Object Pronouns: אותי, אותך, אותו | Hebrew Grammar

English has a separate set of words for objects — me, him, her, us, them — and no obvious reason why he should become him. Hebrew's set is built out of something you already know: it is את, the definite-object marker, with pronoun endings attached. Once you see that, the paradigm stops looking arbitrary and its two odd cells stop looking like mistakes.

The paradigm

English	Hebrew	Reads
me	אוֹתִי	otí
you (to a man)	אוֹתְךָ	otkhá
you (to a woman)	אוֹתָךְ	otákh
him, it (m.)	אוֹתוֹ	otó
her, it (f.)	אוֹתָהּ	otá
us	אוֹתָנוּ	otánu
you (m. pl.)	אֶתְכֶם	etkhém
you (f. pl.)	אֶתְכֶן	etkhén
them (m.)	אוֹתָם	otám
them (f.)	אוֹתָן	otán

המורה שאלה אותי משהו ולא הבנתי בכלל.

hamorá sha'alá otí máshehu veló hevánti bikhlál

The teacher asked me something and I didn't understand a word of it.

היא הזמינה אותנו לחתונה בסוף החודש.

hi hizmína otánu lakhatuná besóf hakhódesh

She's invited us to the wedding at the end of the month.

The two cells nobody predicts

Eight of the ten sit on an אות־ base. The second person plurals do not: they are אֶתְכֶם and אֶתְכֶן, built straight on את with no o in them at all. This is not an irregularity invented to annoy you — it is the older, historically expected shape, and אותכם / אותכן are the later forms, rebuilt on the אות־ base by analogy with the other eight.

You will nonetheless hear אותכם and אותכן constantly in everyday speech. Both are real Hebrew and neither will get you misunderstood; they simply belong to different registers.

אני מחפש אתכם כבר עשר דקות, איפה אתם?

aní mekhapés etkhém kvar éser dakót, éifo atém?

I've been looking for you for ten minutes — where are you? (m. speaker, to a group; אתכם is the normative form)

מחפשים אותכם בכניסה, בואו מהר.

mekhapsím otkhém baknisá, bó'u mahér

Someone's looking for you at the entrance — come quickly. (colloquial, to a group)

💡

Be careful how you file this. Wiktionary's paradigm for את records אתכם / אתכן as the forms considered more correct, with אותכם / אותכן also common in everyday usage — and that is the only source this build found taking a position on the pair; no Academy ruling on it turned up. So: write אתכם, expect to hear אותכם, and do not correct anyone.

Why the marker is there at all

את appears in front of a definite direct object, and only a definite one. A pronoun is inherently definite — him is somebody both speakers already have in mind — so a pronoun object always brings the marker with it. Compare:

ראיתי כלב ליד הכניסה, הוא נראה אבוד.

ra'íti kélev leyád haknisá, hu nir'á avúd

I saw a dog by the entrance — it looked lost. (indefinite object: no marker anywhere)

ראיתי אותו שוב הבוקר, הוא עדיין שם.

ra'íti otó shuv habóker, hu adáyin sham

I saw it again this morning — it's still there. (a pronoun is definite by nature, so the marker has to be there)

That is the whole explanation for why Hebrew has no bare word for him: there is no such thing as an unmarked definite object, so the marker and the pronoun arrive as one word. The condition itself belongs to the object marker את.

אותך is one spelling and two words

The gender split in the second person runs through this paradigm exactly as it runs through everything else, and unpointed Hebrew does not write it. אותך is otkhá to a man and otákh to a woman, one string for both.

חיפשתי אותך כל הערב, איפה היית?

khipásti otkhá kol ha'érev, éifo hayíta?

I was looking for you all evening — where were you? (to a man)

חיפשתי אותך אתמול, למה לא ענית?

khipásti otákh etmól, láma lo anít?

I was looking for you yesterday — why didn't you answer? (to a woman — and ענית is the same trick, anít to a woman and aníta to a man)

The habit this demands is on אתה vs את; what matters here is that reading a Hebrew sentence aloud already commits you to a gender.

אותו also means "the same"

Here is the trap no beginner course flags, and it will confuse you the first time you meet it in the wild. אותו and אותה have a second, completely separate job: placed before a noun, they mean "the same".

אנחנו קוראים את אותו הספר בדיוק.

anákhnu kor'ím et otó haséfer bediyúk

We're reading exactly the same book. (אותו before a noun = 'the same', not 'him')

שנינו צפינו באותו הסרט ולא הסכמנו על כלום.

shnéinu tsafínu be'otó haséret veló hiskámnu al klum

The two of us watched the same film and agreed on nothing.

