how to say “drink” (of various kinds) in Hebrew
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If you’ve taken our Level 1 course or otherwise have a bit of Hebrew background, you know that the simple פעל verb לִשְׁתּוֹת (leesh-TOHT) means to drink, and perhaps also that שְׁתִיָּה (sheh-tee-YAH) is the generic word for a drink, in Modern Hebrew.
In Biblical Hebrew, the common word for a drink was a מַשְׁקֶה (mahsh-KEH), of the root שׁ.ק.ה (sh.k.h) meaning to water. In the centuries that Yiddish was spoken by a large proportion of world Jewry, משקה came to refer to alcoholic beverages, so that in the Hebrew spoken in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem today, the term for such a drink is מַשְׁקֶה חָרִיף (mahsh-KEH khah-REEF) – literally, a spicy beverage.
The plural of משקה חריף is מַשְׁקָאוֹת חֲרִיפִים (mahsh-kah-OHT khah-ree-FEEM).