The Most Common Difficulties in Translating English to Hebrew

Translators are having rough time translating from English to Hebrew. Here are some of the most common mistakes that happen in the process in general and specifically in those two languages. Here are the most common difficulties in translating English to Hebrew.

The Most Common Difficulties in Translating English to Hebrew

Culture Differences

Cultural differences is one of the most common causes of translation gaps. The translation journal simplifies it to several categories; all of them relevant. Some of the words in English don’t exist in Hebrew because they aren’t a part of Hebrew speakers day to day lives.


When I took a writing class with my other Israeli born students; they had a rough time writing idioms in English. This works both ways; finding an idiom could take a long time during translation in general and specifically in English to Hebrew translation. I believe the reason is very simple; most of us haven’t come from the same cultural background.


If you translate a book from English to Hebrew than get ready; the translated text will be 70% shorter. Hebrew is much more conclusive and succinct. It takes less words to convey the same message. If you translate “I want to have a drink” from English to Hebrew you might find it very short – “אני רוצה משהו לשתות”. If you noticed 6 words became 4. “I am going to sleep”; “אני הולך לישון”. Right here, 5 words became 3. This will be the case in 90% of the cases.


In Hebrew and in English connectors have different usage. The translator must know the specific use of connectors in each one of those languages.


This is actually not a difficulty. In Hebrew, there are less grammatical forms than in English. Therefore, it sometime makes our job easier. Nevertheless, one should consider the context. If there are less grammatical form then the target language users understand the grammar and syntax from the context.

Summary – The Most Common Difficulties in Translating English to Hebrew

These are just some of the common difficulties in translation English to Hebrew. Each one of these categories include subcategories of their own. You can write a book about these differences.