Four-Radical Pi'el Verbs: תרגם, טלפן, ארגן, פרסם | Hebrew Grammar

תִּרְגֵּם translated, טִלְפֵּן phoned, אִרְגֵּן organised, פִּרְסֵם published, שִׁכְפֵּל copied, בִּלְבֵּל confused, גִּלְגֵּל rolled. Four root letters each, and not one of them needs a rule you do not already have. This page gives you the full paradigm, the passive, the verbal noun — and the one place where these verbs genuinely differ from דיבר, which is on the page rather than in the mouth.

Why a fourth radical is possible in pi'el but impossible in pa'al is worked out on four-letter roots. The short version: pi'el's mould has four consonant positions, and a three-letter root fills the extra one by doubling its middle radical. Give it four distinct letters and the doubling simply is not needed.

ת־ר־ג־ם in full

Form	Pointed	Written	Reading
Present m.sg.	מְתַרְגֵּם	מתרגם	metargém
Present f.sg.	מְתַרְגֶּמֶת	מתרגמת	metargémet
Present m.pl.	מְתַרְגְּמִים	מתרגמים	metargemím
Present f.pl.	מְתַרְגְּמוֹת	מתרגמות	metargemót
Past — אני	תִּרְגַּמְתִּי	תרגמתי	tirgámti
Past — הוא	תִּרְגֵּם	תרגם	tirgém
Past — היא	תִּרְגְּמָה	תרגמה	tirgemá
Past — הם / הן	תִּרְגְּמוּ	תרגמו	tirgemú
Future — אני	אֲתַרְגֵּם	אתרגם	atargém
Future — הוא	יְתַרְגֵּם	יתרגם	yetargém
Future — את	תְּתַרְגְּמִי	תתרגמי	tetargemí
Imperative m.sg.	תַּרְגֵּם!	תרגם!	targém
Infinitive	לְתַרְגֵּם	לתרגם	letargém

Set that beside דיבר and the correspondence is exact: dibér · medabér · yedabér · ledabér against tirgém · metargém · yetargém · letargém. Same prefixes, same vowels, same stress. The only structural difference is that where דיבר has one letter doing the work of two, תרגם has two letters doing the work of two.

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If you can conjugate דיבר you can conjugate טלפן — there is nothing further to learn. Slot the four consonants into the frame you already have: טִלְפֵּן · מְטַלְפֵּן · יְטַלְפֵּן · לְטַלְפֵּן, אִרְגֵּן · מְאַרְגֵּן · יְאַרְגֵּן · לְאַרְגֵּן. This is exactly why Hebrew's new verbs land here and not somewhere with a paradigm to memorise.

את יכולה לתרגם לי את זה? זה קצר, שתי שורות.

at yekholá letargém li et ze? ze katsár, shtei shurót

Can you translate this for me? It's short — two lines. (to a woman)

המזכירה טלפנה מהמרפאה ואמרה שהתור בוטל.

hamazkirá tilpená mehamirpa'á ve'amrá shehatór butál

The receptionist rang from the clinic and said the appointment had been cancelled.

אני מארגנת את המשמרות לחודש הבא, תגידו לי מתי אתם יכולים.

aní me'argénet et hamishmarót lakhódesh habá, tagídu li matáy atém yekholím

I'm putting next month's shifts together — tell me when you're free. (f. speaker, to a group)

פרסמו את רשימת הזוכים אתמול בלילה ואף אחד לא שם לב.

pirsemú et reshimát hazokhím etmól baláyla ve'áf ekhád lo sam lev

They put the winners' list out last night and nobody noticed.

The one real difference: a shva that gets pronounced

Everything above is regular. But listen to the two paradigms in the cells with a vowel-initial ending and they come apart:

דיברה dibrá · דיברו dibrú — the stem vowel vanishes and you get the cluster br.
תרגמה tirgemá · תרגמו tirgemú — the stem vowel does not vanish.

The reason is the ordinary shva rule. תִּרְגְּמָה has two shvas in a row — under the ר and under the ג — and the second of two consecutive shvas is a shva na, which is pronounced. דִּיבְּרָה has only one, and it is silent. The phonetics agree: without that vowel you would have to say r-g-m in one breath, where דיברה only asks for b-r.

Pealim prints exactly this: tirgemá, tirgemú, metargemím, tetargemí. Compare dibrá, dibrú, medabrím, tedabrí.

גלגלנו את השטיח והוצאנו אותו למרפסת.

gilgálnu et hashatíakh vehotsénu otó lamirpéset

We rolled the rug up and put it out on the balcony.

אתה מבלבל אותי, תתחיל מההתחלה.

atá mevalbél otí, tatkhíl mehahatkhalá

You're confusing me — start from the beginning. (to a man)

שכפלנו את הטופס בשלושה עותקים ושלחנו לכולם.

shikhpálnu et hatófes bishloshá otakím veshalákhnu lekhulám

We ran off three copies of the form and sent it round to everyone.

The spelling: no yod, and why

This is the page's practical payoff, and the usual explanation of it is wrong. The Academy's rule is that an i is written with a yod — unless the next letter carries a shva nach. That condition, not "open versus closed syllable", is what decides.

דִּיבֵּר — the letter after the chirik is a doubled ב, and its second half carries a vowel. Not a shva nach. Yod goes in: דיבר.
תִּרְגֵּם — the letter after the chirik is a plain ר with a shva nach. Yod stays out: תרגם.

So the whole four-radical class writes bare: תרגם, פרסם, ארגן, טלפן, שכפל, בלבל, גלגל, תרגמתי, פרסמו, מארגן. Say it the other way round and you get דיבר wrong, which is why the "closed syllable" version of the rule keeps misfiring. The general statement is on ktiv male rules.

