In short

Two more gzarot whose middle collapses. Hollow verbs (ע”ו / ע”י) — some of the most everyday verbs in Hebrew: קם (kam, “get up”), גר (gar, “live”), שם (sam, “put”), שר (shar, “sing”), בא (ba, “come”) — hide the ו or י of their middle slot, so the stem shrinks to two consonants. Geminate verbs (ע”ע, “the doubled ones”, הכפולים) like חגג (chagag, “celebrate”) carry the same consonant in the last two slots — and in Modern Hebrew pa’al keep both copies throughout (חוגג, חגגתי), conjugating essentially like strong verbs, so the trap is not to collapse them. You already built the hollow present and past back in the first gzarot lesson; here we complete the picture across present, past and future, and add the hif’il.

The payoff is a handful of predictable signatures: a bare skeleton with no linking vowel in the past, a present that is identical to the past 3ms, and a “commuting” mater (the ו/י) that vanishes in present and past but returns in the infinitive and future. Learn those, and dozens of high-frequency verbs conjugate themselves.

The rule

• Two shapes, one problem: a middle radical that won’t stay put. In the template פ־ע־ל, hollow verbs hold a ו or י in the middle “ע” slot (קום, גור, שים) and that letter disappears from the present and past, leaving a bare two-consonant skeleton (קם, גר, שם). Geminate verbs hold the same consonant in the “ע” and “ל” slots (חגג, סבב); in everyday Modern Hebrew the common pa’al ones keep both copies everywhere (present חוגג, past חגגתי), conjugating like strong verbs — the old collapse of one copy survives in hif’il (הגן, below) and in a few literary forms.

• Hollow present = the bare CaC skeleton + gender/number. קם (kam), קמה (kama), קמים (kamim), קמות (kamot). Like every present tense it marks gender and number but no person, and here there is simply no middle letter to see — the same for שם (sam / sama) and גר (gar / gara).

• Hollow past has no linking vowel. The ordinary past endings attach straight onto the two-consonant stem: קמתי (kamti), שמתי (samti), גרנו (garnu), קמו (kamu). You do not insert a helping “a”: it is samti, never *samati, and garti, never *garati.

• Present m.sg and past 3ms are identical. Because both are just the bare skeleton, קם is at once “(he) gets up” and “(he) got up”; שם is “puts” and “put”; שר is “sings” and “sang”. Only context or a time word — אתמול (etmol, “yesterday”), עכשיו (achshav, “now”) — resolves the tense.

• The hidden mater comes back in the infinitive and future. The ו / י that vanished from the present and past reappears in the shem ha-po’al and the prefix conjugation: לקום (lakum) / יקום (yakum), לגור (lagur) / יגור (yagur), לשים (lasim) / ישים (yasim). This is also the one place ע”ו and ע”י finally differ: ע”ו shows u (yakum, lakum), ע”י shows i (yasim, lasim). Present and past look the same for both classes.

• Geminate verbs look deceptively strong. In the present, חגג gives חוגג (chogeg) — indistinguishable in shape from a strong pa’al participle like שומר (shomer), and already carrying both gimels. Both radicals in fact surface in every pa’al form; the past is simply where you are tempted to drop one, so keep them: חגגתי (chagagti), חגגנו (chagagnu), 3ms חגג (chagag). Don’t collapse them into *חגתי.

• Hif’il too: the mater surfaces only in the “open” forms. A hollow root in hif’il keeps an i-vowel stem in the present, the third-person past, the future and the infinitive — מבין (mevin), הבין (hevin), יבין (yavin), להבין (lehavin) — but drops it in the “closed” past persons: הבנתי (hevanti), הבנת (hevanta), הבנו (hevanu). Watch the present: it is מבין (mevin) with e, never *mavin. Same shape for הקים (hekim, “establish/set up”): מקים (mekim), הקים (hekim), יקים (yakim), להקים (lehakim).

