, for me to say I speak English, I’d say אני מדברת אנגלית. For me to say I don’t speak Hebrew, I’d say אני לא מדברת עברית
And that’s all of it. Phew. I get that Duolingo tries to mimic immersion which is widely considered to be the best form of language learning, but I really need like, rules, and explanations, just occasionally. Geez. @jewishamericanbatmelech I look forward to any insight you have about any of this because Suffering.
I bet you’ve been dying to know about verbs ever since last lesson you learned about sentence structure. Well - Here it comes!
Verbs are arguably the most important part of speech in a spoken language. They convey the core meaning of a sentence and in many cases simply knowing the verb is enough to know the meaning of a sentence. Therefore I found it fitting to teach them at such an early stage of this series - now!
Hebrew verbs are generally made of two components: a root (שֹׁרֶשׁ shóresh) and a stem (בִּנְיָן binyán - literally meaning ‘building’). The root contributes the consonants and the stem contributes the vowels (along with its intrinsic prefixes), both make up the full word. Think about it like this: the verb ‘meet’ has its consonants (m-t) and its vowels (ee), both make up the verb. Of course, in English it works nothing like that, but that is the basic morphology of Hebrew verbs: the verb פָּגַשׁ pagásh ‘he met’ has its conosnants פגשׁ and its vowels םָםַם.
Unlike English, where any word can just be put in the middle of a sentence and suddenly become a verb, all Hebrew verbs have to be comprised of a verb and a root. New roots can be coined from loanwords (this is done quite a lot these days), but it always has to be the root that is coined and inserted into an existing stem.
Each verb can be thought of as a plant of sorts. With a consonant root, a vowel stem, and leaves. The leaves, of course, are the different conjugations applied to it - person, number, tense and more (there are not called leaves though!!! that’s just weird). However unlike an actual plant, different leaves can be applied that change the overall pronunciation (which can be thought of as the shape of the plant)
Roots
Roots provide the core meaning to any word in Hebrew. Native roots are almost always comprised of three consonants, with some rare native verbs comprised of four. For example: the root שׁ־מ־ר sh-m-r carries the meaning ‘to keep, to save,’ the root א־כ־ל ‘-k-l carries the meaning ‘to eat’ and the root מ־ל־ח m-l-ch carries the meaning ‘salt.’ Combining them with different verb and noun stems creates different words, whose meanings all relate to the meaning of the original root:
שׁ־מ־ר - to keep, to save:שָׁמַרshamár ‘to save, to keep,’ שִׁמֵּרshimér ‘to conserve,’ שׁוֹמֵרshomér ‘guard’, etc. א־כ־ל - to eat:אָכַל‘akhál ‘to eat,’ אִכֵּל ‘ikél ‘to corrode,’ אֹכֶל ‘ókhel ‘food’, etc. מ־ל־ח - salt:מֶלַח mélach ‘salt,’ מָלוּחַmalúach ‘salty,’ הִמְלִיחַhimlíach ‘to salt (food),’ etc.
Side note: roots can be written in a number of ways. Using hyphens or maqafím (Hebrew hyphens; פ-ע-ל or פ־ע־ל), gersháyim (פע״ל), periods (פ.ע.ל) or even square root signs (√פעל). I prefer hyphens and maqafim.
A term that’ll come up frequently (that I think I just made up) is radical letter (from Latin radix, meaning‘root’). By saying that I refer to the letter of the root as they’re pronounced in the word. In the root פ־ע־לp-’-l, פ is the 1st radical, ע the 2nd and ל Is the 3rd radical letter. In the word נִפְעַלְנוּ each letter פ, ע, ל will be referred to as the 1st, 2nd and 3rd radical letter in the word respectively. For each root, they do not appear in a different order no matter how you manipulate them. The root ח־ט־ב ch-t-b (‘to log/cut trees’) is fundamentally different to the root ח־ב־ט ch-b-t (‘to hit’), for example.
Some roots have irregular conjugations, depending on the consonants they have. Each irregular conjugates differently under each stem, and you will learn more about that later on. Other than that, roots are pretty straightforward. Stems are where things get interesting.
