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Hebrew |
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| Afro-Asiatic | Northwest Semitic |  Israel |
Hebrew abjad | |
An adjective is a word thats main role is to describe or modify a noun or pronoun. In English, the adjective comes before the noun, and it looks like this "the quick fox" In Hebrew, the adjective comes after the noun, and looks like this "מכשפה זדונית" (mchashefah zdonit)
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Gender
Hebrew contains two genders, the masculine and the feminine, and each adjective is required to agree with its noun. There are many types of adjectives, the simplest sort decline like this (our example being טוב tov, meaning good):
| Masculine | Example | Feminine | Example | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Singular | -X | טוב (tov) | -ה (-ah) | טובה (tovah) |
| Plural | -ים (-im) | טובים (tovim) | -ות (-ot) | טובות (tovot) |
The next most common adjective ends with י- (-i) in the masculine singular. These adjectives typically come from nouns with a suffix, but they can also come international words with a suffix instead of words like -ic or -ical. These are conjugated like this (our example being זדוני zdoni, meaning evil):
| Masculine | Example | Feminine | Example | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Singular | -X | זדוני (zdoni) | ת- (-t) | זדונית (zdonit) |
| Plural | -ים (-im) | זדוניים (zdoniim) | -ות (-ot) | זדוניות (zdoniot) |
NB: The plural forms remain the same, however remember that the masculine plural will always be זדוניים zdoniim, NOT זדונים zdonim.
The next sort of Hebrew adjective ends with ה- (-eh) in the masculine singular. Remember that it's -eh, because it will use the normal -ah in the feminine. They are conjugated like this (ex: נאה (na'eh), pretty):
| Masculine | Example | Feminine | Example | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Singular | -X | נאה (na'eh) | ה- (-ah) | נאה (na'ah) |
| Plural | -ים (-im) | נאים (na'im) | -ות (-ot) | נאות (na'ot) |
NB: Make sure to drop the -eh ending before adding any suffixes, and also remember that the feminine singular will look exactly the same as the masculine singular in writing, however it will be pronounced with an /a/ instead of an /e/.
The "three from the end rule"
When the ending of an adjective makes the first vowel the third from the end, as well as that vowel being an /a/ the /a/ disappears. For example, גדול (gadol - big[m]) > גדולים (gdolim - big[mpl]). These adjectives will agree just as the would have without the rule. Also, this rule applies to nouns. ספר (sefer - book) > ספרים (sfarim - books).
Definiteness
Hebrew adjectives are required to agree with their noun counterparts. This is very different from European languages. It can be seen in this example: אשה טובה (ishah tovah) > האשה הטובה (ha-ishah ha-tovah) (a good woman > the good woman) In this way, Hebrew can be said to say "the woman the good."
Word Order
As Hebrew uses the zero copula, to make the distinction between "the big dog" and "a dog is big," in a Hebrew sentence, one must insert the pronoun, essentially saying "a dog, it is big." Ex: כלב גדול (kelev gadol) > כלב הוא גדול (kelev hu gadol).
Agreement
You must remember though, that the adjective must still agree with the noun, even if it is in a copular construction. שפה גדולה (safah gdolah) > שפה היא גדולה (safah hi gdolah) השפה הגדולה (hasafah hagdolah) > השפה היא גדולה (hasafah hi hagdolah)
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