# Do verbs ever agree with the object and not just the subject of the sentence?



## Intercalaris

My mom gave me a ring from Israel and it has a lot of (to me) strange Hebrew.
I am able to read most of it pretty easily by educated guesses, but it still is weird to me.
The first part says "יברכך ה׳" (yevarekhekha /yevarkhekh adonai)

I read it as "May god bless you", since I know that in ancient Hebrew the verbs come before the subject, I know that יברך means (he) will bless, and I know that khaf sofit/ך that isn't inherently part of a word usually indicates "you" in one way or another
But I am used to seeing ך used to show the person who possesses a thing, such as חלונך, or "your window"). 
Seeing it used in verbs is... very unusual. It doesn't seem wrong to me, and I didn't have trouble reading it for some reason (and most of the rest of the ring), assuming that I read it correctly, yet it still leaves me really curious and a little unsettled haha.

*So my real question is:*
Were verbs always conjugated to show the object of the sentence in ancient Hebrew?
And do people ever do so in modern Hebrew? I doubt it would EVER be done in spoken Hebrew, but maybe in written Hebrew? Or maybe poetry?

Thanks in advance!


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## origumi

This ך is (behaves as if?) a contraction of אותך in יברכך, thus a direct object.
It is (behaves as if?) a contraction of שלך in חלונך, thus "your".

I do not say there's a clear, direct development of יברך אותך -> יברכך or חלון שלך -> חלונך. Not sure what was the process, yet this is the result.

This postfix is usually not considered as part of the basic declension/conjugation (for either noun or verb), at least when taught in Israeli schools' grammar lessons.

In modern Language it is taken as high-register. I wouldn't ask a modern Hebrew speaker התרצה כי אקחך במכוניתי למעונך, yet have no problem writing it in an educated article or poetic context.


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## ystab

origumi said:


> This ך is (behaves as if?) a contraction of אותך in יברכך, thus a direct object.
> It is (behaves as if?) a contraction of שלך in חלונך, thus "your".



I won't say it behaves as if, or that it is, a contraction. The possessive suffixes are called in Hebrew כינויי שייכות, while the object suffixes are called in Hebrew כינויי מושא. They are very much similar but not identical. Compare וַתֹּאמֶר הָאִשָּׁה הַנָּחָשׁ *הִשִּׁיאַנִי *וָאֹכֵל (Gen. 3) and הֲשֹׁמֵר *אָחִי *אָנֹכִי (Gen. 4).

By the way, the object suffixes are also common in other Semitic languages, for example Arabic.


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## Drink

By the way, the text on the ring is the beginning of the Priestly Blessing (ברכת כוהנים), given in Leviticus 6:24-26, and is also the oldest attested excerpt of Biblical text (see the silver scrolls found at Ketef Hinnom/כתף הנום, dating to circa 650 BCE).


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## origumi

Drink said:


> and is also the oldest attested excerpt of Biblical text (see the silver scrolls found at Ketef Hinnom/כתף הנום, dating to circa 650 BCE).


Interesting.

On both scrolls it appears as יברך and not יברכך - I guess it's sort of assimilation.


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## Intercalaris

Thank you everyone! You all helped me so much
I understand a lot better now


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## airelibre

origumi said:


> התרצה כי אקחך במכוניתי למעונך


Is that an ancient Hebrew pick-up line?


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## Drink

airelibre said:


> Is that an ancient Hebrew pick-up line?



Then wouldn't it be התרצי?


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## airelibre

Drink said:


> Then wouldn't it be התרצי?


Were women not allowed to drive back then?


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## Drink

airelibre said:


> Were women not allowed to drive back then?



Well I always assumed origumi is a male, but correct me if I'm wrong.


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## elroy

ystab said:


> By the way, the object suffixes are also common in other Semitic languages, for example Arabic.


 Exactly!

If you spoke Arabic, Intercalaris, you wouldn't have batted an eyelid.   In Arabic, pronoun suffixes are used normatively in unmarked sentences as _both_ direct objects and possessive markers.

