Author: Ahmed Farahat

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من رواد النهضة العربية

رفاعة الطهطاوي
كتاب تخليص الإبريز في تلخيص باريز

1. تراكيب وصفية متتابعة

This is a topic we dealt with earlier (see Lesson 2 Grammar Note 2). There are several constructions with  جمل وصفية  in this lesson, which will help us review this important construction.

a.

لقب يدلّ على أهمّيّته

اوّل معهد أنشئ خارج الإطر الديني

In both of these cases, the pronoun that refers to the head noun (in bold) is the subject of the verb in   الجملتين الوصفيتين  (underscored).

b.

عملان رئيسيان هما قاموسه … وموسوعته

Here  الجملة الوصفية  is an equational sentence which may not have occurred before, but which should present no problem; the resumptive pronoun is   هما  which is الجملة الوصفية   مبتدأ .

One more point. The head noun has two modifiers an adjective   رئيسيان   and a sentence  هما قاموسه … وموسوعته  , without a coordinator. This is very common in Arabic and is no stranger to English. In fact as we will see presently more than two such modifiers with no coordinator can occur. But first,

c يستند الى اسبابٍ منها التاريخ واللغة الخ   .

Here الجملة الوصفية   is an equational sentence whose predicate is a prepositional phrase, and the resumptive pronoun is attached to the partitive prep. من     . Hence the meaning of it: ‘reasons some of which are’.

Here are other examples:

صوتا   فيه  قوّةُ الرحمة

عُرف بخصائص منها حبّه لكلّ جديد

d. ألّف كتاباً عن باريس  عنوانه “الابريز …”  وصف فيه الحياة في فرنسا 

                  3                                  2            1

Here we have three modifiers to the head noun  كتاباً  .

(i)  عن باريس                             prep. phrase

(ii) عنوانه “الابريز”      مضاف اليه )resumptive pr. (مضاف +  ‘whose’

(iii) وصف فيه الحياة في فرنسا )resumptive pr. + prep.)                        ‘in which’

Here are other examples of multiple modifiers in a series

قبائل  متعدّدة  لكلّ منها رئيس يدعى الشيخ  يخضع له افراد القبيلة

سوق  قريبة  تدعى عكاظ   يبيعون فيها منتجاته

مدارس  ذات طابع دينيّ خاص   تسمّى كتاتيب   يعلّم فيها القرآن

ألّف كتاباً مشهورا عن باريس يقرأ ه كل من يهمّه الأمر  عنوانه “الابريز …”  وصف فيه الطهطاوي الحياة في فرنسا 

Notice that in addition to a series of modifiers for one head noun,  it is possible to have within modifying units nouns that are themselves head nouns and are modified. Thus,  the first sentence above then reads translates: (they were) numerous tribes to each of which there was a chief who was called “Sheik” and to whom every member of the tribe submitted.

A series of  modifiers of various kinds (such as ( صفة، نعت سببي، اسم فاعل  and a combination thereof without conjunctions can occur in attributive constructions, in predicates, and in جمل حالية, but not as مفعول لأجله.

Also, here are more examples of (i) above:

مدارس  للبنات 

شابّ  من مستواها

برامج  باللغة العربية

شغل مناصب من بينها منصب وزير التعليم  He occupied   positions among which is the position of Minister of

e أعظم عملٍ قام به

The resumptive pronoun is attached to a preposition which is obligatory in Arabic and part of the collocation  قام ب  ; the corresponding English verb does not have it.

 امر آخر كنت داعياً من دعاته

Any problem? Can you come up with 2 sentences having structures like d. and e.  ?

1. مُنْذُ/مُذْ

Like other adverbials of time and place  مُنْذُ  )and its less commonly used  form (مُذْ is used as a preposition, followed by a noun or noun phrase, or a conjunction, followed directly by a sentence or a noun clause مؤوّل   مصدر   . Like   حيثُ  it is  indeclinable. As head of its adverbial construction, it is used by itself (i.e. no preposition precedes or follows it) and follows the main clause it modifies, though it may precede it.

1. منذ    as a preposition

As a preposition,  منذ  can be followed by a verb-initial sentence carries the meaning of ‘since’, ‘from a certain period of time until now’, ‘ago’/‘at a certain point in time’, as well as ‘from this time on’, depending on the context.

منذ عصر الجاهلية                                  since pre-Islamic times

منذ تأسيسها                                              since their founding

منذ سنوات عديدة اسكن هنا                            I’ve lived here for many years.

كنت اسكن هنا منذ عشرين عاماً        I was living here twenty years ago.

سكنت هنا منذ سنة 1960 وحتى سنة 1980       I lived here from 1960 to 1980.

سأبدأ بالمشروع منذ الآن                               I will begin the project, as of now.

2.  منذ   as a conjunction

مُنْذُ   can be followed by a verb initial sentence جملة فعلية  , or a noun clause headed by  أنْ مصدر مؤوّل , with the verb in the perfect. In both cases, they can be replaced with a مصدر صريح  ‘verbal noun’  

لم نَذُق طعم النوم منذ (انْ) وصلنا = منذ وصولنا  We haven’t slept a wink (lit. tasted sleep) since we arrived/our arrival.

منذ (ان) بدأ القرن = منذ بدء القرن                   since the century began (the beginning of the century).

الانسان منذ (انْ)  وُجد لا يعرف معنى الحُرّيّة      Man, ever since he was created,  has not known freedom.

3.  منذ ….. و ….. 

As indicated above, the construction with   منذ   may also occur at the beginning of a sentence. As such, a striking feature is that it may be followed by a clause introduced by a و . Observe this sentence from the Basic Text:

ومنذ ذلك الحين وهي تحاول تشجيع …              Since that time, they have been tying to encourage …

The implication here is “time went by since that time, with them (the governments) all the while trying to encourage …”, which would suggest that the  و   is واو الحال  ‘the circumstantial  و ’ .

 

2. معاني ما

You may well have come across the word ما in your reading and not been sure what it means; there are actually a number of different words spelled and pronounced ما with different meanings. Here are the most common:

1. النافية ما  ‘negativeما ’ ‘not’

    (1) ما النافية is used to negatea perfect verb though it is more common in MSA to use لم followed by the jussive. It however is frequently used to negate the perfect ofكان  or one of its sisters:

        ما كان صاحب مصنع. ‘He was not a factory owner.’

            ما زال شابّا صغير السن     

ما كِدنا نبدأ حتّى سمعنا صراخا

It should be noticed, though,  that in a conditional sentence with  لو  occurring in first position,  the perfect verb in  جواب الشرط  ‘apodosis’ cannot be negated with لم  but obligatorily with ما :

لو عرفت ذلك لما زرته في بيته         If I had known that, I would not have visited him in his home.

b. It is used, though rarely, to negate the imperfect indicative, but once again it very commonly negates the indicative of كان  and its sisters and of كاد :

ما تزال مدينة القدس من اهمّ المدن المقدّسة عند المسلمين

ما تكاد تقرّر الزواج حتّى تغيّر رأيَها

c. It is used to negate an equational sentence; the predicate here is optionally introduced by بِ

ما هم كاذبون او ما هم بكاذبين.           They are not lying.

