Learn 10 must-know particles
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| Hello everybody. Idit here. Welcome to Hebrew top words and today, we are going to talk about Must-Know Particles for Hebrew Learners (Prepositions and Conjunctions) Let’s do it. |
| 1. |
| אל. |
| (El) |
| “to.” |
| אני הולך אל חברה שלי ברגל. |
| (Ani holekh el chavera sheli baregel.) |
| “I'm walking to my friend.” |
| So we use El as “to” but we use it usually when you are going to see people or people’s houses and not for like just random places like school or the post office. So when we use a particular name, we can use either El or LE, which is what we will also use for places. |
| 2. |
| מ. |
| (me) |
| “from” |
| אני חוזר מירושלים מחר בבוקר. |
| (Ani chozer miyerushalaim machar baboker.) |
| “I'm coming back from Jerusalem tomorrow morning.” |
| So Me is much more simple. It has no variations and it’s just always when you use from, you use Me. |
| So here is another example and I want you to please notice that sometimes when we say מ. |
| (me), it kind of sounds like Me but the meaning is the same. |
| For instance, |
| Ani mitel aviv. “I am from Tel Aviv.” |
| 3. |
| עם. |
| (Im) |
| “With” |
| הילד הולך עם הכלב לטייל. |
| (Hayeled holekh im hakelev letayel.) |
| “The child is walking with the dog.” |
| Im, in the letter IM, always means “with” |
| Oftentimes, even Hebrew speakers sometimes confuse IM with אם, with the letter אם, which is “with” with Im in an אם which means, “if.” |
| So, please do your best not to get confused. I will give you another example for Im, “with” |
| Ani holekhet im hachaver sheli leseret. “I am going with my boyfriend to a movie.” |
| 4. |
| בלי. |
| (Bli) |
| Without. |
| אני לא יכולה לרקוד בלי הנעליים שלי. |
| (Ani lo yekhola lirkod bli hana'alaym sheli) |
| “I can't dance without my shoes.” |
| So the word Bli always means “without.”. I can give you a very common example of the usage of the word Bli which is kind of a saying. |
| Lalekhet im – lehargish bli. That means “going with and feeling without.” |
| It has many uses and not only for commercials. |
| 5. |
| ו. |
| (Ve) |
| And. |
| חבריי הטובים הם דוד ואבנר. |
| (Chaveray hatovim hem david ve'avner) |
| “My best friends are David and Avner.” |
| Ve is extremely common, probably the most common of all the prepositions and I remember I asked a friend once how does Hebrew sound to them like if he doesn’t understand Hebrew and I talk Hebrew, what does it sound like and he said, it sounds a lot like just ve ve ve ve ve ve. So it’s very common. |
| 6. |
| כי. |
| (Ki) |
| “Because” |
| העכבר ברח כי הוא ראה את החתול. |
| (Ha'akhbar barach ki hu ra'ah et hachatul.) |
| “The mouse ran away because it saw the cat.” |
| Ki is a very short word to say “because” and it’s very convenient. So I hope you are going to use it a lot. And also it sounds a little bit like the word ki spelled קיא, but קיא means “vomit”. Don’t confuse the two. |
| 7. |
| בשביל. |
| (bishvil) |
| “For.” |
| הפרח הזה בשביל אמא שלי!. |
| (Haperach haze bishvil ima sheli!) |
| “This flower is for my mom.” |
| That’s so cute. |
| 8. |
| או. |
| (o) |
| “Or” |
| אפשר לטוס לרומא או למילאנו. |
| (Efshar latus lroma o lemilano) |
| “I can fly to Rome or Milan.” |
| O and or are very similar. So I don’t see any excuse to forget it. |
| 9. |
| אבל. |
| (aval) |
| “But” |
| אני רוצה לאכול אבל לא משהו מטוגן. |
| (Ani rotse le'ekhol aval lo mashu metugan) |
| “I want to eat but not anything fried.” |
| Of course, I want to eat something fried. So the word Aval means but. Again extremely common and it spells the same as some other words but it doesn’t sound the same. So when you’re talking, you are not going to get confused. So Aval is spelled the same way as the word for “morning” which is kind of bad. But it doesn’t – you don’t say it the same way. Aval or evel, it’s not the same. So we are not going to get confused when you are having a conversation. |
| 10. |
| עד. |
| (ad) |
| “until” |
| היא הבטיחה שתאהב אותו לנצח. |
| (Ani elmad ad shesh) |
| “I will study until six.” |
| Ad means “until” or up to.” Kind of the same meaning. |
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