Look hard at the first one, because it will read to you as an error: את אותו, two ats in a row. It is not a doubled marker. The first את marks the definite object הספר; the second is the demonstrative meaning the same, and it happens to be spelled identically. The Academy of the Hebrew Language holds the sequence to be legitimate — there is no doubling, because the two words are doing different jobs — and rejects the objection Yosef Klausner raised against it. In other words: when you meet את אותו in a newspaper, nothing has gone wrong. The construction has its own page, saying 'the same'.

The insight that saves you months

Everything above assumes the verb takes a direct object. A great many Hebrew verbs do not — and English gives you no warning, because the English translations of those verbs are perfectly ordinary transitive verbs.

Hebrew	English	"him" comes out as
עזר ל־	help him	עזרתי לו
התקשר אל / ל־	call him	התקשרתי אליו
חיכה ל־	wait for him	חיכיתי לו
השתמש ב־	use it	השתמשתי בו

התקשרתי אליו שלוש פעמים והוא לא ענה.

hitkashárti eláv shalósh pe'amím vehú lo aná

I rang him three times and he didn't pick up.

חיכינו לה חצי שעה מתחת לבית.

khikínu la khatsí sha'á mitákhat labáyit

We waited half an hour for her downstairs. (חיכה governs ל־, so no אותה appears anywhere)

💡

So the object pronoun is the second question, not the first. Ask what the verb governs, then pick the form: a direct object gives you אותו, ל־ gives you לו, ב־ gives you בו, אל gives you אליו. Reaching for אותו because the English sentence said him is the single most reliable way to get this wrong. The rest of those paradigms are on inflected prepositions.

Common Mistakes

1. Using the subject pronoun as an object. In English he and him are two words, so the distinction is familiar — but a beginner who has learned היא as "she" and not yet met אותה will simply reuse it.

❌ פגשתי היא במסיבה

Incorrect — היא is a subject pronoun. The object form is אותה, and the object marker comes with it: פגשתי אותה במסיבה.

✅ פגשתי אותה במסיבה של דנה, היא שאלה עליך.

pagáshti otá bamesibá shel dána, hi sha'alá alékha

I ran into her at Dana's party — she asked after you. (to a man)

2. Putting אותי after another preposition. אותי is already את + me. Stacking it behind בשביל or על builds a phrase with two prepositions in it.

❌ קנית את זה בשביל אותי?

Incorrect — אותי is את with a pronoun ending, so it cannot follow another preposition. בשביל takes endings of its own: קנית את זה בשבילי?

✅ קנית את זה בשבילי? לא היית צריך.

kaníta et ze bishvilí? lo hayíta tsaríkh

Did you buy this for me? You shouldn't have. (to a man)

3. Giving a preposition verb a direct object. The error the table above exists to prevent, and the one that survives longest, because the sentence sounds like a faithful translation.

❌ אני אתקשר אותך אחר כך

Incorrect — התקשר takes אל or ל־ and never a direct object: אני אתקשר אליך אחר כך. English 'call you' has a bare object; Hebrew does not.

✅ אני אתקשר אליך אחר כך, עכשיו אני בנהיגה.

aní etkashér elékha akhár kakh, akhsháv aní binhigá

I'll ring you later — I'm driving at the moment. (to a man)

4. Reading אותך in the wrong gender. The spelling gives you nothing, so this is a decision made afresh every time you open your mouth.

❌ אני אוהב אותך

aní ohév otkhá

Incorrect as a sentence said to a woman — אותך is one spelling and two words. To a man it is otkhá; to a woman it is otákh, so the sentence reads aní ohév otákh.

✅ אני אוהב אותך, את יודעת את זה.

aní ohév otákh, at yodá'at et ze

I love you — you know that. (m. speaker, to a woman)

Key Takeaways

The object pronouns are את with pronoun endings: אותי, אותך, אותו, אותה, אותנו, אותם, אותן — plus אתכם and אתכן, which do not sit on the אות־ base.
אותכם / אותכן are the everyday analogical forms. Write אתכם, expect to hear אותכם, and treat the pair as a register difference rather than a right-and-wrong.
The marker is there because a pronoun is inherently definite: ראיתי כלב takes nothing, ראיתי אותו takes את.
אותך is one spelling and two words, otkhá to a man and otákh to a woman.
אותו before a noun means "the same" — and את אותו is therefore not a doubled marker but an object marker followed by a demonstrative. Ordinary Hebrew, and the Academy says so.
Before choosing an object pronoun, ask what the verb governs. עזרתי לו, התקשרתי אליו, חיכיתי לו, השתמשתי בו — four sentences where English says him or it and Hebrew never says אותו.

Now practice Hebrew

Reading grammar gets you part of the way. The exercises are where it sticks — free, no signup needed.

Start learning Hebrew →