Stems
Hebrew has seven verb stems. They’re named by inserting the root פ־ע־לp-’-l, meaning ‘verb’ or ‘action’ into the most basic conjugation of the stem - 3rd person, masculine, singular, past tense. The stems are:
- פָּעַלpa’ál (also called קַלqal) - נִפְעַלnif’ál
- הִפְעִילhif’íl - הֻפְעַלhuf’ál
- פִּעֵל pi’él - פֻּעַלpu’ál - הִתְפַּעֵלhitpa’él
The stems are divided in groups of two (and one of three), where each has an active stem and a passive stem.
I’ll be teaching more about each stem in upcoming lessons. This lesson I’ll be concentrating on the first two: פָּעַל pa’ál & נִפְעַל nif’ál. These are the two most basic stems.
פָּעַל is the simplest and most common stem in the language. Verbs of this stem generally have only a basic meaning directly related to the meaning of the root. for example: שָׁמַר shamár ‘to save, to keep,’ אָכַל ‘akhál ‘to eat.’
נִפְעַל is generally considered its passive counterpart. For most פָּעַל active verbs, there is a נִפְעַל passive counterpart: נִשְׁמַר nishmár ‘to be saved, to be kept,’ נֶאֱכַל ne’ekhál ‘to be eaten.’ However, contrary to other passive stems, not all נִפְעַל verbs are passive. For example, the verb סָגַר sagár means ‘to close (a door),’ and its passive counterpart is נִסְגַּר nisgár ‘(for a door) to be closed.’ However, the same verb נִסְגַּר nisgár also means ‘to close,’ as in “the door is closing,” without stating whether someone closed it, or it closed by itself. To put it differently: נִפְעַל has a double role, as a passive verb stem (describing a subject who is being acted upon), and as a stative verb stem (describing a state the subject is in).
Other examples are:
שָׂרַףsaráf ‘to burn’ - נִשְׂרַףnisráf ‘to be burnt’ or ‘to be burning’ רָאָה ra’á‘to see’ - נִרְאָהnir’á ‘to be seen’ or ‘to seem’ צָפָה tsafá ‘to watch’ - נִצְפָּהnitspá ‘to be watched’
Another different nuance נִפְעַל has is to describe some sort of process, usually changes in position. For instance, you would use שָׁכַב shakháv to describe someone who is already lying on a bed, whereas you would use נִשְׁכַּב nishkáv to describe someone in the process of lying down onto a bed. Other examples are:
עָמַד ‘amád ‘to stand’ - נֶעֱמַדne’emád ‘to stand up / be standing up’ שָׁפַךְshafákh ‘to pour’ - נִשְׁפַּךְnishpákh ‘to be poured’ or ‘to pour in/out’ (“The water poured out of the bottle.”) שָׁבַרshavár ‘to break’ - נִשְׁבַּרnishbár ‘to be broken (by someone)’ or ‘to break’ (“My arm broke.”)
Generally, the one aspect in common with all נִפְעַל verbs is that none of them can take direct objects; but that’s about it.
Now let’s talk conjugations!
There are only three tenses–past, present and future–and constructions such as perfect and progressive tenses simply don’t exist.
The most important part to about conjugating Hebrew verbs is knowing their tense. As you know, verbs are always conjugated according to person, number, gender and tense. Within each tense the conjugations share many similarities, however between the tenses the patterns vary considerably.
Past Tense
Past tense conjugations are characterized by suffixes. For each person-gender-number combination a unique suffix is added which encodes information for all three of these. They are as following:
Before I begin explaining, I need to say one more thing. When talking about verb conjugations, syllable stress plays a big role in pronunciation, as you will see in the next paragraphs. Stress in Hebrew words classically falls in one of two places: the ultimate (last) syllable, or the penultimate (second-to-last) syllable. Colloquially, it can fall on other syllables, especially in proper names and loanwords, but this is technically incorrect.
