Biblical Hebrew for All
«The Weak verbs»

Volume 2

The Weak verbs

In this series, a "weak verb" is defined as: "a verb with a root that has as its radicals: one, and only one, guttural, plus two different strong consonants." 
In this instance, resh is considered to be a strong consonant, but waw and yod are, with a few exceptions, not considered to be strong consonants.
The Roman numbers I, II, III, are used to indicate the position of the guttural in the root of the verb. For example: III-hey indicates that the verb has a hey as a radical in the third position. In other words, the root ends in a hey.
The weak verbs can be classified into twelve classes according to the four stronggutturals, multiplied by the three root positions in a root where they could be found. Except for II-guttural verbs, resh is excluded as it presents no unexpected influences.
Chapter Class Description Example
I-guttural A guttural in the first root position
30 א I א in the first root position אָמַר, אָסַר
31 ע I ע in the first root position עָמַד
32 ח I ח in the first root position חָזַק
33 ה I ה in the first root position הָלַךְ
II-guttural A guttural in the second root position
34 א II א in the second root position שָׁאַל
35 ע II ע in the second root position בָּעַר
36 ר II / ח II ר / ח in the second root position בָּחַר
37 ה II ה in the second root position מָהַר
III-guttural A guttural in the third root position
38 א III א in the third root position מָצָא
39 ע III ע in the third root position שָׁמַע
40 ח III ח in the third root position בָּרַח
41 ה III ה in the third root position בָּנָה

Notes:

With weak verbs, only vowel changes take place.
In weak verbs, the vowel changes take place in those forms that have prefixes and vocal shewas, namely the imperfect, imperative, and infinitives.
With irregular verbs however, vowel changes as well as changes to the radicals (root consonants) can occur.
(Chapters 42 - 46)
In Chapter 1.4 of Volume 1 it was shown that the strong gutturals display certain peculiarities. Keeping these peculiarities in mind and adhering to all vocalization rules known by now, we could surmise that many weak verbs behave in what could be called: "an expected or normal I-, II-, or III-guttural verb fashion."