Learn how to ask "When?"
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| Shalom, ani Yana. Hi everybody! I’m Yana. |
| Welcome to HebrewPod101.com’s “Ivrit be-shalosh dakot”. The fastest, easiest, and most fun way to learn Hebrew. |
| In the last lesson, we learned how to ask "Where" questions in Hebrew. |
| This time, we are going to ask questions with the interrogative word "When?". |
| Let’s go! Bou nathil! |
| Imagine you want to ask when your roommate is coming back home. You will ask him Matai ata hozer? Or, Matai at hozeret?. |
| [slowly] Matai ata hozer? |
| [slowly] Matai at hozeret? |
| So let’s break down this answer: |
| First we had: |
| Matai, which is the basic translation of "When" in Hebrew. |
| Ata/at- you |
| Lahzor is the verb "to come back", Hozer in Hebrew is the form for masculine singular. And Hozeret is the same verb in the form of feminine singular. |
| So, all together it is Matai ata hozer? |
| Matai at hozeret? |
| "When will you come back/return?". |
| So in Hebrew, "When" is generally translated as the word Matai. For example, if you want to ask "When were you born?" It’s Matai noladeta? in masculine form. And |
| Matai noladet? in feminine form. |
| Also here, the question word is the first in the sentence. |
| So let’s have a look at another example: |
| How can you say "When did you arrive?" |
| It is really simple since it is exactly the same pattern: Matai higata? in masculine form. |
| Matai higat? in feminine form. |
| First we have Matai which is "When" |
| The verb Higata/higat indicates past tense second person. |
| By the way, the verb in the previous question for `when were you born` is also in past tense. |
| Can you notice some patterns on second person past-tense verbs in Hebrew? |
| Regardless of time- present, future or past, you can use Matai in any tense. |
| If you want to ask a question about duration as in "Since when have you been teacher?" Then you will have to say Mi-matai ata melamed? Or, Mi-matai at melamedet? |
| Direct translation of mi-matai- is `from when`. |
| It is the same Mi-- as Me-eifo- from where. |
| As in- me-eifo ata? me-eifo at? |
| Ani mi-america. |
| Let’s see how to ask "Until when?" in Hebrew. It is very easy as you can translate it directly. It becomes: Ad matai? |
| So for example, if you want to ask a friend "Until when are you going to stay here?" It will be Ad matai ata nish`ar po? Ad matai at nish`eret po? |
| You can detect easily by now which one refers to a female speaker and which one to a male. |
| But of course there are other ways to ask about time. You can even be more specific by asking about the year, the date or the hour. |
| For example, you can ask: |
| - "Which year did you start working?" - |
| Be-eizo shana hithalta laavod? |
| Be-eizo shana hithalt laavod? |
| - "Which day is better for you?" |
| will be |
| Be-eize yom noah leha? |
| Be-eize yom noah lah? |
| - "What hour can we meet?" |
| is |
| Be-eizo shaa nuhal lehipagesh? |
| Here, `we` can be used both for masculine or feminine. |
| Now it’s time for Yana’s Insights. |
| lets try to review all variations of “when” in Hebrew so far; |
| Matai- “When” Matai ata hozer? matai at hozeret? |
| Mi-matai- “Since when” Mimatai ata melamed? Mi-matai at melamedet? |
| Ad Matai- “Until when” Ad matai atem ptuhim? |
| (Until when are you open? For example, at a shop). |
| Ok, so in this lesson, we learned how to correctly use the interrogative Hebrew word for "When", Matai- but also its different variations. |
| Next lesson we’ll learn more about asking questions with "Who" in Hebrew. |
| I`ll give you a hint! I already introduced it to you couple lessons ago!! |
| I’ll be waiting for you in the next Ivrit be-shalosh dakot |
| Lehitraot!! |
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