The article and the object marker

"The" is glued to the word

Look again at Genesis 1:1.

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.

Genesis 1:1

English has a separate word "the" in "the heavens" and "the earth". Hebrew does not. In הַשָּׁמַיִם (hashamayim) and הָאָרֶץ (ha'aretz), the "the" is the ה at the very front, fused to the noun. This is the Hebrew definite article, and the app's 원어 panel labels it "Particle · Definite article (Hebrew)". It points to something specific: the heavens, the earth, the light.

There is no word for "a" or "an" at all. A noun without the article is simply "light" or "a light". Genesis 1:3 has אוֹר ('or), "light", on its first mention, with no article. Verse 4 then has God seeing הָאוֹר (ha'or), "the light", the one just created.

How the article looks

The ordinary article is הַ, with a patach under the ה, and it usually puts a dagesh (a dot) into the first letter of the noun, doubling it. The dot inside the שׁ of הַשָּׁמַיִם is exactly that. You see the same thing in הַמָּיִם (hamayim), "the waters". The noun itself, מַיִם, appears over 570 times. Modern Hebrew generally does not pronounce the doubling, so this course reads these words simply as "hamayim".

Some letters, however, cannot take a dagesh: א, ר and ע among them. Before these, the article usually keeps its single letter and lengthens its vowel instead, giving הָ (with a qamets). That is why we find הָאָרֶץ, הָאוֹר and הָאָדָם (ha'adam), "the man" or "humankind", in Genesis 1:27. The noun אָדָם occurs over 500 times. A few words take הֶ, as in הֶהָרִים (heharim), "the mountains", from הַר (har), which appears about 450 times.

I lift up my eyes to the hills. From where does my help come?

Psalm 121:1

You do not need to memorise which letter takes which form. A reader's rule of thumb is this: if a word begins with ה plus a vowel, and the next letter carries a dot or the vowel is long, it is very likely "the".

Some words are definite without the article. Personal names such as אַבְרָם do not take הַ. Neither do nouns with an ending meaning "my" or "your". In Exodus 20:2, אֱלֹהֶיךָ means "your God" and has no הַ, because it is already specific. Those endings are called suffixes, and they have their own lesson later.

אֵת, the sign you do not translate

Genesis 1:1 also has two small words that vanish when we translate: אֵת ('et) and וְאֵת (ve'et, "and 'et"). The panel calls this word an object indicator. It announces that the next word is the definite direct object of the verb: the thing God created. It has no English meaning of its own. Read the verse as "God created 'et the heavens, and 'et the earth", and the sentence is clear.

This little word is very common. It appears about 10,900 times, the highest count in the app's frequency list, and it is often written with a hyphen-like line, a maqqef, joining it to the next word, as in אֶת־ ('et-) in Genesis 1:4.

Here אֶת־ introduces הָאוֹר, "the light", which is what God saw. Usually אֵת is followed by a word with הַ, a name or a noun with a "my/your" ending, so when you see אֵת followed by a הָ- or הַ- word, you are looking at a specific object. The panel files both the article and אֵת under the heading "particle", a name we will explain in the lesson on little words. One caution: there is another word spelled אֵת that means "with". "Enoch walked with God" in Genesis 5:24 uses it, אֶת־, and the panel labels that one a preposition. The context, and the panel, tell them apart.

Summary

Hebrew "the" is הַ (or הָ, הֶ) fused to the front of a noun, and it normally brings a dagesh in the next letter. There is no word for "a". Names, and nouns with "my" or "your" endings, are definite without the article. אֵת or אֶת־ goes untranslated and marks a definite direct object. Open Genesis 1 again and you will see both everywhere.

Words in this lesson

• אֵתet[Obj.]10,928 times in the OT
• אָדָםadamman529 times in the OT
• מַיmayimwater576 times in the OT
• הַרharmountain: mount451 times in the OT

Practice