# חנה : action vs. resultat



## hadronic

I have a couple questions regarding the verb חנה.
As I understand it, it's the action verb of "to park" : אני חונה את המכונית.

a. Can the car be directly the subject of the verb : המכונית חונה  ? 

b. How would you say "a car is parked in front of my door" ? With other action verb like "open", "close", etc... we can use the passive participle פתוח, סגור etc... But it seems that here one cannot say מכונית חנויה מול הדלת ?
How about using the past tense (if the car _has parked_, then it means it _is parked_ now) :  מכונית חנתה מול הבית שלי ?

c. What's the difference between  חנה  vs.  החנה  ?

Thank you !


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## Drink

I would have suggested the nif'al, but according to morphix it does not exist. Perhaps the huf'al would work?


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## hadronic

In any case, nif'al is an "agentive" passive, not a "resultative" passive (cf. נפתח vs. פתוח). 
True, huf'al could be solution :  מכונית מוחנית מול ביתי  ,  a car is parked in front of my house ?  (not sure if it's _mukhnet_ or _mukhna_).


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## amikama

hadronic said:


> As I understand it, it's the action verb of "to park" : אני חונה את המכונית.


We don't say אני חונה את המכונית but אני מחנה את המכונית.



> a. Can the car be directly the subject of the verb : המכונית חונה  ?


Yes.



> b. How would you say "a car is parked in front of my door" ? With other action verb like "open", "close", etc... we can use the passive participle פתוח, סגור etc... But it seems that here one cannot say מכונית חנויה מול הדלת ?


I would say מכונית חונה מול הדלת שלי. 
מכונית חנויה מול הדלת is grammatically correct but doesn't sound native. 



> How about using the past tense (if the car _has parked_, then it means it _is parked_ now) :  מכונית חנתה מול הבית שלי ?


Yes, that is what I would say (with the meaning of "parked/has parked", not "is parked").



> c. What's the difference between  חנה  vs.  החנה  ?


החנה - what a person does to his/her car.
חנה - what a car does. As an intransitive verb also what a person does: חניתי במגרש החנייה. 
See also https://www.safa-ivrit.org/form/haniti.php


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## amikama

hadronic said:


> True, huf'al could be solution :  מכונית מוחנית מול ביתי  ,  a car is parked in front of my house ?  (not sure if it's _mukhnet_ or _mukhna_).


No, it sounds awkward to me. (And it's מוחנית, not מוחנה.)


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## hadronic

- I understand better. חנה is the intransitive verb, which means "to park (w/o object)", (FR) "se garer". החנה is the _transitive_ verb, which means "to park sth", (FR) "garer (qqch)". Now I understand why חנוי is _not_ grammatical, you can't take the passive of an intransitive verb.
Now, I don't understand why you're saying that מכונית חונה מול הדלת שלי means "a car _is parked _in front of my door". Doesn't it mean "a car parks, is parking, is doing manoeuvers to park", that is, an action verb, not a statal verb ? 

- What do you think about המכונית מוחנית ?

- Last question: in the previous examples, I was trying to translate "a car is parked in front of my gate" , which could very well be rendered by "a car has parked in front of my gate", they both describe the same situation: I'm in front of my gate, and I'm stuck because of car in front of it.
Now, what about this situation : (wife to husband) "-Darling, I'd like to go shopping, can I use your car?  - Of course, my car is parked behind the block, here are the keys". Here, you couldn't possibly use "has parked".  What does it translate to in Hebrew ?


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## hadronic

From the safa-ivrit link (which I couldn't bring up before), it is said that  חנה could mean שהה שם זמן מה.
So חנה is a verb of "staying", not a verb of "doing" ? I'm confused...


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## Drink

hadronic said:


> From the safa-ivrit link (which I couldn't bring up before), it is said that  חנה could mean שהה שם זמן מה.
> So חנה is a verb of "staying", not a verb of "doing" ? I'm confused...



If it is a "stative verb" as opposed to an "active verb", then "חונה" means "is parked" rather than "is parking".


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## hadronic

Yes, this is what I meant 
So how does one say : the car parks / is parking ? does חנה mean both ?


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## origumi

hadronic said:


> So how does one say : the car parks / is parking ? does חנה mean both ?


Yes. It's both stative and active. Remember that originally (in biblical Hebrew) חנה was an action people performed for themselves, not for their car (or donkey / horse / camel). Phrases like ויסעו ויחנו are popular in the bible.


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