It is so used when combined with   الا ‘except’, where it means ‘only’

and with an equational sentence with inverted order (predicate-subject);

 ما هي الا بنت صغيرة

ما له ايّ ُ عذر

It is so used when combined with   الا ‘except’, where it means ‘only’,

and with an equational sentence with inverted order (predicate-subject);

 ما هي الا بنت صغيرة

ما له ايّ عذر

ما بيدنا حيلة

When followed by  من  and an indefinite noun like  لا of absolute negation, , it has the meaning of ‘none at all’, ‘no … whatsoever’, ‘absolutely none’:

ما من انسان مستعد ٍّ ان يفعل ذلك

ما من مبرِّر لهذه الأوضاع

d. It is used in idiomatic constructions like ما إنْ…حتى ‘no sooner…than…’  and ما هي الا…حتى… ‘it was only…before…’:

  ما ان وصل الى اوربا حتى وقعت الحرب.        ‘No sooner had he arrived in Europe than war broke out.’

         وما هي الا لحظات حتى عرف انه يحبها. ‘It was only a few moments before he realized that he loved her.’

2. ما الاستفهامية ‘Interrogative ما’ ‘what?’

    a. ما here is an interrogative pronoun which pronoun which asks a question about a thing (in contrast to مَن which asks a question about a person) and may serve as subject or predicate in an equational sentence:

       ما النتيجة؟ ‘What is the result?’

       ما اسمك؟ ‘What is your name?’

       ما هذا؟ ‘What is this?’ (here the subject is هذا.) 

As such it is often followed by the 3rd person pronoun which is always singular, masculine or feminine, especially when the following noun is definite:

ما هي النتيجة؟ ‘What is the result?’

ما هو الفرق بين هذين الحزبين؟  ‘What is the difference between these two parties

ما هي الكلمات التي تعلّمناها اليوم؟ ‘What are the words we learned today’

Note that: as the subject or object of a verb مادا is used:   

      مادا جرى؟ ‘What happened?’       مادا تريد؟ ‘What do you want?          

In this case, a relative clause with  الذي is also often used:

ما الذي جعلك تـُقدم على هذا العمل؟  ‘What made you undertake this work?

ما الذي قاله لك في غرفته؟ ‘What did he say to you in his room?

ما , and more commonly  ماذا , may refer to a person when enquiring or wondering as to his position or nature, in the sense of ‘who might he be’:

انا استاذ ومربّي ولكن في الحقيقة ماذا أنا؟                     I am a professor and an eduction, but truly what am I?

b. As a question word, ما may serve as object of preposition, in which case is written combined with the preposition and the ’alif  اis usually shortened to  ـَ  فـَــتـْحة

        عمّ تبحثون؟ ‘What are you searching for?’

الامَ  (  +    الى ما) ‘to what?’                 علام‘on what?’                     بِمَ      ‘in what?’                                    لِمَ  ‘for what?’                                         مِمَّ  ‘from what?’                عَمَّ ((عن + ما ‘about what?’  

فيمَ ‘in what?’

عَمَّ تبحثون؟ ‘What are you searching for?’

ما however, does not form compounds with prepositionals like  عندَ ، بعدَ ، فوقَ الخَ, nor is it used as an interrogative with them.

c. Interrogative ما as well as مَن and ماذا are used in indirect questions:

سألني ما هو الشعر الحرّ؟                He asked me what free verse was.

أتعرف ماذا تريد انْ تفعل؟          Do you know what you want to do?

3. ما الاسم الموصول ‘Relative ما’    

   The indefinite relative pronoun ما includes its own antecedent: ‘that which; what’(See Lesson 2 Grammar Note 3   and Lesson 3 Grammar Note 5):

    اشترينا ما كنا في حاجة اليه       We bought what we were in need of.

خذ ما (هو) في جيبي                                              Take what is in my pocket.

ما لي لك وما لك للأولاد               What I have is yours and what is yours belongs to the children

    باعوا كلَّ ما أنتجوا            ‘They sold all that they produced.’

ندفع الآن ثمن ما نفعل(ه)         We are paying the price of what we did.

A couple of points, observed in these sentences and others, concerning relative ما are worth repeating at this point:

1) Pronouns and verbs that agree with ما are in the m.s.

2) As is the case with other relatives, the referent pronoun in the relative clause is most often dropped:

 a) when it is subject of a nominal clause and the predicate is a prepositional phrase. To the above examples, one might add the words بعد ، قبل ، عند ، بين  :

انتظر الى ما بعد غروب الشمس

يعود تاريخه الى ما قبل الميلاد

حكم ما بين العامين 1952 و1970

b) when it is object of the verb in the relative clause as in the 4th and 5th examples above.

b. relative ما is often governed by prepositions such as في ، ب ، الى ، من ، عن (and in the case of من و عن the ن is assimilated to the م ):

اخبرني عمّا جرى لك أثناء زيارتك                             Tell me what happened to you during your visit.

لا تتدخّل فيما لا يعنيك                   Don’t poke your nose in what does not concern you.

اشار الى ما قاله الرئيس           He referred to what the president said.

c. Often relative ما will follow an indefinite accusative adjective of extent or degree like كثيرا  or a noun like عادةً and the whole phrase is best translated as an adverb:

قليلا ما نذكر اسمه                  We seldom mention his name.

كثيرا ما رأيته يعمل مساءً     I have often seen him working in the evening.’

غالباً ما يكتب لي بالفرنسية            He mostly writes me in French.

الانسان أحيانا ً ما ينسى ماضيَه         Man often times forgets his past.

سرعان ما انتقل من موضوع الى آخر       He in no time moved from one subject to another.

             Or, how quickly he moved from …

These adjectives or nouns can be looked at as predicates of an underlying  كان or  حدث ‘happen, occur’ which has been elided.

d. Relative  ما  follows a number of prepositions, prepositionals, or nouns such as بِ  in بِما ‘because’, كَ  in كما ‘same as, just as’, بينَ as in بينما ‘while’, حينَ as in حينَما ‘when’, مثلَ as in مثلـَما ‘like’ and others (for which see Lexical Note 3 in this lesson) to function as subordinating conjunctions,  with which ما  is spelled either as one word like بينما or two in others like قدر ما:

بينما كنت أسير في احد الشوارع رأيت منظرا ً ازعجني   While walking in one of the streets I saw something that upset me.

سنحاول مساعدتَه قدر ما نستطيع  We will try to help him as much as we can.

    e. Relative ما  occurs in idioms where it is annexed to a verb, always in the 3m.s. such as قلـَّما ‘seldom, rarely’ , which is followed by a verb in the perfect or in the indicative, and طالما ‘as long as’, which may be followed by a verb in the perfect, by a nominal sentence, or by أنّ:

هذه كلمات طالما سمعته يردّدها These are words I have often heard him rrepeat.