The first three rows are very simple - just add the corresponding suffix to the basic verb form, and that’s it. שָׂרַף > שָׂרַפְתִּי saráf > saráfti (‘burn’), נִשְׁבַּר > נִשְׁבַּרְתְּ nishbár > nishbárt (‘break’).
The fourth row, 2nd person plural, marked with a 1, works similarly, yet there are some notable differences. The stress moves to the last syllable (the suffix), instead of staying on the 2nd radical letter, as with other conjugations. As a consequence, the 1st radical letter in the פָּעַל stem gets reduced to a shva (the null vowel point): שָׂרַף > שְׂרָפְתֶּם saráf > sraftém. As with the copula you learned last lesson, informally it is pronounced as if it was like the first three rows: שָׂרַף > שָׂרַפְתֶּם saráf > saráftem.
The double pronunciation situation going on with these (in the formal pronunciation) is because some clusters are easily producible while others aren’t. When the first letter can be easily clustered it is pronounced with a null vowel, when it isn’t it is pronounced with an /e/ (rarely as /a/). For example: שָׁמַר > שְׁמַרְתֶּם shamár > shmartém; but מָרַח < מְרַחְתֶּם marách > merachtém (‘smear, lather’), and עָרַך > עֲרַכְתֶּם ‘arákh > ‘arakhtém (‘set (a table); edit’).
The last two rows are a bit more complicated. Instead of being pronounced with the stress still on the 2nd radical letter, it also moves to the suffix. However, here it is the 2nd radical that gets reduced to a shva. שָׂרַף > שָׂרְפָה saráf > sarfá, נִשְׁבַּר > נִשְׁבְּרוּ nishbár > nishberá. Consonant clusters of more than 2 consonants aren’t possible, so the shva in the נִפְעַל conjugation is pronounced as a /e/ instead of as no vowel.
You might’ve noticed the last rows, marked with a 2, have that pesky double pronunciation going on. This is because פ־ע־לp-’-l is an irregular root.
As I’ve said earlier, roots are irregular depending on their letters. In פ־ע־ל, the ע is the irregular. It is part of the guttural letters, called so because they’re classically pronounced deep in the throat (guttur in Latin). These letters are א, ה, ח, ר, ע, contracted as הָאָ״ח רַ״ע / רֵ״עַ (ha’ách ra’ ‘the brother is bad’ or ha’ách réa’ ‘hooray, a friend’). Three of these letters–א, ע, ה–cannot take a null shva (שְׁוָא נַח), simply because it is hard to pronounce. (The other two can, but also give rise to some problems in other instances.) Therefore they are usually pronounced with a dummy vowel inserted, depending on the surrounding vowels. This dummy vowel is usually notated as a tnu’á hatufá (סֱ סֲ סֳ) - hence the complicated origin I didn’t explain in the 1st lesson!
The right pronunciation, not marked with the 2, is the general case. The left one is the specific pronunciation with the gutturals.
Future Tense
While the past tense is characterized by suffixes, the future tense is characterized by prefixes, sometimes combined with suffixes. These prefixes are always one of four letters: א, י, ת,נ - contracted as אֵיתָ״ןeytán. It is fairly simple, and goes as following:
The variation between /o/ and /a/ is weird and really only depends on the verb. The only way to know which it is is to memorize: it’s תֹּאכַל tokhal (‘she will eat’) and תִּפְתַּח tiftach (‘she will open’), but תִּשְׁבֹּר tishbor (‘she will break’) and תִּשְׂרֹף tisrof (‘she will burn’).
As you can see, the characteristic נ prefix of the נִפְעַל stem is gone in the future conjugations. This is because it underwent full assimilation into the following consonant (effectively it melted into the following consonant): יִנְשָׁבֵר > יִשְׁשָׁבֵר > יִשָּׁבֵר yinshavér > yisshavér > yishavér. The dagesh in the 1st radical letter signifies that assimilation, as will be explained in a future lesson. An important consequence of this is that any בג״ד כפ״ת letters in the 1st radical position are pronounced hard, in all future נִפְעַל conjugations.
