Verbs That Take an Infinitive (רוצה, אוהב, מנסה, מתחיל) | Hebrew Grammar

Up to now every sentence you have built has had one verb in it. This page adds the second, and it is the cheapest expansion Hebrew offers: put a conjugated verb in front of an infinitive and you have doubled what you can say without learning a single new form. אני רוצה לאכול, היא מנסה להבין, הם החליטו לנסוע — one verb carries all the grammar, and the other just sits there.

אני רוצה לשבת בחוץ, יש מקום ליד החלון?

aní rotsé lashévet bakhúts, yesh makóm leyád hakhalón?

I'd like to sit outside — is there a table by the window? (m. speaker)

היא מנסה להבין למה המחשב שלה כל כך איטי.

hi menasá lehavín láma hamakhshév shelá kol kakh ití

She's trying to work out why her computer is so slow.

One verb does all the work

The division of labour is absolute, and it is worth stating in those terms because English does not make it nearly so cleanly. The first verb carries the tense, the person, the gender and the number. The infinitive carries none of them, ever. It has no plural, no feminine, no past. Whatever happens around it, לנסוע is לנסוע.

הם החליטו לנסוע לצפון בסוף השבוע במקום להישאר בבית.

hem hekhlítu linsóa latsafón besóf hashavúa bimkóm lehisha'ér babáyit

They decided to drive up north for the weekend instead of staying home.

אנחנו מתחילים לעבוד בשמונה, אז אני קם בשש.

anákhnu matkhilím la'avód bishmóne, az aní kam beshésh

We start work at eight, so I'm up at six. (m. speaker — מתחילים is plural, לעבוד is not anything)

No linking word goes between the two verbs. There is no Hebrew word for to: the ל is the first letter of the infinitive, not a separate particle you insert, which is why it is written solid against the stem. An adverb can still slot into the gap — הוא מנסה שוב להתקשר, הם החליטו פה אחד לנסוע — but there is never a particle you have to supply.

The verbs that do this

This is the everyday list. Each of these takes a bare infinitive with no preposition in between — no ל־ before the ל, no את, nothing.

Verb	Reading	Meaning	With an infinitive
רוצה	rotsé	want	רוצה לאכול
אוהב	ohév	like, love	אוהב לבשל
מנסה	menasé	try	מנסה להבין
מתחיל	matkhíl	start	מתחיל לעבוד
ממשיך	mamshíkh	carry on	ממשיך לחכות
מפסיק	mafsík	stop	מפסיק לעשן
מחליט	makhlít	decide	מחליט לנסוע
מסכים	maskím	agree	מסכים לעזור
שוכח	shokhéakh	forget	שוכח להתקשר
זוכר	zokhér	remember	זוכר לקנות
מקווה	mekavé	hope	מקווה לחזור
יודע	yodéa	know how	יודע לנהוג
לומד	loméd	learn how	לומד לנגן

תפסיק לצלצל לי כל חמש דקות, אני בישיבה.

tafsík letsaltsél li kol khamésh dakót, aní bishivá

Stop ringing me every five minutes — I'm in a meeting. (informal, to a man)

תזכרי לקחת מטען, בצימר אין כלום.

tizkerí lakákhat mat'én, batsímer ein klum

Remember to take a charger — there's nothing in the cabin. (to a woman)

שכחתי להתקשר לאימא שלי בשבת והיא עדיין מזכירה לי את זה.

shakhákhti lehitkashér le'íma shelí beshabát vehí adáyin mazkirá li et ze

I forgot to ring my mum on Saturday and she still brings it up.

אנחנו אוהבים לאכול בחוץ בשישי, זה הערב היחיד שיש לנו זמן.

anákhnu ohavím le'ekhól bakhúts beshishí, ze ha'érev hayakhíd sheyésh lánu zman

We like eating out on Fridays — it's the one evening we've got any time.

