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- "שרה אוהבת את אברהם."
78 Comments
1940
Is this some kind of bait?-) The Torah is part of the Hebrew heritage. Whether you believe parts of it or all of it is your choice and privilege...
Not entirely sure what you're trying to say here; I made no statement one way or the other about beliefs.
- 1940
Joe, Thanks for taking the time to clarify your question. If Jonah appears later in the course, my guess is that it would be of much interest to the Christian community!
I definitely like biblical sentences here in the Hebrew course. But most people unfortunately are not Christian and therefore think differently.
I don't know where you get the authority to make that kind of declaration. A lot of people study Hebrew intent on reading the scriptures in their original language. A lot of them are probably Jews, but another large part will be Christians, and certainly both groups believe in the same revelation of the Old Testament. I thought that would just follow logically.
Keep in mind, however, that Christians aren't the only ones that read the Word. In terms of people thinking differently about biblical sentences, I would not be surprised to find that none differ so widely in perspective under the same title as Christians do. It's nice that there are some Christians that don't see the earlier writings as a waste of space, but it doesn't seem to be the case for most branches of that faith.
How is that unfortunate? You do know we are the ones who wrote the thing, right? So if you are learning Hebrew to get a better ubderstanding of the Bible, acknowledge that it is a different culture from your own, and that it is our sacred language and our sacred books too.
- 921
How come "את" is used here? Wouldn't that make it "Sarah loves the Abraham"? Since according to before in the notes and tips it said "את" = The (most times in between sentences)
No, את is not "the" exactly, it indicates a direct object that is definite. Since אברהם is a proper name, it is considered already definite, no article necessary, therefore את אברהם.
So do you use את also if you wanted to say (Name) loves/likes any person or also direct object? Like I'm assuming you wouldn't use it to say Sarah loves cats, but if Sarah loves the cat, a specific cat, would it be את החתול? Or if Sarah loves the sweater or the coat? I'm probably running ahead of myself and this will be solidified later on in the course but just want to be sure I'm getting this. Guess it's obvious with objects, less so with names.
Yes, exactly. שרה אוהבת את אברהם, שרה אוהבת את החתול, שרה אוהבת את המעיל. שרה אוהבת אנשים, שרה אוהבת חתולים, שרה אוהבת מעילים.
All is well, just pointing out it works with plural since all your examples were not
True, my examples coul be understood to mean that it's a singular/plural thing. But you could think of a situation where you want to say that there is a certain coat Sara likes: שרה אוהבת מעיל ירוק.
So if the object of the sentences are in plural forms just like NaftaliFri1 mentioned, e.g.: שרה אוהבת את החתולים Does it means that Sarah loves cats in general (Sarah loves cats!), or does it means that Sarah love a spesific group of cats (i.e. Sarah loves THOSE cats!) ?
Well, Hebrew can uses the definite article for specifics, but also generics: הַנָּמֵר צָד בַּלַּ֫יְלָה the leopard hunts by night means depending on context that specific leopard or all leopards in general.
Ingeborg is right that הנמר can mean leopards in general as well as one specific leopards. But that is only with singular. הנמרים (or, in the question in this thread, החתולים) very strongly suggests a particular set of leopards.
i'm a bit confused so do people in israel say שרה אוהבת אבראהם like slang or do they use the grammatically correct את?
Congrats to Duolingo for this kind of references, since I am here mostly because of the holy Scriptures, and it makes no difference if you are unbeliever cause modern Hebrew is mostly based on biblical, may we see more of this, שלום.
- 1940
If you read the Bible, you will find that it is based on Hebrew history rather than gossip.
I don't why this is in the possessives section. I mean, this sentence doesn't have של or שייך.
It can be the feminine form of you, but it's also a marker used to note a definite object, which is how it's being used here.
There is two different words that looks the same. The word "את" (at) means you, but the word "את" (et) means the (not exactly), it's a word that does not have a meaning in English, just like the word "is" don't have a meaning in Hebrew.
At means the, in the feminine form, or et is used to introduce a semantically definite direct object. I was wondering whether or not et is used before objective proper nouns.
