Free Hebrew lessons – May 2011 – Training – Day 68 – Last lesson

Shalom ^averim (Hello friends),

Today we will not have a lesson. Not today and not next week…     
 

Today’s menu: Termination

Attention: The underlined letters represent the accent.

After 17 months, 67 lessons and hundreds of Hebrew words, I have decided to close this course.

I hope that you enjoyed the lessons as much as I did, even if sometimes they were not so easy, as I promised…

I found many new friends here, some of you came just accidentally, some heard about my Heblish course from friends, some were simply looking for a way to learn Hebrew and some of you are my friends or customers.

I tried to bring something new and refreshing, and I really enjoyed the journey, but I find that it takes me far from my target, which is to sell Israeli jewelry.

I hope to see you here, when you decide to visit Israel.

Be’ahava (with love),

Yaron Gordon
Goood

Free Hebrew lessons – May 2011 – Training – Day 66

Shalom,
Ma nishma?

In our previous lesson we learned more about adjectives. We learned about “heavy” and “light” (kaved ve’kal), “beautiful” and “ugly” (yafe ve’me^oar) and also about “long” and “short” (aro^ ve’katsar).

Let’s see what we have today…     
 

Today’s menu: Practice Hebrew

Attention: The underlined letters represent the accent.

Before we start the lesson, last week I promised to teach you how to say “please speak slower,” because sometimes it’s necessary when you speak with an Israeli.

I will teach you to say it in two different ways, and my suggestion to you is to remember the second way.

One way to say “please speak slower” is:
   – Bevakasha daber leat when you speak to a man, and
   – Bevakasha dabri leat when you speak to a woman.

The problem with this saying is that it sounds like a command, even though you use the word “bevakasha” (please). That’s because the word “speak” (daber or dabri) is an imperative form.

The other way to say “would you speak slower” is:
   – “Ata mu^an ledaber ktsat yoter leat?” when you speak to a man, and
   – “At mu^ana ledaber ktsat yoter leat?” when you speak to a woman.

Here, it’s more like you are requesting an action, rather than demanding.

I opened this lesson with: “Shalom, ma nishma?”

In lesson 15 I taught you that for “What’s new?” you should ask “ma nishma?”

“Ma nishma?” is not the literal translation for “what’s new?” except for the word “ma” which is “what.”

As we learned in lesson 37, “new” is ^adash (m), or ^adasha (f). On the other hand, “nishma” means “we will hear…”

In this lesson we started to learn some of the subtle distinctions in language; that you can say something using the “right” words, but the meaning is not what you intended.  As always in these lessons, I will teach you the more everyday way to communicate in Hebrew. If you ever have questions, of course I am available through Facebook to address them individually.

I want to keep this lesson short, but next week I will teach you a few more phrases, related to the popular question (what’s new?). Don’t miss it…

Lehitraot in lesson 67…

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Free Hebrew lessons – March 2011 – Training – Day 61

Shalom,

In our previous lesson we talked about Japan and its tragedy.

Lately, there have been a lot of disasters, but we must always look forward to the future and hope the best for us and for our families.

Therefore, today we will talk about the future, and I also have a beautiful story for you at the end of the lesson…      
 

Today’s menu: Future tense

Attention: The underlined letters represent the accent.

In lesson 43 we learned about the Eitan letters, and I taught you how to conjugate the word “close” in the future tense for all of the English pronouns.

As I told you, in Hebrew every verb has a root, and in the future tense there are four possible prefix letters before the root.
If you learn them, you will be able to conjugate almost every Hebrew verb in the future tense.
The letters are: e, i, t and n, and in Hebrew the name of this group of letters is “Eitan.”

Today I will only give you some examples with some new verbs.
Let’s have fun today, and use a sentence from the beautiful Beatles song, “Close your eyes”…

“Close your eyes and I’ll kiss you, tomorrow I’ll miss you…”

A man speaking to a woman

1. Close your eyes – Tisgeri et ha’einaim shela^

   – Close – Tisgeri  
   – Your – Shela^
   – Eyes – Einaim

The word “close” in English is not in the future tense, but in Hebrew when I use “close” for “close your eyes,” or for any similar sentence, I use an imperative form.

Since in Hebrew we don’t use the imperative form very often, most of those words will be in the future tense. That’s why the word “close” for this example is in the future tense.

If you want to know how to say it in high (very proper) Hebrew, you can read the following explanation. Otherwise, simply go ahead and read the next paragraph.
For “tisgeri,” as an exception to what I said about the Eitan letters, I also can say “sigri.” Sigri is the imperative form of “tisgeri.”
For “ha’einaim shela^” (your eyes), I can say “einai^” which is only one word, so the whole sentence for “close your eyes” will be “sigri et einai^.”

Now leaving the high Hebrew aside, let’s learn the rest of the sentence:

2. And I’ll kiss you – Va’ani anashek ota^

   – And I – Va’ani
   – I will kiss – anashek (The prefix “a” indicates the first person, even though I already said “ani“.)
   – I will not talk about the “you” (ota^) today. We will talk about it in our next lesson.  It is not hard, it just needs some more detailed explanation. 

Here, for “anashek,” you can see that I used “a” instead of “e” for “I will kiss”. I don’t want to dwell on the reason, but in Hebrew it is always the same letter “alef,” translated as the “e” letter. In Heblish it will be either “e” or “a” depending on the root. 

So, to expand on the rule I taught you in lesson 43:
- For every verb in the future tense in Hebrew, we use one of the “Eitan” prefixes:  e, i, t or n before the root. For first person (singular) it will either e or a.

3. Tomorrow I’ll miss you – Ma^ar etgaagea elai^

   – Tomorrow – Ma^ar
   – I will miss – etgaagea
   – (I will miss whom? I will miss…) you – elai^

Now, here is the story I promised:
One of our famous Israeli writers, Meir Shalev, wrote a short article about his father.  Mr. Shalev’s story went something like this:  “In WWII my father volunteered in the British army. During his service, he shared a truck with another soldier, who was a devout Christian believer. Although he was a Jew, my father did not practice orthodox Judaism. When the Christian driver heard that his companion was from Jerusalem, he started talking to my father about the stories in the Bible. They drove four days; my non-orthodox Jewish father and the orthodox Christian, “together with” Abraham and Moses, Rachel and Sarah, King David and more heroes from the Bible.

The Christian driver, who knew a lot about the Bible, was surprised to discover how much my father knew about the Bible. At the end of the journey, when they arrived in Alexandria (Egypt), he hugged my father and said: “I knew that the Bible was translated to many languages, but I never dreamed that it was also translated into Hebrew…” ”

Lehitraot in lesson 62…

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http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=230884728509.