Word
לא נתחיל את שריפת הביסק, אלא אם כן הייבוש יסתיים.
Meaning
We will not begin the bisque firing unless the drying is finished.
Part of speech
sentence
Pronunciation
Course
Breakdown of לא נתחיל את שריפת הביסק, אלא אם כן הייבוש יסתיים.
לא
not
את
direct object marker
להתחיל
to start
להיגמר
to end
Questions & Answers about לא נתחיל את שריפת הביסק, אלא אם כן הייבוש יסתיים.
Why is נתחיל enough to mean we will begin? Where is the word for we?
In Hebrew, the verb itself usually tells you the person and number.
- נתחיל = we will begin / we will start
- the prefix נ־ in the future tense marks first person plural: we
So Hebrew does not need a separate word for we here.
The subject is built into the verb.
Related forms:
- אתחיל = I will begin
- תתחיל = you will begin / she will begin
- יתחיל = he will begin
- נתחיל = we will begin
The base verb is להתחיל.
Why do we say לא נתחיל for we will not begin?
לא is the normal word for negating ordinary verbs in Hebrew.
So:
- נתחיל = we will begin
- לא נתחיל = we will not begin
This is the standard way to negate past, present, and future verb forms in normal statements.
That is different from:
- אל, which is mainly used for negative commands
- אין, which is used in different kinds of present-tense existential/nominal sentences
So here לא is exactly what you want.
Why is there an before ?