سأزوره طالما هو هنا. I will visit him for as long as he is here.

ستستمرّ المفاوضات طالما أنّ الطرفين متعاونان  The negociations will continue as long as the two sides are cooperating.

    قلـّما نجدُ امثال هؤلاء الناس            It is rare to find the likes of these people.

    قلّما يسرن في المدينة ليلا ً     Rarely do ladies walk downtown at night.

f. Finally, relative ما and مَن , followed and preceded by the same form of a verb, are used as a rhetorical device to indicate the indefinite nature of the action and/or the subject, as can be seen in the following examples:

قيل ما قيل

عاش من عاش ومات من مات

رأينا ما رأينا

Adverbial constructions with the relative pronoun  ما:  ريثما، وقتما، لاسيّما، طالما، قلّما، نادراً ما، كثيراً ما، قليلاً ما، اوّلَ ما، غالباً ما، ربّما، ايَّما، حالما، بقدرِ ما، كلّما، بينَما، فيما،ا،

4. ما المصدرية ‘Nominalizing   ما’

Nominalizing ما introduces a clause, and serves to convert the clause into a nominal that is, an element having the functions of a noun.  .  Such a nominalized clause can serve also as a subject or object of a verb or object of a preposition or مضاف اليه (See Lesson 9 Grammar Note 1):

  سلاها ما قاله تسلية عظيمة ‘What he said consoled her immensely.’

نعرف كل ما قلت لها ‘We know everything that you told her.’    

بعدما وصل قابلوه بكل اكرام ‘After he arrived they received him with all honor.’

Nominalizing ما plus a verb is equivalent to a verbal noun:

  1.   بعد ما وصلوا‘after they arrived’

بعد وصولهم      ‘after their arrival’

5. ما الشرطيّة ‘conditional ما’ ‘whatsoever’

 The verb following  ما الشرطية and the verb in the result clause may be perfect or jussive, usually rendered into English as present:

ما يزرعْه الانسان يحصدْه        Whatsoever a man sows, that shall he reap.

A number of words or particles are followed by   ما    and have conditional meaning. These include: مهما ‘whatever’, كيفما ‘however’, اينما ‘wherever’, كلـّما ‘as often as, every time that’, حيثما ‘wherever’ ايّما ‘whatsoever’ and others. These behave like conditional  ما, but unlike it, may be postposed, that is follow the main clause. In this latter case, the verb may be perfect of jussive, but is often used in the indicative in MSA. In addition, the result clause with these words may be introduced by  فَ or فإنّ 

كلـّما رأيتها شعرت بالسعادة الكاملة      Whenever I see her I feel perfectly happy.

اينما رأيتـَه  وجدتَه/ تجدْه/ تجدُه/ فإنّك تجدُه  مبتسما ً        Wherever you see him, you will find him smiling.

مهما وجدوا من مَشَقّة فانهم سينجحون.                        Whatever hardship they will find, they will succeed.

    مهما يكن من الأمر فالوضع سيتغيّر.Be it as it may/whatever the case may be, the  situation  will change.

When postposed,  ما resumes its indefinite relative pronoun function:

يحصدُ الإنسان ما يزرعـُه                                        

6. ما الكافـّة  ‘the hindering  ما’

When attached to إنّ  or أنّ  the noun that follows is no more put in the accusative but is in the nominative; it usually suggests a restrictive meaning. Thus:

انـَّما الشيطانُ عدو ٌّ لدود للانسان         Truly, the devil is (or is nothing but) a deadly enemy to man.

This same ما  when suffixed to كأنّ ولكنّ   has the same effect.

7. ما الديمومة ‘Durative ما’ ‘as long as’ ‘Durative ما’ ‘as long as’

This occurs with a verb in the perfect tense:

ما دام حياً ‘as long as he is alive’

سأبقى في بيتي ما لم يَتسع الأمر         I will stay at home so long as the situation does not dictate otherwise.

قام بواجبه ما استطاع الى ذلك سبيلا ً        I performed his duty sor as long as he was able to

But it can also be followed by a nominal clause:

لن تحلّ َ المشكلة مابقيت الأوضاع على ما هي

سأواصل الاتّصال بك ما بقيت هنا

Durative ما occurs in well  known expressions such as:

الى ما شاء الله                            for ever and ever, for all time

الى ما لا نهاية                               and infinitum, endlessly

8. ما التعجبية ‘Exclamatory ما’ ‘how…!’

This is followed by an invariable Form IV verb (called by Arab grammarians as  افعال التعجّب ‘verbs of wonderment’) based on an adjectival root (this is called an “adjectival verb”) plus an object in the accusative (it is precisely because of this that Arab grammarians consider it a verb) :

ما اجملـَها                                                          How beautiful she is!

ما اروعَ هذا الشعرَ                                               How splendid this poem is!

Instead of an object, an indefinite noun following  مِن البيانية ‘explanatory مِن’ (see Lesson 3 Grammar Note 5       ) is sometimes used. Thus the second example may be seen as:

ما أروَعَه من شعرٍ معاصر            How splendid a contemporary poem it is (lit. how splendid it is of a contemporary poem(

The object may take the form of a  مصدر مؤوّل ب “أن” ‘:

ما أصعب أن يعيش الانسان بعيدا ً عن أهله     How difficult it is for a man to live away from his family!

It may also take the form of a relative clause headed by the relative pronoun  ما followed by noun clause with ‘an:

ما اسرع ان يرحّب البدويّ بالزائر وما أكثر ما يقدّمُ له الطعام والشراب

How quick is the Bedouin in welcoming a guest and how often he offers him food and drink.

9.او ما الإبهام   ما المبهمة ’Indefinite ما’ ‘one, some, a certain; ever’  

 (1) It follows an indefinite noun where, if nunated, the /n/ of its nunation assimilates to the /m/ as ini:

        يوماً ما ‘one day, some day’              الى حدٍ ما ‘to a certain extent’ 

        لسببٍ ما ‘for some reason or other’   في مقالةٍ ما ‘in some article or other’

which are pronounced: yawmam maa, Haddim maa, sababim maa, and maqaalatim maa.

10. ما الزائدة ‘ Redundant ما / This ما is called “redundant” because it may be omitted without altering the basic meaning of the phrase. It occurs after the particle إذا as in إذا (ما) ذهبت ‘if you go’ (which suggests more vagueness), after only a few words as in عن قريب’soon’ vs. عمّا قريب ‘(pretty) soon’, and after  دون   as in:

فعل ما طـُلب منه دونما اعتراض                               ‘He did what he was asked to do without objection’.

11. ما also appears in combination with other forms, such as:

كما ‘as, just as, and also’ and كما ان ‘as, just as’ (for which see Lesson 5 Lexical Note 4). For ما…مِن and ممّا see Lesson 3 Grammar Note 3 and Lesson 5 Lexical Note 5, respectively).

