# Expecting a child - He expected a child



## Chazz

Hi,

how would you translate "He expected a child" in hebrew 
thanks


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## Maayan

The litteral translation is quite common: מצפה לילד _metzapa leyeled._
Now I see I didn't answer your question: He expected a child (meaning: he's about to become a father) = הוא ציפה לילד_ hu tzipa leyeled_


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## OsehAlyah

Maayan said:


> ..... הוא ציפה לילד_ hu tzipa leyeled_


Hi Maayan.

I'm curious why did you use the prefix ל before ילד? Could one have used the prefix ה? Would it have changed the meaning of the sentence?

TIA


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## Flaminius

Hi, *OsehAlyah*.

First of all, ה is not a prefix but the definite article.  You will probably understand why it is not used if you see how strange this English sentence is:
*He is expecting the baby.

Second, why ל?  It's required by the verb _letsapot_.  You have to memorise it as a property of the verb.  It may be of use to know that another verb with the sense WAIT is also used with ל, _lechakot_:
hu mechake la-otobus.
He is waiting for the bus.


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## OsehAlyah

Flaminius said:


> Hi, *OsehAlyah*.
> 
> First of all, ה is not a prefix but the definite article.


 Ooooops, of course.


Flaminius said:


> You will probably understand why it is not used if you see how strange this English sentence is:
> *He is expecting the baby.


Sorry, but I see absolutely nothing wrong with the above sentence.


Flaminius said:


> Second, why ל?  It's required by the verb _letsapot_.  You have to memorise it as a property of the verb.  It may be of use to know that another verb with the sense WAIT is also used with ל, _lechakot_:
> hu mechake la-otobus.
> He is waiting for the bus.


You mentioned that this is something that I need to memorize, so I take it then that there's no rule governing this? Is there at least a list of verbs somewhere I can consult or memorize from?

Thank you Flam


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## Flaminius

Sorry, _la-yeled_ (with the definite article assimilated to ל) may be as correct as _le-yeled_ (without the article).  Definiteness vs. indefiniteness is not exactly my strong point....  



> Is there at least a list of verbs somewhere I can consult or memorize from?


I'd love a list like you mentioned myself.  Still, I assume that respectable dictionaries note what preposition to use with a verb.


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## elroy

OsehAlyah said:


> Sorry, but I see absolutely nothing wrong with the above sentence.


 The sentence is fine grammatically, but it's not what would be said in the context of someone expecting a baby.  We would use the indefinite article, "a."

לילד could actually be either "leyeled" (indefinite) or "layeled" (definite), so even if it were definite ה would not be used because it would already be "included" in the ל.


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## OsehAlyah

elroy said:


> The sentence is fine grammatically, but it's not what would be said in the context of someone expecting a baby.  We would use the indefinite article, "a."


This, of course, is highly situation/context dependent.
My niece's husband calls me from the hospital and tells me "He is expecting *the* child"
My aunt calls me and asks me where my niece and her husband are. I tell her "They are in the hospital expecting *the* child".
In the above two situations, would the prefix ל be replaced with the definitive article ה ?
I'm basically trying to understand why prefix ל  was used in the above translation because when I translate it word for word into English here's what I get: "He is expecting *for* a child". This as you know is not proper English, as the word *for* cannot be used in this sentence. Usually Hebrew translates into Russian even more naturally and elegantly than into English, and although it's a slightly greater effort for me I can at least understand many sentences/words that way. But in this situation neither language makes any sense. So there must be some rule of the language that governs this peculiar formation. This is what I'm trying to get to. Although, Flam says it is just an anomaly that must be memorized when encountered.


elroy said:


> לילד could actually be either "leyeled" (indefinite) or "layeled" (definite), so even if it were definite ה would not be used because it would already be "included" in the ל.


Sorry I have not yet learned this particular language rule, I don't think. But it almost looks like you are talking about using both ל and ה together in the definite case, and that the need for ה drops off because ל makes it definite. This isn't quite related to what I'm asking. But now I know that such a rule exists, that can make a noun definite and indefinite without employing the prefix ה.


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## Flaminius

OsehAlyah said:


> But in this situation neither language makes any sense. So there must be some rule of the language that governs this peculiar formation. This is what I'm trying to get to. Although, Flam says it is just an anomaly that must be memorized when encountered.


But *Oseh*, don't you think "wait for someone" quite synonymous to "expect someone"?  If you take ל as the Hebrew equivalent of "for", you've got two Hebrew verbs under your belt:
_lechakot_ > _mechake le-mishehu_; _letsapot_ > _metsape__ le-mishehu_




> Sorry I have not yet learned this particular language rule, I don't think. But it almost looks like you are talking about using both ל and ה together in the definite case, and that the need for ה drops off because ל makes it definite. This isn't quite related to what I'm asking. But now I know that such a rule exists, that can make a noun definite and indefinite without employing the prefix ה.


Well, if you want to stick to how Hebrew is written out, then you can say that ה become invisible when applied after ל.  No other preposition does this.  If you want to say "[wait] for the child", it is always _la-yeled_; never _le-ha-yeled_.  In writing, there is no knowing whether a particular instance of לילד is _le-yeled_ or _la-yeled_, unless you know grammatically when to expect a definite noun.  In speech, the difference is given, of course, phonetically.


