modern hebrew on memrise

1. Verbs
Verbs in Hebrew are quite a bit different than in
English. A verb will change form depending on
which person you use (1st, 2nd, 3rd) and if the
subject of the sentence is singular or plural,
masculine or feminine.
In this lesson, we will introduce the pronouns in
Hebrew and a few vocabulary words to make some
simple sentences.

2. The verb ‘to be’
The verb ‘to be’ in English is the best example of
how a verb can change based on a pronoun. For
example:
I am You are He is We are They are
Notice how the same verb completely changes
based on the subject.
In Hebrew the verb ‘to be’ does not exist. So to say
something like ‘I am a man’ you would say ‫אני‬‫איש‬
(ani ish) literally ‘I man’. The lesson sentences will
use this construction.

3. Indefinite nouns
A noun in Hebrew can be definite or indefinite. For
example:
a cat or an owl are both indefinite (not specific)
THE cat is definite (specific one)
In Hebrew the words ‘a’ and ‘an’ for indefinite
nouns also does not exist. Using the same
example ‫אני‬‫איש‬ (ani ish) illustrates this. Not only
is there no form of the verb ‘to be’, but there is no
word for the indefinite word ‘a’ in this sentence.
Keep this in mind in the lesson sentences.

4. The root
Almost all Hebrew words have a ‘root’. This is usually 3
letters although it can be 2 or 4 or more. Don’t worry
about the meaning but notice the root in the following
verb:
Root ‫למד‬
○ ‫,לומד‬ ‫למדתי‬ , ‫אלמד‬ , ‫למדו‬ , ‫מלמד‬ , ‫לימדתי‬
Hebrew does add letters to the beginning, middle, and
end of a word as you can see, but the root is present in
every form of the verb (You can see the same three
letters in every form). We will discuss these forms in
later lessons. For now just learn that Hebrew words
have 3 letter roots most of the time.