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أركان القومية العربية


العلاقة بين القومية العربية والإسلام
بلاد العرب أوطاني

GRAMMAR NOTE 1: وظائف المصدر المؤّول  ‘Functions of  a Nominalized Clause’

A nominalized clause is a clause headed in most cases by الموصولات الحرفية ‘subordinators’    or  حروف مصدرية  ‘nominalizers’,  and which, again in most cases, can be replaced by a  مصدر صريح ‘a verbal noun’, with no change in meaning.

The most common nominalizers are: أنْ، أنّ،  (ل)كي، لَو التي للتَمَنّي، ما المصدرية    

Most of these are familiar except perhaps   لَو‘ التي للتَمَنّي لَو’ which expresses ‘wish, desire’, which  is used after verbs like  تمَنّى/ ودّ  ‘to wish, desire’. To these subordinators we might add the  أ  we saw in Lesson 3 Lexical Note 1, in…    سواءٌ أ  which is called  همزة التسوية ‘the hamza of equal options’.

The functions of these clauses in a sentence are:

1. subject of an equational (nominal) sentence: 

عليك انْ تسالم من يسالمك.                         It is incumbent on you to make your peace with whoever wants to be at peace with you.

أن نستسلم معناه ان نُهزم.            For us to surrender is to accept defeat.

This is also the case where the predicate is  من التبعيضية (see Lesson 3 Grammar Note 1)  

2.  predicate of an equational sentence: 

المهم أنْ لا نثقّل انفسنا بالهموم.                     What  is important is not be burden ourselves with worry.

الحقيقة/الواقع  أنّ هذه اللغة لم تعد مستخدَمة.      The truth/fact of the matter is that this language in no more used.

3. subject of an active or passive verb:

لا يجوز لك أن تفعل ذلك.   You must not (lit. it is not allowed for you) to do that.

لم يسبق لي ان غادرت البيت مساء.   I have never left the house in the evening.

خـُيـِّـِل اليها انّه غريب في هذه الديار.              It appeared to her that he was a stranger in these parts.

أتيح له أنْ يزور القدس مرارا .ً       He was given the opportunity to visit Jerusalem frequently.

4. direct object of a transitive verb or verb with two objects:

اريد ان أعود من حيث أتيت        I want to go back to where I came from.

نسيتُ ان احمل بطاقتي الشخصيّة    I forgot to carry my identity card with me.

نسيت انّك من المها جرين       I forgot she was one of the immigrants.

نصحتها أنْ لا تشارك أحدا        I advised her not to partner with anyone.

علـّموهم أنّ الكرامة أهمّ شيء في الحياة            They taught them that honor is the most important thing in life.

5. in constructions with كاد، أوشك، عسى :

يكاد ان يصبح الرئيس دكتاتوراً            He is about to become a dictator.

اوشكن (على) ان يحقّقن جميعَ اهدافِهنّ.            They (f.p.) are about to reach all their goals.

وجئت كما ترى في الصباح الباكِرِ  عسى أن الحق بالخطاب

As you see, I came early morning so perchance I might trace the letter.

6. مضاف اليه

a. after certain nouns:

بشرط ان تقبل شروطنا  سنقبل عرضك            We will accept your offer on condition that you accept ours.

على/ب اعتبار انّه فرد من افراد العائلة سنذهب لزيارته

We will go to visit him in view of the fact that he is a member of the family.

7. object of a verb-preposition idiom

اعجز عن ان افعل شيئاً                             I am incapable of doing anything.

انا واثق بانك صادق وأمين      I am confident that you are truthful and trustworthy.

8. after  prepositionals such as بعد انْ، قبل انْ، دون أنْ، الى ان،   and adverbial expressions used as subordinators such as غيرَ انّ،  إلاّ انّ، رغمَ انّ، سوى انّ

رأيناها  بعد ان عادت من رحلتها.  We saw her after she returned from her trip.

لم أشعر بشيء سوى انّه مرّ بسرعة.               We didn’t sense anything except that it went by fast.

على انّ النزوح الى بلدٍ ما لا يعني الاقامة الدائمة فيه

However, immigrating into a country does not permanent residence in it.

 لم يقل شيئا ً سوى أنه غادر بلاده قبل الحرب بسنة         He said nothing save that he had left his country a year       before the war.   

LEXICAL  NOTE . /أيّةٌ /أيٌّ    

ايّ  has a variety of meanings ranging from ‘which? what kind of?’ to ‘whoever, whosoever’, to ‘any (one, thing), every (one, thing)’, and others. It has a masculine and a feminine forms      which are commonly inflected for case  It is used as an interrogative,  a nominal determiner, an exclamatory or rhetorical question word, a conditional , a vocative, and in a number of expressions.

1.  ايّ  as an interrogative occurs  as مضاف in an اضافة  or as a single  unit . It usually heads the sentence, but may also head a sentence following a preposition

1.1 . as مضاف in an اضافة ; it may have  for a مضاف اليه

(i) an indefinite singular noun:

ايّ لهجة يدرس؟                                    Which dialect does he study?

ايّةُ مدينة هذه؟                                       What city is this?

 من ايِّ بلد انت؟                                    What country are you from?

(ii).   an indefinite dual or plural noun:

ايّة امور اخلاقية تعتبر هامّة؟     Which moral matters are considered important?

الى أيِّ فريقين تنحاز؟                               To which two teams do you lean?

أيّة سبلٍ قادتك الى هذا المكان؟      Which roads led you to this place?

(iii). a definite dual or plural noun or pronoun:

ايّ المرشّحَيْن تُفضّل؟           Which of the two candidates do you prefer?

ايّ المدرّسين أحبّ اليك؟         Which (one) of the teachers do you like most?

تحدّثت عن هاتين المرأ تين. أيُّهما أسرع الى خدمة الآخرين؟                        

You talked about these two women. Which one is the quickest to help others?

An alternate construction in this case would be to use:ايّ   + the indefinite  noun in the singular followed by  مِنْ  and the definite  dual or plural noun; with human nouns,  أيّ  واحد/ واحد(ة)    can be used :

ايّ واحد/مرشّح من المرشّحَيْن تُفضّل؟             Which one/candidate of the two candidates do you prefer?

ايّ واحد/مدرّس من المدرّسين أحبّ اليك؟         Which one/ of the teachers …

تحدّثت عن هاتين المرأ تين. أيٌّ واحدة/امرأة منهما أسرع الى خدمة المواطنين؟

You talked about these two women. Which one/of the two women is the quickest to help …

Note the distinction between the indefinite and the definite dual or plural constructions:

الى ايّ فريقين/الى ايّ الفريقين                              to which two teams/to which one of the two teams

أيّةُ سبلٍ/ ايّة السبلِ                   which roads/ which one of the roads

For the singular, the difference between  ايّ الفريق  and ايّ فريق  would be: which team and which part group/part within the team.

1.2 as a single  unit

As such it is nunated (with تنوين) and followed by a prepositional phrase with partitive  مِن  .

ايٌّ من تلك الافلام أعحبك؟                   Which of those  movies did you like?

الى ايٍّ من الاحزاب تنتمي الاكثرية؟               To which party does the majority belong?   