Is it more common or correct to stress proper names that end in a vowel on the last syllable like the speaker here and like in Biblical Hebrew, i.e. שָׂרָ֫ה [sarA], or on the penultimate, like I am used to hear, i.e. שָׂ֫רָה [sAra]?
Great question! And a long story...
The biblican pronuciation probably stressed the last syllable. I believe also the pronuciation of the Jews who lived in the Arabic-speaking world. The Jews living in Europe, however, adopted pronuciation on the penultimate syllable (of all words, including proper biblical names).
Early in the revival of the Hebrew as a spoken Language, it was decided by the experts that pronunciation on the last syllable was correct, and Hebrew speakers obeyed - with most words. I'm not sure why, it didn't catch with private names. For decades and decades, everyone knew that ultimate stress was "right", and that's what was used in the radio etc. Also when talking about the biblical characters themselves people would use ultiamte stress.
But in day-to-day life, speaking about one another and people of our time, penultiamte was almost always used - even for people named with the biblican names! So while the biblical mother is riv-KA, my own real mother is RIV-ka.
This was not without exceptions. חנוך (the biblical Enoch, also happens to be my father's name) has been always pronounced with ultimate stress. Also some indviduals insisted on ultimate stress in their names, and this would be respected (דוד בן גוריון), though potentially preceived as weird.
Then in the last two-three decades the tables flipped again. Again I'm not sure why, parents began to pronounce their children names with the proper ultiamte stress, and again this is usually respected as the child grows. Though some ultimate-stress children at some point adopt penultimate stress with their friends. I even heard of opposite cases - people who were known in penultimate stress their whole lives, at some point start to adapt ultimate stress.
So today, you really can't tell. Suppose I get an email at work, "please welcome our new staff member Rachel (רחל) Ohayun". Then when I meat her face to face, one of my first questions will probably be "So do you say ra-CHEL or RA-chel"?
Thanks for all that, YardenNB! A pleasure to read and learn from.
Coming from a language that put less stress on the stressing (of the pronounciation), i would say this stress thing is stressing me out! Lol But your explanation/sharing is great as always YardenNB. Thanks for that! Sharing is caring :)
Well, as אַבְרָהָם is determined, as a proper noun always is, there should be אֶת before it, because it is a direct object here (she loves whom?).
Even when he fakes her as his sister and tries to sell her to the Pharao
In previous example, there was a ל before אברהם. In this example, not. Can anyone explain the use of ל? Thanks!!!!
Well, אָהַב is only followed by לְ־ when using the infinitive: שָׂרָה אוֹהֶ֫בֶת לָנוּחַ Sarah likes to relax.
- 714
No. You need the object pronoun "you", which is אותך. So, it would be שרה אוהבת אותך, אברהם.
אני אוהב אותך
(Ani ohev otakh)
You as a subject and you as an object are different, in Hebrew. That's in addition to the differences depending on gender.
- 291
Why is it " את " is used in the feminiine singular form ? Supposing the sentence is reversed to " אברהם אוהב את שרה " does the " את " gender still remain unchanged? Could someone explain this please . Thanks
There is את /at/ which is feminine signular pronoun. And there is את /et/ which introduces definite direct object. The latter doesn't change with gender, so no change in "אברהם אוהב את שרה".
Why would and atheist want to learn hebrew? Anyway, no matter the reason it would be better to respect
There are quite a few atheists of Jewish background (non-believing Jews), including many who live in Israel and speak Hebrew every day, and others who might like to learn to speak with them. Besides that I'm a non-Jewish atheist learning Hebrew, because I'm learning everything, because why not?
That said, I don't object in any way to these references to the תנ"ך, which is part of the cultural background of the language, after all.
Don't other humans besides athiests and religious people exist that would like to communicate with other Hebrew speakers? The answer is yes. And also, nobody mentioned being an atheist.
Because I have lots of Israeli friends and want to be able to talk to them in their native language? It's not that weird. I do think it's rude for atheists to come here and use this free resource and then complain that some sentences dare to use religious names, though.
I'm slightly embarrassed to admit I didn't even realise this was a religious reference until I read the discussion. I thought it was just an example of how to use some common Hebrew names in a sentence.
Because they want to. Hebrew isn't just a language Jewish people learn, it's the national language of a whole country.