The passive and the verbal noun

pi'el's passive is pu'al, and it is automatic — you do not choose it. ת־ר־ג־ם gives תּוּרְגַּם turgám "was translated" and the participle מְתוּרְגָּם meturgám "translated", which behaves as an ordinary adjective. The verbal noun is תִּרְגּוּם tirgúm, written תרגום, alongside the noun תַּרְגּוּם targúm — both spelled the same bare, and both meaning "a translation".

הספר תורגם לשתים עשרה שפות, ולעברית רק בשנה שעברה.

haséfer turgám lishtéim esré safót, ule'ivrít rak bashaná she'avrá

The book has been translated into twelve languages — into Hebrew only last year.

כל האתר מתורגם לרוסית ולערבית, אבל התפריט לא.

kol ha'atár meturgám lerusít ule'arvít, avál hatafrít lo

The whole site is translated into Russian and Arabic, but the menu isn't.

התרגום שלך הרבה יותר ברור מהמקור.

hatirgúm shelkhá harbé yotér barúr mehamakór

Your translation is a lot clearer than the original. (to a man)

Where the four letters come from

Three sources, and it is worth knowing which is which:

Source	Verbs	What happened
Reduplication	בִּלְבֵּל · גִּלְגֵּל · צִלְצֵל · זִמְזֵם	a two-letter base copied twice
From a noun	טִלְפֵּן ← טלפון · חִשְׁמֵל ← חשמל · תִּקְצֵב ← תקציב	the noun's consonants read as a root
Borrowed	פִרְמֵט ← format · טִרְפֵּד ← torpedo	four consonants kept, the rest discarded

ויקימילון states the טלפן derivation outright — גזירת פועל מן טלפון, "a verb derived from טלפון" — and marks the entry עברית חדשה, Modern Hebrew. The noun-based type has a page of its own: pi'el built from nouns.

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Be careful reading register off a dictionary. Milog carries no register labels at all, so finding a verb there tells you it exists, not that it is neutral standard Hebrew. Pealim does label — it marks סימס and גיגל as slang and gives תרגם, ארגן, פרסם and שכפל no label at all. Those four are as ordinary as any verb in the language and turn up in legislation and academic prose.

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When a ready-made verb exists, use it. English builds phrases around nouns — make a phone call, do a translation — and learners carry that habit across. Hebrew has the verb and prefers it: טלפנתי or the commoner התקשרתי rather than a phrase built on טלפון; תרגמתי את המסמך rather than a phrase built on תרגום. Both Hebrew options here are perfectly ordinary; the phrase-built version is the one that marks you out.

Common Mistakes

1. Writing a yod in a four-radical verb. The over-correction from דיברתי, and by far the commonest error with this class.

❌ טילפנתי אליו פעמיים ולא ענה

Incorrect as ktiv male — in טִלְפַּנְתִּי the chirik is followed by a shva nach on the ל, so no yod is written: טלפנתי. Same for פרסמתי, ארגנתי, גלגלתי.

✅ טלפנתי אליו פעמיים והוא לא ענה.

tilpánti eláv pa'amáyim vehú lo aná

I rang him twice and he didn't pick up.

2. Swallowing the shva in the 3fs and plural. The habit comes from דיברה dibrá, where it really is swallowed.

❌ תרגמה

tirgmá

Incorrect — tirgemá. Two shvas fall in a row (ר then ג), and the second of two is a shva na, so it is pronounced. Likewise תרגמו tirgemú, מתרגמים metargemím, תתרגמי tetargemí.

✅ היא תרגמה את כל החוזה בלילה אחד.

hi tirgemá et kol hakhozé beláyla ekhád

She translated the whole contract in one night.

3. Putting the stress on the ending in the past. Hebrew stress is mostly final, so learners apply it everywhere.

❌ תרגמתי

tirgamtí

Incorrect — tirgámti, stressed on the second syllable, exactly like dibárti. In everyday speech only תרגם, תרגמה and תרגמו carry final stress; the normative תרגמתם / תרגמתן do too, but Israelis say tirgámtem.

✅ תרגמתי את זה מהר מדי ויצאו לי שתי טעויות.

tirgámti et ze mahér midái veyats'ú li shtei ta'uyót

I translated it too fast and made two mistakes.

4. Reaching for nif'al as the passive. English speakers know נשבר, נכתב, נסגר and generalise the נ.

❌ המסמך נתרגם אתמול

Incorrect — pi'el's passive is pu'al, not nif'al: המסמך תורגם אתמול. (The string נתרגם exists, but only as נְתַרְגֵּם 'we will translate'.)

✅ המסמך תורגם אתמול ונשלח ללקוח בבוקר.

hamismákh turgám etmól venishlákh lalakóakh babóker

The document was translated yesterday and sent to the client in the morning.

Key Takeaways

A fourth radical fills the position a dagesh fills in a triliteral, so nothing is doubled and there is no new paradigm — תרגם runs exactly like דיבר.
Learn the set together: תרגם · מתרגם · יתרגם · לתרגם, passive תורגם / מתורגם, verbal noun תרגום.
The one audible difference: the shva survives where a triliteral loses it — tirgemá, tirgemú, metargemím against dibrá, dibrú, medabrím, because three consonants cannot stack.
No yod in ktiv male: תרגם, פרסם, ארגן, טלפן. The trigger is a following shva nach, not a closed syllable — דיבר is closed and keeps its yod because the doubled ב has a vowel on its far side.
The roots arrive three ways: reduplication (בלבל, גלגל), from nouns (טלפן, חשמל, תקצב), from borrowings (פרמט, טרפד).
Milog applies no register labels, so an entry there is not evidence a coinage is neutral. Pealim marks סימס and גיגל as slang and gives תרגם, ארגן and פרסם no label at all.

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