Hebrew Grammar Guides

The Hebrew past tense (זמן עבר - zman avar) is used to describe completed actions and events. Unlike English with its many past forms (I ate, I was eating, I had eaten), Hebrew has just one simple past tense.

The Hebrew present tense (זמן הווה - zman hove) is unique because it functions as both a present tense and as a verb adjective (participle). Unlike past and future, present tense verbs don't change for person - only for gender and number.

The Hebrew future tense (זמן עתיד - zman atid) is used for actions that haven't happened yet. It's formed with prefixes and sometimes suffixes added to the verb root. The future tense is also used for commands in some contexts.

Every noun in Hebrew has a gender - either masculine (זָכָר - zachar) or feminine (נְקֵבָה - nekeva). This affects not just the noun itself, but also any adjectives, verbs, and pronouns that go with it. Understanding gender is fundamental to Hebrew.

Hebrew uses a prefix ה (ha-) as its definite article, equivalent to English 'the.' Unlike English, there's no indefinite article (a/an) in Hebrew - you just say the noun without any article to mean 'a book,' 'a city,' etc.

Forming plurals in Hebrew follows patterns based on gender. Most masculine nouns add -ים (-im) and most feminine nouns add -ות (-ot). However, there are important exceptions and irregular plurals to learn.

Negation in Hebrew is relatively simple - the word לֹא (lo - no/not) is placed before the verb to negate it. There are a few additional negation words for different contexts.

Forming questions in Hebrew is straightforward. Unlike English, you don't need to rearrange words to make a question. You can simply raise your intonation, or add a question word at the beginning of the sentence.

One of the most unique features of Hebrew grammar is the binyan (בִּנְיָן - building) system. Each Hebrew verb belongs to one of seven binyanim, which are verb patterns that carry meaning about the nature of the action.