• Geminate in hif’il keeps one stem consonant + the ending. הגן (root ג־נ־נ, “defend / protect”) gives present מגן (megen), past הגן (hegen) and הגנתי (heganti), future יגן (yagen), infinitive להגן (lehagen). It governs the preposition על — מגן על הבית (megen al ha-bayit, “protects the house”). Mind the homograph: unvocalized מגן is also the noun מגן (magen, “shield”).

Forms & patterns

pa’al hollow ע”ו — קום (get up). Present marks gender/number only:

Same root קום — past & future across persons (mater hidden in past, back in future):

Infinitive: לקום (lakum) — the ו returns, exactly as in the future.

Frequent pa’al hollow anchors — ע”ו and ע”י. The class only shows in future/infinitive:

pa’al geminate ע”ע — חגג (celebrate). Strong-looking present, doubled past:

hif’il — hollow & geminate. i-stem in the open forms, dropped in the closed past:

Examples

Common mistakes

• אני קום בבוקר -> אני קם בבוקר (ani kam ba-boker) - the hollow present hides the middle ו: it is קם (kam), never *קום (that stem shows only in לקום / יקום).
• קומתי מוקדם -> קמתי מוקדם (kamti mukdam) - the mater stays hidden in the past too; “I got up” is קמתי (kamti), not *קומתי.
• שמתי (samati) -> שמתי (samti) - no linking vowel in the hollow past; the ending attaches straight to the bare stem, so samti, never *samati.
• אני מבין (mavin) -> אני מבין (mevin) - the hif’il hollow present takes e, not a: it is mevin, never *mavin.
• הבינתי את השאלה -> הבנתי את השאלה (hevanti et ha-she’ela) - the yod drops in the hif’il hollow 1st/2nd-person past; “I understood” is הבנתי (hevanti), with no yod.
• חגתי -> חגגתי (chagagti) - a geminate verb keeps both identical radicals in the past; “I celebrated” is חגגתי, not a collapsed *חגתי.
• מתי תשב הביתה? (for “return”) -> מתי תשוב הביתה? (matai tashuv ha-bayta) - in the future the hidden ו comes back: “will return” is תשוב (tashuv); bare *תשב would read as תשב (teshev, “will sit”, root ישב).

Tips

• Anchor each hollow verb by two forms: the present m.sg (which equals the past 3ms) and the infinitive, which reveals the hidden mater — קם / לקום, גר / לגור, שם / לשים.
• The mater commutes: hidden in present and past (קם, קמתי; שם, שמתי), back in the infinitive and future (לקום, יקום; לשים, ישים). Learn the pair and the class is solved.
• Present m.sg and past 3ms are the same word: קם is “he gets up” and “he got up”, שם is “puts” and “put”. Lean on a time word (אתמול, עכשיו) to fix the tense.
• No linking vowel in the hollow past — attach the ending straight onto the bare stem: קמתי (kamti), שמנו (samnu), גרו (garu). Say samti, garnu, kamu, not *samati.
• ע”ו and ע”י diverge only in the future/infinitive vowel: ע”ו takes u (יקום yakum, לקום lakum), ע”י takes i (ישים yasim, לשים lasim). Everything else is identical.
• Pa’al geminate verbs conjugate like strong verbs in Modern Hebrew (hif’il collapses them: הגן, מגן) — חוגג (chogeg, the ordinary CoCeC shape) already carries both gimels, and the past keeps them too: חגגתי (chagagti), חגגנו (chagagnu). The only trap is dropping a radical — never *חגתי.
• In hif’il, a hollow root keeps its i-stem in the “open” forms (מבין mevin, הבין hevin, יבין yavin, להבין lehavin) but drops it in the “closed” past persons (הבנתי hevanti, הבנו hevanu).
• Don’t confuse the participle מגן (megen, “defends / protects”) with the identically spelled noun מגן (magen, “shield”) — same letters, different vowel and meaning.