"לדבורה יש דבש."

Translation: The bee has honey.

[danny912421]

la-dvorá yesh dvash.

[SarahBerry17]

I would say you couldn't translate this sentence as Deborah has honey (I had been considering that) because the first word is pronounced "la dvorah." So that has to translate as "the bee" here.

[Shadowex3]

Why? Dvorah could be someone's name too.

[radagastthebrown]

Yes, but if it's a name, you don't add 'ה for definiteness, so instead of pronouncing "la'dvora", you'd say "le'dvora" (or, more correctly, "li'dvora").

[TeribleT]

I thought the hey was implied, do you mean in pronunciation?

[radagastthebrown]

Deborah is definite. However, the -ה prefix should not be used with names, just like you don't say "The Deborah has honey".

[Daiana.215]

Why is it ladvorah and not hadvorah ???

[danny912421]

Because that is how possession works in Hebrew. יש ל means "have" and ל is attached to the word that has something. The same way as saying יש לי I have, here לדבורה יש the bee has.

[Hsn626796]

I did understand that the sentence means " the bee has honey",
but it was marked wrong when I just tried the word-for-word translation : " for the bee, there is honey " , which also might be considered correct .

[jarrettph]

It would be To the bee there is honey but I don't think they're accepting literal translataions, probably mainly because you just wouldn't say that in English.

[MarnaRente]

That sentence "For the bee, there is honey" in English means there is honey available for the bee, not that the bee necessarily has possession of it.

[Ap.Jonatas]

to Devorah has honey It's possible translate. Like a personal name, right?

[radagastthebrown]

"Deborah has honey" could be accepted, I guess. Though the name is usually said with different emphasis nowadays (dvóra instead of dvorá for bee).

[SHEmerman]

It seems to me that when a noun becomes a person's name, the acccent shifts to the first syllable. Is that correct?

[radagastthebrown]

Not the first, the one before last. But yes, it's common to change the stress to differentiate between the noun and the name.

[rich739183]

It's not only that we hear the stress on the last syllable. What if it had been a one-syllable word/name such as Gal? Isn't it more important that we notice that the first syllable is La instead of Le or Li? Grammatically, doesn't La usually go with a common noun, not with a person's name?

a908 rich739183

[TeribleT]

Could you say instead
יש דבש מדבורה?

[radagastthebrown]

That's "from a bee".

[GabeGewurt]

Why is it incorrect to translate it literally; "to the bee there is honey"?

[danny912421]

Because when translated literally, it sounds ridiculous. Would you ever say it like that?