Structure
Verb［stem］+ はじめる
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About はじめる
To express that actions are beginning or ending in Japanese, the verbs 始める (to commence), or 終わる (to end) will need to be used. In this lesson, we will focus on actions that are 'beginning'.
To say that (A) is starting/beginning, we will need to attach はじめる to the ます stem of almost any verb. Whether you use the hiragana form, or the kanji form does not matter, as there will be no change in nuance.
Due to はじめる being a verb itself, the tense can be changed, to show that something will start, is starting, or has started.
Caution
It can be easy to accidentally use 始まる, the intransitive form of this verb. However, with this expression, the transitive form will always be used, due to the verb that はじめる is attached to being the thing that 'is started', by 'something' else.
Antonyms
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Examples
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今朝、雪が降りはじめた。
It started to snow this morning.
明日から、日本語を習いはじめます。
I will start learning Japanese from tomorrow.
練習しはじめてください。
Please begin to (do) practice.
９時になってから、働きはじめた。
I started working from nine.
彼が話し始めてから１時間経った。
It has been an hour since he started talking.
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…始める and …だす
Wasabi
How to use V+はじめる
MaggieSensei
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[AIAIJ] An Integrated Approach to Intermediate Japanese
Page 133
[DBJG] A Dictionary of Basic Japanese Grammar
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Tobira
Page 18
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はじめる – Grammar Discussion
Most Recent Replies (16 in total)
Hqrshy
I’ve seen other stuff like this and I am kind of confused. Why is it はじめた instead of はじまた because nobody is causing the snow to fall, it is falling by itself shouldn’t the intransitive version be used?
nekoyama
When 始める is used as an auxiliary, the main verb is what determines transitivity. 降り始める is therefore intransitive because 降る is intransitive.
You can think of it as 降り acting as the object for 始める.
始まる isn’t used as an auxiliary and if it was, its past form would be 始まった.
Guguru-san
Think of it as if it said “rain began to fall” (instead of “rain”). That way it’s easier to understand it as a transitive.
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