Examples from Modern Standard Arabic (MSA) and Palestinian Arabic (PA):

MSA: kitaabu*ka* 
PA: ktaab*ak*
'*your* book'

MSA: ra'aytu*ka*
PA: shuft*ak*
'I saw *you*'

In PA, there is an alternative to the possessive suffix construction that is similar to the Hebrew של construction (*li*ktaab *taba3i* = *ha*sefer *sheli*), but this is not the normative or unmarked form.  Similarly, in MSA there is an alternative to the direct object suffix that is similar to direct object pronouns in Hebrew (*iyaaka* ra'aytu = ra'iti *otkha*) but again, this is not normative or unmarked (notice that in my Arabic example I placed the object before the verb, because this construction tends to be used for emphasis unless there is another object pronoun).  In both MSA and PA, the _iyaa_- forms are obligatory when there are two object pronouns (MSA: a3taytuka *iyaahu*; PA: a3teetak *iyyaa*; 'I gave *it* to you'), and in PA they are obligatory in a few other constructions as well, but for the most part, the forms with the suffixes (or attached pronouns) are the predominant ones.

The upshot is that this is simply a feature of Semitic languages that has been mostly lost (or, more specifically, reduced to formal/poetic contexts and set phrases) in Modern Hebrew.  It is not at all surprising that this feature seems to be predominant in Biblical Hebrew.  This would be another example of Modern Hebrew being stripped of some of its Semitic features.  In other words, I don't think we need to engage in any far-fetched etymological musings like those in Origami's post .  I think this phenomenon has a very straightforward explanation.


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## Drink

elroy said:


> This would be another example of Modern Hebrew being stripped of some of its Semitic features.



I wouldn't quite put it that way. The features replacing them are no less Semitic. Widespread use of אותי/אותך/אותו/etc. and of של already began before any significant influence from non-Semitic languages. In fact the widespread use of של probably came about through heavy influence from Aramaic, where the preposition די and its prefixed version ד had already replaced direct genitive constructions much earlier. Incidentally, a similar shift from a direct genitive to a preposition-based genitive had taken place in the Ancient Egyptian language as well, even earlier (Ancient Egyptian is the closest relative to Semitic languages outside of the Semitic family).

But you are of course right that אותך comes _from_ the ך suffix and not the other way around. I have noticed that Israelis have the tendency to believe (incorrectly) that the shorter forms are contractions of the longer forms.


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## hadronic

What has become the Aramaic preposition ד or Arabic _dhu, _ in Hebrew? It should presumably be something like ז, but has it just been lost in pre-biblical times?


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## Drink

hadronic said:


> What has become the Aramaic preposition ד or Arabic _dhu, _ in Hebrew? It should presumably be something like ז, but has it just been lost in pre-biblical times?



It is זה/זאת I believe (if you want I can give you a more detailed explanation of why I think they match up perfectly phonologically).


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## hadronic

I believe that זה/זאת is the same reflex as Aramaic דא and Arabic _hâdhâ_, but I wouldn't relate these to ד-/_dhû. _


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## bazq

hadronic said:


> I believe that זה/זאת is the same reflex as Aramaic דא and Arabic _hâdhâ_, but I wouldn't relate these to ד-/_dhû. _



Maybe it's the biblical זו (zu) which is a relativizer?


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## Drink

hadronic said:


> I believe that זה/זאת is the same reflex as Aramaic דא and Arabic _hâdhâ_, but I wouldn't relate these to ד-/_dhû. _



It doesn't fit phonologically with דא/ذا. It is probably related to them, but I think זה/זאת is the same exact form and not just a relative.


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## Haskol

Wow, זו as the Hebrew version of די makes so much sense. I can't believe I've never heard of that before. It makes these verses so much clearer grammatically:
עם זו יצרתי, תהילתי יספרו
נחית בחסדך עם זו גאלת


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## utopia

About the question if there's ever an agreement between the verb and the object in an Hebrew sentence, well there are some instances (not everyone agree about it) that might show just that:

אבנים שחקו מים (water eroded stones)

there are close constructions, like מצאת חן בעיני (I'm fond of you) which makes the object (you) the subject of the construction.

לסטודנטים חסר את הידע לעשות את זה בעצמם. (the students lack the knowedge to do it themselves).

And so is the Hebrew possesive: I had the book - היה לי ת'ספר. I had two cars - היו לי שתי מכוניות.


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