Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Bearpecs AT aol.com]

In a message dated 7/26/2005 12:35:59 PM Eastern Daylight Time,  joel AT exc.com 
writes:

In  Modern Hebrew, past-tense motion verbs (but not other
verbs) are used for  future-tense suggestions (e.g., "HALAXNU?,"
literally "did we go?"   meaning "shall we go?") [This example is
doubly interesting because  "SHARNU," "did we sing?" cannot mean "shall
we sing?"  It basically  only works with motion verbs.]


But I have also heard "ma ratsita?" (lit. "what did you want?") to mean  
"what do you want?" or better: the more polite (in English) "what would you  
like?"