ايّاً من مؤلّفات هذا الأديب قرأتم؟      Which of this litterateur did you read?

Properties of the interrogative ايُّ

a. Its functions:

(i) It occurs at the beginning of the question, either as subject or governed by a preposition

(ii) Like other interrogatives, questions with  ايّ  can be embedded in sentences as indirect questions:

سألتني عن أيّ قطار يتّجه الى القاهرة  ومن ايِّ  بلد انا.    She asked me which train goes to Cairo and where I was from.

(iii) ايُّ may occur as مضاف اليه

محاضرة ايّ من الضيوف اعجبتك اكثر من غيرها؟ا         Of all the guests, whose lecture did you like most?

b. Its gender and case:

Gender agreement is a rule which is not strictly observed today;  the m.s. is the default form, which can be used in all instances. As can be seen from the examples above, it is assigned the case marker of its syntactic function in the sentence.

2. ايُّ as a nominal determiner with the meaning of ‘any’

Like the interrogative, it occurs in an اضافة  or as an single  unit, is mostly used in the m. form, and takes on the appropriate case in its sentence.

  •  In an اضافة it makes the indefinite noun that follows it more explicitly indefinite. This is rendered still more explicit  by having the اضافة followed by a prepositional phrase consisting of partitive   من   and the plural of the  مضاف اليه:

كأيّ انسان                                            like any human being
في اي مكان وتحت اية ظروف           in any place and under any circumstances

لأي سبب من الاسباب                       for any reason whatsoever

باية حال من الأحوال    in whatever condition (lit. in any condition  of conditions

Once more, it is important to distinguish between

في ايّ جامعتين و  ايّ الجامعتين                            in  any two universities/ in any of the two universities

  • 2.2  as a single nominal determiner, ايُّ is nunated (used with تنوين ) followed by a prepositional phrase with partitive  من and a dual or plural noun or pronoun

لم يحضر ايٌ من الاساتذة.                          None of the professors came.

لم يحدث هذا في ايٍّ من البلدين.                    This did not happen in either of the two countries

اودّ الاتصال بأيّ من الاطراف على حدة.          I would like to be in touch with any of the parties separately.

ايُّ as a nominal determiner serves various syntactic functions, just like any noun, such as subject, object of a preposition, etc.:

من أصعب الامور ان نحدّد أركان أيِّ قوميّة        It is most difficult to delineate the basic elements of ‘nationality’

لا يصلح اىٌّ منها لكي …             None of them would be appropriate to …

 لا تحدَّد بايِّ عامل                                  It is not delineated by any one factor

يعتمد نجاح ايِّ انتاج على …          The success of any product depends on …

هل تناول ايّاً من اركان القومية في حديثه؟            Did he in his speech  deal with any of the bases of nationalism?

3.  ايّ as a noun with exclamatory connotations of astonishment and wonder in rhetorical questions:

أيّةُ سبلٍ قادتك الى هذا المكان                      What kind of roads could have led you here!

ايّةُ مدينة هذه!                                       What a city this/that is!

أيّة فائدة تُرجى من مثل هذه المفاوضات          What benefit could be expected from such negotiations!

قادتها الظروف الى نعيم، وأيِّ نعيم                 Circumstances led her to bliss, and what bliss!

This ايّ with exclamatory connotations of astonishment and wonder is also used in an اضافة whose مضاف اليه  is مفعول مطلق , and is thus in the accusative; it  often occurs in the form  ايَّما :

سررت بنجاحه ايَّ سرور    I rejoiced over his success “and how! (lit. with what joy”
أُعجب بها أيَّما إعجاب  He admired her greatly “and what  admiration!” 

أَوْرَقت أيَّما إيراق                It leaved greatly (“and what a leaving!”)

In these and the examples above,  ايّ  takes the appropriate case ending that the syntactic rules require. With respect to gender agreement, there is more flexibility, and the masculine form is more generally used.

4. أيُّ   as a vocative noun  مُنادى  أيُّها/أيَّتُها  ‘O!’

ايَها الرجلُ لا تنس ما لك وما عليك.              O man, do not forget what is yours and what you owe.

أيَّتُها الإمْرأتان لا تنسيا ما لكما وما عليكما.           You two ladies, do not forget …

أيُّها  المستمعون  الكرام                   Dear honored listeners,

 As such, the form of أيُّ is always with a ضمّة, but unlike other uses أيُّ  here agrees in gender with the noun that follows, which is always definite and in the nominative.

أيُّها/أيَّتُها may be preceded by the particle يا  with no difference in meaning. 

For review.  here are some notes on the particle يا . The vocative  يا , as you will recall from Elementary Modern Standard Arabic and other books you studied, can occur as a single. Here are some of its properties:

  • The noun after يا  , which does not  take  the article but refers to a specific addressee,  is  in the nominative:

لا تتأخّرْ يا استاذُ سليم                Mr. Salim, please don’t be late.

يا مَن لا يعرف طريقه، إحْذر!    O you who do not know your way, take care.

يا  يوسُفُ!                                           O Joseph!                                       

  • When the noun is مضاف in an اضافة , it is put in the accusative:

يا سيادةَ الرئيس                                     Your Excellency!

يا صاحبَ السموِّ الملكيّ                             Your Royal Highness!

يا  أبا  عليّ!                                         Abaa ‘Ali!

يا سائقي وسائقاتِ الحافلاتِ!                       Men and Women Drivers!

يا  أصدقاءَنا الكرام                                 Dear friends!

يا  ربَّنا العظيم                                      O Great God!

The  إضافة: may be حقيقية  ,  as in the examples above.  or  غير حقيقية  as in:

يا  قليلِي الايمان                      O ye of little faith!

يا زارعَ اليقينِ والظنونِ           O Thou who plants certainty and doubt!

يا مكتوفَ اليدينِ!ِ                                             O you with tied hands!

  • When the word after يا  is a verbal, like  اسم فاعل  etc. with verbal force,  where the  addressee is non-specific, i.e. it does not refer to a specific group or person  ,it is put  in the accusative,  or, as expected,  in the genitive if the verbal  require a preposition) :

يا راكبا جملاً                         You who are riding a camel!

يا راغباً في الزواج، لا تكن متسرِّعاً       You who seek marriage, don’t be hasty!

Note that the object جبلاً   in  يا راكبا جملاً  is in the accusative also. Such constructions are rare. The alternative in  الإضافة , يا راكبَ  جمَلٍ  is more common today.

(iii).With the name of God,  يا  اللهُ  is used, but a much more widespread term of address on formal occasions is  اللَّهُمَّ   :

اللَّهُمَّ  ارحمنا                                       God, have mercy on us!

اللَّهُمَّ  ارحمْني وأنِرْ عقْلي وألِنْ قلبيَ القاسي!       God, have mercy on me, enlighten my mind, and soften my remorseless heart.