אתם ממשיכים לחכות? אני הולך לקנות קפה.

atém mamshikhím lekhakót? aní holékh liknót kafé

Are you lot going to keep waiting? I'm off to get a coffee. (to a group, m. speaker)

💡

Two entries in that table are doing more than their gloss suggests. יודע is Hebrew's know how to all by itself — אני יודע לנהוג is "I can drive", and there is no word answering to English's how. (אני יודע איך לנהוג exists and is fine, but it has shifted the focus onto the method, the way English I know how it's done does.) And מקווה takes an infinitive far less often than the table implies: what you hope for usually involves somebody else, so מקווה reaches for a ש-clause most of the time — see the next section.

אתה יודע לנהוג באוטומט או רק בידני?

atá yodéa linhóg be'otomát o rak bidaní?

Can you drive an automatic, or only a manual? (to a man)

הוא לומד לנגן בגיטרה לבד, בלי מורה ובלי סבלנות.

hu loméd lenagén begitára levád, bli moré uvlí savlanút

He's learning the guitar on his own, with no teacher and no patience.

The rule that governs the whole pattern

Here is the thing to take away, and it is one sentence: the infinitive is only available when both verbs have the same subject.

אני רוצה לאכול works because the person wanting and the person eating are the same person. The infinitive names no subject of its own, so it can only borrow the one already in the sentence. The moment the second action belongs to somebody else, the infinitive has nothing to borrow — and Hebrew does not stretch it. It switches construction entirely, to ש plus a finite verb, and after verbs of wanting that verb goes into the future.

היא רוצה להתחיל בשבע, אבל אף אחד לא יגיע לפני שמונה.

hi rotsá lehatkhíl beshéva, avál af ekhád lo yagía lifnéi shmóne

She wants to start at seven, but nobody's going to get there before eight. (she does the starting)

היא רוצה שנתחיל בשבע, אבל אף אחד לא יגיע לפני שמונה.

hi rotsá shenatkhíl beshéva, avál af ekhád lo yagía lifnéi shmóne

She wants us to start at seven, but nobody's going to get there before eight. (we do the starting)

Read those two side by side. One word changed — להתחיל became שנתחיל — and the entire second half of the sentence changed hands. That single swap is the whole rule, and a learner who has it can build sentences of real complexity without meeting any new morphology at all: everything is already in the future tense you know.

אני מקווה שהגשם ייפסק עד הערב, יש לנו חתונה.

aní mekavé shehagéshem yipasék ad ha'érev, yesh lánu khatuná

I'm hoping the rain stops by this evening — we've got a wedding. (m. speaker — the rain is not the hoper, so ש takes over)

אני מקווה לחזור לפני שהילדים נרדמים.

aní mekavé lakhazór lifnéi shehayeladím nirdamím

I'm hoping to get back before the kids fall asleep. (m. speaker — same subject, so the infinitive is available again)

The inventory of verbs taking a ש-clause, and what the tense inside it does, belong to verbs taking ש and ש-clauses. What matters here is only the trigger: different subject, different construction.

The honest exception: asking, telling, helping

The same-subject rule has a real exception, and pretending otherwise would leave you unable to read half of what you hear. A small group of verbs — ביקש מ־ ask, אמר ל־ tell, עזר ל־ help, הרשה ל־ allow — name the second person themselves, in a ל־ or מ־ phrase, and then take an infinitive whose subject is that person rather than the speaker.

ביקשתי ממנו להוריד את המוזיקה והוא דווקא הגביר.

bikáshti miménu lehoríd et hamúzika vehú davká higbír

I asked him to turn the music down and he turned it up instead. (he does the turning down, not I)

Notice what makes this legal: the subject of the infinitive is named in the sentence, just not as its subject. That is precisely what אני רוצה אותו לבוא tries and fails to do — see mistake 2 below. רוצה has no ל־ slot to put a person in, so it has no way of licensing a second subject, and the ש-clause is the only route.

