Heblish – Hebrew lessons: Day 45
Let’s talk
Free Hebrew lessons – November 2010 – Training – Day 45
Shalom ve’boker tov (Hi and good morning),
Today we will talk…
In our previous lesson we learned about the “ti” suffix for first person (“I”) past tense verbs.
Today, we will review some of the verbs we’ve learned in our previous lessons, and try to use them with some words we learned in lesson 11. No rules, no headaches…
Today’s menu: Let’s talk
Attention: The underlined letters represent the accent.
Let’s take a look at the verbs we learned in lesson 39:
English Verb | Hebrew Verb |
break | shover |
count | sofer |
drive | noheg |
close | soger |
sell | mo^er |
wear | lovesh |
Now, let’s see the words we learned in lesson 11:
Feminine nouns – dress, cake, ring
English singular | Heblish singular | English plural | Heblish plural |
dress | simla | dresses | smalot |
cake | uga | cakes | ugot |
ring | tabaat (ta–ba–at) | rings | tabaot |
Masculine nouns – book, bottle, bracelet
English singular | Heblish singular | English plural | Heblish plural |
book | sefer | books | sfarim |
bottle | bakbuk | bottles | bakbukim |
bracelet | tsamid | bracelets | tsmidim |
Present Tense
I break the bottle (m) – ani shover et ha’bakbuk.
I count cakes (f) – ani soferet ugot.
He counts cakes – hu sofer ugot.
I’m driving my car (f) – ani noheget ba’me^onit sheli. (me^onit: a car, sheli: my or mine.)
I close the book (m) – ani soger et ha’sefer.
I close the book (f) – ani sogeret et ha’sefer.
I sell bracelets (m) – ani mo^er tsmidim.
I sell bracelets (f) – ani mo^eret tsmidim.
I wear the dress (f) – ani loveshet et ha’simla.
I’m wearing a dress (f) – ani loveshet simla.
Past Tense
Remember: for first person past tense there is no gender.
I broke a bottle (m)+(f) – shavarti bakbuk.
I counted cakes (m)+(f) – safarti ugot.
I counted books – who can guess what the Hebrew translation for this is? (Answer at the end of the lesson)
I drove her car (m)+(f) – nahagti ba’me^onit shela.
I closed the window (m)+(f) – sagarti et ha’^alon (window = ^alon)
I sold bracelets (m)+(f) – ma^arti tsmidim.
I wore my dress (m…)+(f) – lavashti et ha’simla sheli. (sheli: my or mine)
Future Tense
I will break the bottle (m)+(f) – eshbor et ha’bakbuk.
We will count the books (m)+(f) – nispor et ha’sfarim.
I will drive his car (m)+(f) – enhag ba’me^onit shelo (his = shelo).
I will close the bottle (m)+(f) – esgor et ha’bakbuk.
I will sell the ring (m)+(f) – emkor et ha’tabaat
I will wear the dress (m…)+(f) – elbash et ha’simla.
OK, and what about “I counted books” which I asked you about before?
I counted books – safarti sfarim. Looks similar?
The word sofer (count) is a verb. Its root is ” s.f.r.”
The word sefer (book) is a noun, and although we haven’t studied it yet, there are some nouns which have a root. The root for book, sefer, is also ” s.f.r.”
After this lesson, you may have some questions. If you don’t, something is wrong… because I used some inflections you haven’t seen before…
I’ll be waiting for your questions via my e-mail address, our Comments section here, or in our Facebook group…
Lehitraot in lesson 46…
You are welcome to join our group on Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=230884728509.
Okay, here goes. As to ” driving my, his, her car. Why do you use ba rather than be. Ba makes it seem as though the phrase would be “in the car my, his, her”.
Question 2- Why do all past tense verbs have the “a…a” sound?
And 1 comment.I am able to read Hebrew. What I find though is that the transliteration sometimes takes over the Hebrew I know so that i have to give special effort to “see” the hebrew letters. Perhaps a weakness of the method?
Hi Bob,
I’m glad you asked.
1. When I’m driving my, his, her car… you know which car I’m talking about, right?
When we know which car it is, we use “ba.”
I’m driving my car – ani noheg BA‘me^onit sheli.
When it’s only a car, not a specific car, we use “be” – ani noheg BE‘me^onit.
2. The past tense verbs I gave are all the same form (do you remember we talked about the 7 different form in Hebrew?)
All these verbs belon to the “Kal” form. That’s why the sound is “a…a”
3. I understand what you mean about the difficulty of transliteration for someone who knows the Hebrew alphabet. At this time, our course is aimed primarily toward English-speaking students who have no knowledge of the Hebrew alphabet, to make it as easy as possible. Try to ask me a specific question about transliteration, maybe I can help.
your method is great and makes it easy for foreigns to learn hebrew…toda very much
Hi, Yaron,
So “Ba” is like a “Be and Ha” shortened into one word. Would that be the right thinking on my part ?
Also, I notice that the “v” in shover changes to “b” in the future tense. Does this happen to all verbs with a “v” in them ?
Thanks very much, Richy 😉
Gunjan!!!
That is great and I’m glad you saw that!
Ba is exactly “Be and Ha” together. It is like “in the”.
Your second question is great too(!) and I really waited to see if one of you can see that.
There is no connection to future tense, but next lesson I will talk about it broadly 😉