5. Expressions with ايّ  :

ايّ  occurs in a number of high frequency expressions:

 (i)    أيّاً  كان(ت)        ‘no matter who, whoever he/she is, whatever’,

(ii) ايُّ مَن كان            ‘whoever/whosoever he may be’

لا احترم احداً يقول ذلك أيّاً  كان/ ايُّ مَن كان.     I don’t respect any one who says that, whosoever he might be

 (iii) أيّاً  يكـُن

لن اتحدّث اليه  أيّاً  تكُن الظزوف.                           I will never talk to him, no matter what (lit. whatever the conditions be).

(iv)   على ايِّ حال         ‘ by all means, in any case,  at  any rate’

هو على ايّ حال خير من غيره.        He, in any case, is better than others.

 (v)   ايُّ واحدٍ                                       any  one

LEXICAL  NOTE 2  جميع وبعض   ومُعْظَم‘all’ , ‘some’, and ‘most/the majority’

جميع

 The word   جميع   is in many ways like  كلّ.  It  appears in several forms and constructions:

1. It occurs as مضاف   followed by a definite plural noun, or by the indefinite relative pronoun مَن  , where it is declined according to its function in the sentence:

حضر  جميع ُ المدعُوّين الناشطين                  All the active members attended.

اجتمعت بجميعٍ الزائراتِ المصريّات  اللواتي حضرن      I met with all the Egyptian lady visitors  who attended.

قابلت جميعَ من كان  في الدار       I met all those who were in the house.

جميع  الزائراتِ المصريّات قبلن الدعوة           All the Egyptian visitors (f.p.) accepted the invitation.

As can be seen, agreement of the elements that follow, whether an attributive or predicative with  المضاف اليه  in person, gender, number and case, as appropriate.

2. It occurs as a definite independent masculine noun,  الجميع  , with the meaning “everyone”,“all”  and is declined according to its function:

أخذ الجميعُ نصيبه من ثروتها          Every one took his share of her wealth.

الجميعُ  أخذ نصيبه من ثروتها        Every one took his share of her wealth.

الجميعُ  أخذوا  نصيبهم  من ثروتها                 All took their share of her wealth

With  الجميع  as subject in first position, the verb may be singular or plural

3. It, followed by the appropriate pronoun, occurs  in apposition to a preceding definite plural noun or plural pronoun and agrees with that head noun  in case.

المدعُوّون  جميعُهم حضر                           All the   guests attended (lit. the guests, all of them   

اهتمَّ بالأديباتِ المصريّاتِ جميعِهن                 He took care of all the Egyptian guests (f.)

ثم دعاهن جميعَهنّ للعشاء                           Then he invited them all to dinner

الأديباتُ المصريّات ُ جميعُهنّ أحضرن امتعتهنّ   All the Egyptian writers (f.)  brought their luggage.

In this construction, a synonym to  جميع   is  بأسْرِ

الأديباتُ المصريّات ُ جميعُهنّ (او بأسْرِهنّ) أحضرن امتعتهنّ

4. Like  كلّ  , جميع , when followed by a pronoun, may occur as an independent word but only in subject position (whether as  مبتدأ  or فاعل):

جميعُهنّ حضرن الاجتماع         All of them (f.) attended the meeting.

but not,
*رأيت  جميعهنّ في المؤتمر                      

5. It occurs as an indeclinable indefinite word in the accusative,  جميعاً  , which follows a noun or pronoun:

حضرتم  جميعاً  بلا استثناء.                          

عانقتكم  جميعاً  حال  وصولِه.ا        She embraced you all as soon as she arrived.

نحن/المدعوّون/نحن  المدعوّين جميعاً من أصل عربيّ.  All of us/All the guests/ All of us, guests,  are of Arab extraction.

  بعض

We have run into the noun  بعض  a number of times in our reading. Here is first an overview of its uses, including forms and uses we may not have seen, followed by agreement rules related to its use:

Uses of بعض

1. It occurs as head or governing noun  in an  إضافة :

1.1 Most commonly it is followed by a plural noun or pronoun with the meaning ‘some, some of’; it is masculine singular:

أظهر بعضُ الناس/ بعضُهم اهتماماً بالموضوع.

إذا ببعض السيّدات  يغادر الغرفة.

إنّ بعضَ الطلاب مشغول بالامتحان.

إذا ببعضهنّ يغادر الغرفة.

إنّ بعضَهم  مشغول بالامتحان.

قصائده متنوّعة: بعضُها جيّد وبعضُها أقلّ جَودةً.

1.2  In a collective  context,  بعض  followed by a dual or plural  pronoun indicates reciprocity and translates ‘each other’:

اجتمعنَ وأخذنَ  يسألنَ  بعضَهُنّ

صديقان لا يبتعدان عن بعضِهما

مشَينا ممسكيْن أيديَ  بعضِنا

1.3  It can be followed by a singular definite concrete or abstract noun or by a  pronoun to mean ‘some, a certain amount of’:

امضينا معه بعضَ الوقت.

شعرت ببعضِ الضَجَر والاشْمِئزاز.

1.4 Also, it may be followed in an  إضافة  by the relative pronouns    مَن  or  ما   to mean ‘some of’,

اليكم بعضُ  ما قالته الصحف اليوم.

احتفينا ببعضِ من شاهدنا اليوم في الحفل.

1.5 بعض is also used in an اضافة whose مضاف اليه  is مفعول مطلق , and is thus in the accusative :

هو ملتزم بوعده بعض الالتزام وليس كلّ الالتزا م

 2. It occurs as an independent definite noun  البعض ,  which  bears the collective meaning of ‘some’ as in ‘some people’:

يقول البعضُ إنّ الأوضاع قد تحسنّنت، إلاّ انّ البعضَ الآخَرَ  ينفي ذلك.

بالنسبة للبعضِ فإنّ المشكلة لا حلَّ لها

3. It occurs  as an independent indefinite noun  بعضٌ

3.1 Here it is followed by a prepositional phrase with  partitive  مِن   to mean ‘some of’:

زارنا بعضٌ من أقرب المقرّبين الينا.

أطلعني على بعضٍ من مؤلّفاته.

قرأوا بعضاً مما كتبته الصحف عن الموضوع.

3.2  Or it occurs alone to express reciprocity and means ‘each other’:

هذا الكلام يبعدنا عن بعضٍ.

تقابلوا بالصدفة وتحدّثوا مع  بعضٍ.

4. It occurs in pairs as successive duplicate occurrences of  بعض   and convey the meaning of reciprocity, ‘each other’.

The most common occurrences are:

4.1   بعض+ ضمير   بعضاً

Here the pronoun is plural, with the reciprocating parties (i.e., the subject of the verb) for antecedent; the first بعض   takes the pronoun of its antecedent and is in apposition to it, and the second is in the accusative:  بعضاً .

عانقن بعضُهُنّ بعضاً.                      They embraced each other.

أخذوا يهنّئون بعضُهم بعضاً ً.              They began to congratulate each other.

In addition  بعض  may in this case serve as subject, with the pronoun attached to indicating the reciprocating parties:

عانق بعضُهُنّ بعضا.  

