חֻרְשָׁה listen to this word pronounced Says Wikipedia, “A thicket is a very dense stand of trees or tall shrubs, often dominated by only one or a few species, to the exclusion of all others.” When I hear the word thicket I think Bambi. Anyway, a thicket or a grove in Hebrew is a חורשה (khoor-SHAH). And in Jerusalem’s…
עִם שְׁתֵּי רַגְלַיִם עַל הַקַּרְקַע listen to this expression pronounced A person having both feet on the ground refers to this person being sensible, realistic, practical. The Hebrew expression means the same thing. For example, הוּא בָּחוּר עם שתי רגליים על הקרקע (hoo bah-KHOOR eem SHTEH-ee rahg-LAH-yeem ahl hah-kahr-KAH) – He’s a guy with…
לְשַרְיֵן listen to this word pronounced First of all, a correction: The Modern Hebrew word for jet lag – יַעֶפֶת (yah-EH-fet) comes from the root י.ע.פ (y.a’.f), meaning flight. It doesn’t come from the acrobatic linguistic act I described the other day. Thanks for the tip, Larry. Now for today’s dose… The…
לְהִשָּׁבַע listen to this word pronounced Check out our summer courses for adults and teens! This one’s for Zach-נָחוּם. We (I can only speak for the extended family) are proud of you. On Friday Blogger went down, so I wasn’t able to put out the Daily Dose of Hebrew. I hope everyone used…
יַעֶפֶת (גֶ’ט-לֶג) listen to this word pronounced Check out our summer classes – for adults and teens! Most Israelis call it, simply, גֶ’ט-לֶג (jet lag). But those who work at the Academy of the Hebrew Language would call it by its official Hebrew name, יַעֶפֶת (yah-EH-fet). I haven’t looked into it thoroughly, but…
נִמּוּק If you know some Hebrew, you probably thought I’d be introducing the word סִבָּה (see-BAH) for a reason. Gotcha. Truth is, I thought of today’s word because it’s a synonym of סיבה, which appears in a song I have not yet been able to (and don’t really want to) get out of my head today,…
לְנַפְנֵף listen to this word pronounced יוֹם הָעַצְמָאוּת (yohm hah-ahts-mah-OOT) – Independence Day – is also called, unofficially, יוֹם הַנַּפְנָפִים הַלְּאוּמִי (yohm hah-NAHF-nah-feem hah-leh-oo-MEE) – The national day of wavings. From Ynet This nickname refers to the tradition of waving fans over barbecues to encourage the flames to keep – נִפְנוּף (neef-NOOF). נפנוף…
נוֹעָז listen to this word pronounced Check out our summer Hebrew classes for adults and teens! Thanks to acts of bravery, selflessness and, at times, utter audacity on the part of Israeli soldiers, Mossad agents, security personnel and the leaders of the State, the Jewish people have a place to call home today. The Hebrew…
יְרִיָּה יֶרִי (YEH-ree) is gunfire. יְרִיָּה (yeh-ree-YAH) is the act of shooting, as well as a gunshot. The latter comes from the verb לִירוֹת (lee-ROHT) – to shoot. On יוֹם הַזִּכָּרוֹן (yohm hah-zee-kah-ROHN) – Memorial Day for the fallen soldiers (at that time not yet designated for the victims of terror) – in 1995, I stood…
מְלַאי listen to this word pronounced Yesterday, I introduced the word חִסּוּל (khee-SOOL), in honor of the חיסול of Osama Bin Laden. Several readers wrote to me noting that לְחַסֵּל (leh-khah-SEL) means not only to finish something (or someone) off, but is also commonly used to mean liquidation, particularly in the phrase חיסול…
לְחַסֵּל Check out our summer Hebrew classes for adults and teens! This week the arch terrorist Osama Bin Laden was… taken out. The (non-slang) way of saying that in Hebrew is הוּא חֻסַּל (hoo khoo-SAHL). חוּסל (khoo-SAHL) is a “passive-intensive” פועל (poo-AHL) verb – he was taken out. To say, they took him out,…