Common Mistakes

1. Reaching for the English gerund. This is the big one, and it is invisible to most learners because the English is so natural. English uses -ing, not the infinitive, after start, stop, keep, finish, like and enjoy — stop smoking, start working, enjoy cooking. Hebrew has no gerund at all. Every one of those verbs takes the plain infinitive.

❌ התחלתי עובד שם בחורף

Incorrect — the second verb cannot be a present-tense form. Hebrew has nothing corresponding to English '-ing' here, only the infinitive: התחלתי לעבוד שם בחורף. Same for הפסקתי לעשן, אני אוהב לבשל.

✅ התחלתי לעבוד שם בחורף ועדיין לא מכיר את כולם.

hitkhálti la'avód sham bakhóref va'adáyin lo makír et kulám

I started working there in the winter and I still don't know everyone. (m. speaker)

2. Building I want him to come with אותו. English puts the second subject in the object case and follows it with an infinitive. Hebrew cannot: an infinitive has no subject slot for אותו to fill, and the result is a string with no grammatical reading at all.

❌ אני רוצה אותו לבוא

Incorrect — רוצה takes no object-plus-infinitive. When the two subjects differ, Hebrew uses ש with a finite verb in the future: אני רוצה שהוא יבוא.

✅ אני רוצה שהוא יבוא איתנו, אבל הוא לא עונה לי.

aní rotsé shehú yavó itánu, avál hu lo oné li

I want him to come with us, but he's not answering me. (m. speaker)

3. Making the second verb agree. The pull here is the belief that a Hebrew verb always agrees with its subject — true of finite verbs, and the infinitive is not one. A learner who has drilled היא נוסעת produces it again in the second slot.

❌ היא רוצה נוסעת לאילת בשבת

Incorrect — the second verb must be the infinitive, which never agrees with anything: היא רוצה לנסוע לאילת בשבת. רוצה already carries the feminine.

✅ היא רוצה לנסוע לאילת בשבת, ואני רוצה לישון.

hi rotsá linsóa le'eilát beshabát, va'aní rotsé lishón

She wants to drive to Eilat on Saturday and I want to sleep. (m. speaker)

4. Dropping the ש. English I want him to come has no that in it, so nothing prompts you to supply one — and unlike English that, Hebrew's ש is never optional.

❌ אני רוצה הוא יבוא

Incorrect — a finite clause after רוצה must be introduced by ש, written solid onto the next word: אני רוצה שהוא יבוא.

✅ אני רוצה שתתקשרי אליי מחר בבוקר, לא היום.

aní rotsé shetitkashrí elái makhár babóker, lo hayóm

I want you to ring me tomorrow morning, not today. (to a woman)

Key Takeaways

A conjugated verb plus an infinitive is Hebrew's basic two-verb sentence: the first verb carries everything, the infinitive carries nothing — no gender, no number, no tense.
No linking word goes between them. There is no separate word for to; the ל is the infinitive's first letter. An adverb can still come between the two (מנסה שוב להתקשר) — what is missing is the particle, not the slot.
The everyday governing verbs are רוצה, אוהב, מנסה, מתחיל, ממשיך, מפסיק, מחליט, מסכים, שוכח, זוכר, מקווה, יודע, לומד, and all of them take the infinitive bare.
יודע plus an infinitive is "know how to" — אני יודע לנהוג. Hebrew supplies no word for how.
The rule is same-subject. The infinitive borrows the main verb's subject, so it is only available when the same person does both things.
Different subjects means ש plus a finite verb, and after verbs of wanting that verb is in the future: היא רוצה להתחיל against היא רוצה שנתחיל.
ביקש מ־, אמר ל־, עזר ל־ and הרשה ל־ are the honest exception: they name the second subject in a ל־ or מ־ phrase, and then an infinitive is legal after all.
English -ing after start, stop and like is an infinitive in Hebrew, and *אני רוצה אותו לבוא is not a Hebrew sentence in any register.

Now practice Hebrew

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

Start learning Hebrew →