4.2  بعضٍ + بعض+ ضمير   حرف جرّ

Here the appropriate preposition حرف جرّ  is used with the second   بعض   if and as required by the verb;

يكيد رجالُ السياسة  بعضُهم ببعضٍ.       Politicians lay snares one to another.

يُسِئنَ بعضُهُنَّ الى بعضٍ.                  They hurt one another.

Here again the first بعض  may serve as subject, with the pronoun attached to it indicating the reciprocating parties:

. يُسِيءُ/تُسيءُ  بعضُهُنَّ الى بعضٍ

4.3 بعض+ ضمير  البعض   

Here, as in 1), the pronoun ضمير  is plural, with the reciprocating parties (i.e. the subject of the verb) for antecedent:

عانقن بعضُهُنّ البعضَ                     They embraced each other.

أخذوا يهنّئون بعضُهم البعضَ

Once more, the appropriate preposition/ حرف جرّ  is used if and as required by the verb and in this case usually precedes  the first  بعض  , but may also  precede the second:

يكيد رجال السياسة ببعضِهم البعضُ

يُسِئنَ الى بعضِهِنَّ البعضُ

Following this overview, here are some agreement rules related to the use of بعض :

1. Gender and number.

The noun بعض  is masculine singular, so words agreeing with it are naturally masculine singular as in many of  the examples above. In the case of the independent البعض , they may be plural, agreeing with the plural idea associated with it, as in:

يقول البعضُ إنّ أوضاعهم المالية قد تحسنّنت ويضيف البعض الآخر ان كل اوضاعهم قد ساءت.

Some say that their conditions have improved,  but others add saying that their conditions have all become worse.

However, in cases where it is in an اضافة construction, agreement is commonly with the مضاف اليه .  Thus an acceptable alterative to pertinent examples above would be:

إذا ببعض السيّدات  يغادر الغرفة.       or      إذا ببعض السيّدات  يغادرن الغرفة

إنّ بعضَ الطلاب مشغول بالامتحان.   or   إنّ بعضَ الطلاب مشغولون بالامتحان

إذا ببعضهنّ يغادر الغرفة.                          or      إذا ببعضهنّ يغادرنَ الغرفة

إنّ بعضَهم  مشغول بالامتحان.                     or      إنّ بعضَهم  مشغولون  بالامتحان

قصائده متنوّعة: بعضُها جيّد وبعضُها أقلّ جودةً   or       قصائده متنوّعة: بعضُها جيّدة وبعضُها أقلّ جَودة

إنّ بعضَ المصريين لا يزال يعقد حفلات الزار.   or      إنّ بعضَ المصريين لا يزالون  يعقدون حفلات الزار

2. Case

In most examples above the assignment of case is straightforward: as a noun, بعض  is assigned the case of a noun in that position.

Questions may arise in dual occurrences of بعض when the second occurrence is definite (as in 4.3) .

عانقن بعضُهُنّ البعضَ

أخذوا يهنّئون بعضُهم البعضَ

يكيد رجال السياسة ببعضِهم البعض

يُسِئنَ الى بعضِهِنَّ البعض

In the first two examples the first  بعض ,  as a noun in apposition, takes the case of the noun or pronoun  it follows, and the second  بعض  is in the accusative as the object of the verb.

In the last two examples the first  بعض follows a preposition and is in the genitive; but there is no consensus as to the case of the second  بعض  . To some , these examples could be read as:

يكيد رجال السياسة بعضِهم بالبعضِ

يُسِئنَ بعضِهِنَّ الى البعضِ

and hence  those sentences can be read as:

يكيد رجال السياسة ببعضِهم البعضِ

يُسِئنَ الى بعضِهِنَّ البعضِ

Others  stop  short of assigning case to the second بعض  on the basis of lack of direct evidence.

مُعْظَم

Uses of مُعْظَم

It only occurs as مضاف  , and is  followed by a definite singular or plural noun, a pronoun, or by a relative clause, where it is declined according to its function in the sentence:

سكنت  في هذا الحيّ معظمَ حياتها.                 She lived in this neighborhood most of her life.

كان متديّناّ كمعظمِ أقاربه.        He is religious like most of his relatives.

معظمُ  اللواتي حضرن سوريّات من حلب.                  Most of those who attended are Syrian ladies from Aleppo.

قابلت معظم  الذين كانوا  في الاجتماع.            I met most of those who were at the meeting .

انّ معظمَ ما يكتبه يتعلّق بالسياسة.                           Most of what he writes has to do with politics.

معظمُ  الزائراتِ المصريّات قبلن الدعوة           All the Egyptian visitors (f.p.) accepted the invitation.

هذه رسالتي وقد اتممت كتابة معظمِها امس.         This is my thesis; I completed most of it yesterday.        

Agreement of مُعْظَم

As can be seen from the examples above, in most cases agreement of the elements that follow the إضافة  , whether attributive or predicative, is with  المضاف اليه  in person, gender, number and  case, as appropriate.

However, as a masculine singular noun, agreement may be in the masculine singular:

معظمهم  أخذ نصيبه من ثروتها.                   Most of them  took their share of her wealth.

معظم الحاضرين شارك في المناقشة               Most of those present participated in the discussion

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التعليم في البلدان العربية

التعليم في البلدان العربية
روسيا تتعلم العربية

GRAMMAR NOTE الضمير العائد‘The resumptive/referential pronoun’

In discussing relative clauses we referred to two types.  One modified a definite head noun and is introduced by the relative pronoun الذي , which as we know agrees with it in gender and number and is a definite relative clause referred to in Arabic as اسم موصول وصلته. The other modified an indefinite noun and occurred immediately after  it, referred to in Arabic as جملة  وصفية . Both clauses are internally identical in their inner construction  and contain a pronoun that refers to the head noun, called resumptive  or referential pronouns, known  in Arabic as العائد ; i.e. they are complete sentences (verbal or nominal/equational) linked to their head noun by العائد that agrees with it in gender, number, and case .                         

العائد occurs in a variety of places in the clause and its function depends entirely on its position in that clause:

  1. It occurs as  subject in a verb-initial clause and is to be found within  the verb itself . Try to locate it in the following sentences.

رئيس يدعى الشيخ                                  a leader who is called “The Sheik”

كانوا وثنيين يعبدون …                             They were pagans who worshiped …

بعث فيهم شعوراً جديداً يقوم على مبادئ           It evoked in them a new spirit that rested on principles.

  • It occurs as object of a verb; note that this pronoun object is not translated into English:

من الأحداث التي عرفها العرب    among the events that the Arabs experienced

جريدة الاهرام التي أنشأها صحافيّان               the Ahram newspaper which two journalists established

With a doubly transitive verb having one object as a pronoun, العائد is attached to the word إيّا

 تلك مساعدة وهبته إيّاها االحكومة.                 That is assistance which the government  gave him

3. It occurs as subject of an equational sentence.

وصف المرض الذي هو عدوّنا وعدوّكم            He described the malady which is our enemy and                                                                              yours.

