124
Language points Days of the week and ordinal numbers In Dialogue 1 above, Maya refers to yom shishi, yom khamishi, yom shabat – the days of the week. Hebrew uses ordinals to name the days, echoing the order of creation in that first week in Genesis. Ordinals have both masculine and feminine forms and follow the noun. You’ll notice that, apart from ‘first’, which comes from rosh ÷‡¯ ‘head’, ordinals derive from the cardinals you have already learnt, with some vowel changes. Generally ‘i’ È is added for the masculine and ‘it’ ˙È for the feminine.
(‰)Ô«÷‡¯
1st
rishon(-ah,f.)
2nd
sheni(shniyah)
3rd
shlishi(-t)
(˙)È÷ÈÏ÷
4th
revi-i(-t)
(˙)ÈÚÈ·¯
5th
khamishi(-t)
6th
shishi(-t)
(˙)È÷È÷
7th
shvi-i(-t)
(˙)ÈÚÈ·÷
8th
shmini(-t)
(˙)ÈÈÓ÷
9th
tshi-i(-t)
(˙)ÈÚÈ÷˙
10th
asiri(-t)
(˙)ȯÈ◊Ú
(‰)È÷
(˙)È÷ÈÓÁ
‘Day’ yom Ì«È is masculine in Hebrew, so the days of the week use the masculine form of the ordinals. The last day of the week, the seventh day, Saturday, is a day of rest in the Bible, the Sabbath shabat ˙·÷ . So the first day of the week in Israel, yom rishon Ô«÷‡¯ Ì«È , is Sunday. Israelis also often use the Aleph Bet letters to specify the days of the week, mostly in writing.