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## OsehAlyah

Flaminius said:


> But *Oseh*, don't you think "wait for someone" quite synonymous to "expect someone"?  If you take ל as the Hebrew equivalent of "for", you've got two Hebrew verbs under your belt:
> _lechakot_ > _mechake le-mishehu_; _letsapot_ > _metsape__ le-mishehu_


Synonymous it may be, however, it isn't the meaning I'm struggling with. It is the way he sentence is constructed. Taking your example, in English, I can say "wait for someone" but I *cannot* say "expect for someone" and this is precisely what the Hebrew translation translates to. 


Flaminius said:


> Well, if you want to stick to how Hebrew is written out, then you can say that ה become invisible when applied after ל.  No other preposition does this.  If you want to say "[wait] for the child", it is always _la-yeled_; never _le-ha-yeled_.  In writing, there is no knowing whether a particular instance of לילד is _le-yeled_ or _la-yeled_, unless you know grammatically when to expect a definite noun.  In speech, the difference is given, of course, phonetically.


If I am the speaker, then I need to know the difference, and the rule, so that I can pronounce it correctly. So off I go searching for this rule.


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## elroy

OsehAlyah, I think you're confusing two different things here.

Whether or not a definite article is required has nothing to do with whether a preposition is required, so the very question ("why ל and not ה?") is problematic.

Let's address the two issues separately:

1. _Do we need an article?_  This, as you said, has to do with context.  For "to expect a child," we don't need an article; for "to expect the child," we do.

2. _Do we need a preposition? _ In this case, we do, simply because the Hebrew verb requires one.  The preposition is needed whether or not the object is definite.  Comparing the Hebrew verb with an English or Russian one is pointless, because there is no one-to-one correspondence between any two languages when it comes to preposition usage.  In English, we say "to look for" but in Hebrew we say לחפש (no preposition); in English, we say "to help" (no preposition) but in Hebrew we say לעזור ל.

Now, the preposition ל is special because, if it precedes a definite noun, it "swallows" the definite article, reflecting it through a change in the vowel.  So the actual morpheme ה is never used after the preposition ל.  It's either "le" or "la," but never "leha."



> My niece's husband calls me from the hospital and tells me "He is expecting *the* child"
> My aunt calls me and asks me where my niece and her husband are. I tell her "They are in the hospital expecting *the* child".
> In the above two situations, would the prefix ל be replaced with the definitive article ה ?


 Your examples do not sound natural to me in the given context, but either way, you would not change the ל to a ה to translate "expecting the child."  You would keep the ל and just pronounce it "la" instead of "le."

By the way, Flaminius, ל is not the only preposition that works this way.  ב does the exact same thing.


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## Maayan

I don't recall ever encountering this phrase before: אני מצפֶּה לילד (male speaker), it's always either: אני מצפֶּה לילד (female speaker) or אנחנו מצפים לילד (plural). The sentense doesn't sound natural in Hebrew at all...


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## OsehAlyah

elroy said:


> OsehAlyah, I think you're confusing two different things here.


Sorry, not quite. I don't seem to be able to communicate clearly what is confusing me, although it is one thing only.  I think I'll let it go for now, seeing how patiently and thoroughly you've stuck around with me. Often times things come into their own given enough time.


elroy said:


> ......
> 2. _Do we need a preposition? _ In this case, we do, *simply because the Hebrew verb requires one*..........


This is the part that confuses me.  The one and only part. I can't understand why certain verbs would call on the usage of preposition ל on the following noun that causes a translation that does not *appear* to make sense. I'm guessing that it does not appear to make sense to me because there's something intrinsic and/or underlying that I don't understand about the language that others have gotten a grasp on.
I'm becoming more and more certain that I'm having an identical problem with preposition ב.
Anyway, huge thanks to you for all your replies, and everyone else's as every little bit helps and clears things up more and more, albeit very slowly in my case. 


Maayan said:


> I don't recall ever encountering this phrase  before: אני מצפֶּה לילד (male speaker), it's always either: אני מצפֶּה  לילד (female speaker) or אנחנו מצפים לילד (plural). The sentense doesn't  sound natural in Hebrew at all...


Maayan, I don't quite understand what you were trying to say with the above response.  Also the (male speaker) and (female speaker) parts appear identical.

Thank you everyone for your replies, and Chazz I'm sorry if I kidnapped your thread, I hope I stayed on topic.

שבת שלום לכולם


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## amikama

elroy said:


> By the way, Flaminius, ל is not the only preposition that works this way.  ב does the exact same thing.


And the preposition כ too  (ב כ ל are the only prepositions that swallow the definite article.)


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## Maayan

OsehAlyah said:


> Maayan, I don't quite understand what you were trying to say with the above response.  Also the (male speaker) and (female speaker) parts appear identical.


 
Sorry, I should've written in English transcipt: It's the difference between מצפֶּה _metzap*e*_ (male speaker) and מצפָּה _metzap*a*_ (female speaker).
I just felt like mentioning that it sounds strange (unnatural) to my Hebrew ears to hear a male speaker saying _ani_ _metzape leyeled_... It's usually: _ani_ _metzapa leyeled_ or _anachnu metzapim leyeled, _even though it's grammatically correct


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