Today Hebrew grammar is well understood and there are many books on it. Rashi, however, lived before the age of grammar books. A major Rashi method is therefore the teaching of basic grammar.

Many students belittle this aspect of Rashi. They erroneously think that because of modern methods we know more. However Rashi will frequently focus on rare grammatical points not covered in conventional textbooks.

There are many classical aspects to grammar whether in Hebrew or other languages. They include
• The rules for conjugating verbs. These rules govern how you differentiate person, plurality, tense, mode, gender, mood, and designation of the objects and indirect objects of the verb. For example how do you conjugate, in any language, I sang, we will sing, we wish to sing, she sang it.
• Rules of agreement. For example agreement of subject and verb, of noun and adjective; whether agreement in gender or plurality.
• Rules of Pronoun reference.
• Rules of word sequence. This is a beautiful topic which is not always covered in classical grammatical textbooks.

Today we discuss some aspects of the conjugations. In all languages there are several present tenses.
• Simple present: I am going to the store.
• Habitual Present: I go to the store every day for work.
• Informational/Conditional Present: If I need food I go to the store.
Although all three of these sentences are present their meaning as well as their conjugation, indicated by the underlined words, differ. For example the simple present indicates activity actually being done now. By contrast, the habitual present indicates intended activity in the past, present and future. As can be seen from the underlined words the conjugations used to indicate the differents presents can differ.

Verse Gn29-08b discussing when the shepards in Beer Sheva watered their flocks states And they said: 'We cannot, until all the flocks be gathered together, and they roll the stone from the well's mouth; then we water the sheep and then return the stone to its place on the mouth of the well.' The underlined words until....be gathered ....roll indicate a conditional present. The words until ...be gathered indicates a future action and is conjugated in the text with a future conjugation. The word roll indicates action that habitually happens daily. Like any habitual action it refers to the past, present and future. Because the conditional trigger of this action is the future gathering of all the flocks the conjugation of this habitual present is indicated via a past conjugation and a prefix vav, which always indicates the future in Biblical Hebrew.

Advanced Rashi: Two further points should be made: First the meaning of the verse is clear We habitually gather every day, roll the stone, water the flock and return the stone. ##### ##### ##### #####