The irregular conjugations are marked with an asterisk in both tables. These have double pronunciations for the same reason as in the past conjugations: the word-final stress causes the 2nd radical letter to be reduced, and because the root פ־ע־לp-’-l has a guttural 2nd letter (ע), it cannot be pronounced with the reduced shva and gets a reduced /a/ instead. Again: the right pronunciation is the general case, while the left is specific to gutturals.
2nd and 3rd person feminine plural conjugations, as you can see, are put in parentheses. This is because, as you remember from last lesson about copulae, these days the feminine and masculine conjugations have merged into the masculine form. It would be very rare these days to see a 2nd or 3rd person female plural verb conjugated as תִּפְעַלְנָה / תִּפָּעֶלְנָה instead of יִפְעַלוּ / יִפָּעֲלוּ. This is true for all verbs, so I’m not going to say this after teaching each stem’s conjugations.
Before I move on I need to make one remark about the obviously missing tense - present tense. The present tense in Hebrew works differently to the two others, so I found it more suitable to introduce it after I finish past and future for all stems/
Exercise
OK so that was quite a bit for one lesson - but it doesn’t mean you don’t need to exercise what you’ve just learned!
For the next ten lessons, I’ll leave out the verb and you need to fill it out according to the root and tense given. Each subject will have its pronoun in parentheses (if it isn’t a pronoun anyway), so you can practice those too. On we go!
1. אָכַל. hakélev akhál harbé basár. “The dog ate a lot of meat.”
2. פָּרְשָׁה.achotí parshá mehalimudím. “My sister dropped out of school.”
3. יִשְׂרְפוּ. hem yisrefú et ha’etsím. “They will burn the tree / wood.”
4. פָּעַל. rósh hamemshalá Rabín pa’ál letovát hashalóm. “Prime Minister Rabin acted towards peace.”
5. אַחֲטֹב / אַחְטֹב. aní achtóv / achatóv etsím rabím, “I will log / cut down many trees.”
6. חָשַׁבְתָּ. atá chashávta lo nakhón. “You were thinking wrong,”
7. תִּגְדַלְנָה / יִגְדְּלוּ. hachatulót tigdálna / yigdelú harbé ‘im hashaním. “The cats will grow up a lot as years go by.”
8. שְׁבָרְתֶּן. atén shvartén et hashulchán. “You broke the table.”
9. אָהַבְתְּ. at ahávt otó me’ód. “You liked him a lot.”
10. יָשַׁבְנוּ. anáchnu yashávnu sham. “We sat / were sitting there.”
That’s it for this lesson!
Talk about dense information.
Next lessons I’ll be explaining the conjugations of the other two verb stem groups (הִפְעִיל&הֻפְעַל, פִּעֵל&פֻּעֵל&הִתְפַּעֵל), then the elusive present tense. They won’t be as information dense, hopefully, since I already explained a lot of the basics this lesson.
I look at her, and she is pretty, right. Long black hair, nice thighs everything you like. You are staring at her and on your face a smile I know just too well. And it all comes back to me. The sounds, the taste, the touch. Oh, the memory.
I was walking and now, I am falling. But don’t you see it doesn’t matter, because you moved on and I am still in the clutter, healing up my soul trying to fill the hole.
I hope she won’t believe the promises you make the way I did. Because baby, you said we were in for life, but look at us now. We became strangers, inhabitants of a past time. It’s okay though, I guess I was just being a fool, believing you felt for me the way I felt for you.
I feel or too little or too much. There’s no middle ground.
I am drowning at sea as he looks at me on the shore.
He is on his knees though I am looking away.
For once I would like to feel the right thing at the right time.
Give myself to someone that will keep me by his side, not throw me away when he gets tired.
Maybe I am cursed to walk those streets alone: to be broken by or breaker of bonds.
I have obviously never had to go through things that the black community has had to. I do NOT understand, I will NEVER understand what they have to go through on the daily. However I DO stand with them as much as I possibly can. I WILL try my hardest to use my voice to help make their struggles noticed by others. White privilege is a thing wether you believe it or not. It is real and it is happening. I UNDERSTAND, THAT I WILL NEVER UNDERSTAND BUT I STAND WITH YOU!