برز عملان رئيسيان هما قاموسه … و …         Two works stand out which are his dictionary and …

ذكر اسم امرأة ساعدته هي اخته. He mentioned the name of a woman who helped him that is his sister.

Note in this last sentence the presence of two relative clauses where العائد  in both cases is subject .

  • It occurs as  object of a preposition. Here it is normally rendered in English by the preposition and a relative pronoun:

كتاتيب يُعلَّم فيها القرآن               kuttabs in which the Qur’an was taught
المدارس التي  أُنشئ عدد منها         the schools, a number of which were established

صوتاً فيه قوّة الرحمة      a voice in which there was the power of mercy

سوق تدعى عكاظ  يبيعون فيها  a market known as :Ukaz” in which they sold …

ألقى نحوي نظرة خاطفة  فيها الحبّ والحنان       He gave me a quick look in which there was love and tenderness.

5. It occurs as the last term of an  اضافة. Here it is usually rendered as “whose” in English:

رئيس يخضع … افراد القبيلة لإدارته             a leader to whose authority the members of the tribe submitted

قُدّمت اقتراحات … هدفها  تيسير الكتابة      Recommendations were presented whose goals were  to facilitate writing.                                                                    .

المنظمة التي زرنا فروعها      the organization whose branches we visited

Note the difference between the following two constructions:

المناسبات التي تتطلّب استعمالَـَها        the occasions that require its (الفصحى ) use (that it be used)

المناسبات التي يتطلـّب استعمالـُها الفصحى                  the occasions whose use requires Standard Arabic.

  1. العائد  also occurs in these same positions in clauses (though with less frequency)  with the indefinite pronouns ما و مَن (See Lesson 2 Grammar Note 2).  It  occurs in the clause  after  فـ  in an        امّا … فـ   construction (See Lesson 3 Grammar Note 4) and   in the comment of a topic-comment sentence , though in these two cases the referent is called رابط .  It also occurs in and is attached to the subject in a نعت سببي and is attached to the noun that follows the participle, which is invariably is its subject (See Lesson 7 Grammar Note 1 ).
  • There are cases where العائد is not used and is dropped:
  1. when  it is subject  and the predicate is a prepositional phrase:

شخّص المرض الذي(هو) فينا وحولنا            He diagnosed the disease which is in us and around us.

الأصدقاء والمعارف الذين (هم) بجانبنا كثيرون    Our friends and acquaintances who are at our side are many.

خذ كل الأشياء التي (هي) على الطاولة    Take all the things that are on the table.

  1. when it is the object of a preposition in a phrase  whose antecedent is a time expression:

أُلاحظ ذلك في اوقات تكون ( فيها ) الاوضاع صعبة . I notice that at times during which  circumstances are hard.                                                   

هو بانتظار اللحظة التي سيعمل (فيها) معها.       He is awaiting the moment   on which  he will work with her.

c.  frequently with the indefinite pronouns        ‘that which’  and       ‘he who’

لم اكن عل علم بمَن  (هم) في الصف.     I was not in the know of who was in class.           

هذا ما كنت اتوقّع( ه ).                                       That is what I expected.
Lesson 8.   GRAMMAR NOTE 8  العائد  ‘The resumptive pronoun’

This pronoun appears mostly in جملة  وصفية/صلة اسم الموصول   indefinite/definite relative clauses. It occurs in a variety of places in the clause as:

1. subject marker in a sentence headed by  verb .

رئيس يدعى الشيخ                                  a head who is called Sheik

كانوا وثنيين يعبدون …                             they were pagans who worshiped …

بعث فيهم شعوراً جديداً يقوم على مبادئ           it evoked in them a new spirit that rested on principles

2. object of a verb:

من الأحداث التي عرفها العرب   among the events the Arabs experienced

جريدة الاهرام التي أنشأها صحافيّان               the Ahram newspaper which two journalists established

3. subject of an equational sentence.

شخـّص الداء الذي هو عدوّنا وعدوّكم

برز عملان رئيسيان هما قاموسه … و …         Two works stand out which are his dictionary and …

It is dropped in this case, if the predicate is a prepositional phrase:

شخّص المرض الذي (هو)  فينا وحولنا            He diagnosed the disease which is in us and around us.

الأصدقاء والمعارف الذين (هم) بجانبنا كثيرون    The friends who are by our side are many.

خذ كل الأشياء التي (هي) على الطاولة            Take the things which are on the table.

4. object of a preposition.

Here it is normally rendered by preposition + relative pronoun in English, if the English construction requires it:

كتاتيب يُعلَّم فيها القرآن         “kuttabs” in which the Qur’an was taught
المدارس التي  أُنشئ عدد منها                      the schools, a number of which were established

صوتاً فيه قوّة الرحمة      a voice in which there was the power of mercy

سوق تدعى عكاظ  يبيعون فيها …   (     a market known as ‘UkaZ’ in which thy sold …

Note that in the following sentence, English does not require a preposition:

السيارة التي وعدني بها                             the car which he promised me

This is not a function of relative clauses or resumptine pronouns but of two-word verbal phrases. If there is no prep. the rule does not apply here.

ألقى نحوي نظرة خاطفة  فيها الحبّ والحنان       He gave me a quick look in which there was love and tenderness.

5. the last term of an  اضافة .

Here it is usually rendered as ‘whose’ in English:

رئيس يخضع … افراد القبيلة لإدارته  (2, 2:4)           a leader to whose authority every member submitted

قدّمتْ اقتراحات … هدفها  تيسير الكتابة   (3, 5:3)        it presented recommendation whose goals were to facilitate writing     

المنظمة التي زرنا فروعها    the organization whose branches we visited

Note the difference between the following two constructions:

المناسبات التي تتطلّب استعمالَََـَها…   the occasions that require its (الفصحى ) use

المناسبات التي يتطلـّب استعمالـُها الفصحى      the occasions whose use requires  الفصحى

As you will remember this pronoun also occurs in these same positions in a topic-comment sentence and is attached to the subject in a نعت سببي .

It is important that you apply these rules when you compose in Arabic.

 GRAMMAR  NOTE 2 . الـ  ‘The Particle al-‘ 

This particle has the following three uses in Arabic:

1. التعريف ال ‘the definite article’

The basic meaning of the definite article in Arabic, as in English, is specified referent: the noun so defined has either been mentioned previously or is a specific item in the mind of the speaker and can be identified by the hearer, where it is the ‘article of the expected’ as in:

ماذا قال الرئيس في خطابه                What did the president say in his speech?

ذهبت الى البيت وفتحت النوافذ واستمعت الى الراديو ثمّ استخدمت الهاتف.

I went home, opened the windows, listened to the radio, and then used the phone.

It is also used by convention with many groups of nouns, contrary to English usage, such as:

a. Kinship terms when talking about close relations,  instead of using a personal pronoun, but whether it refers to the speaker’s or hearer’s relations would depend on the context:

إهدِ سلامي للوالد                                    Give my greetings to (your) father.

سأذهب لزيارة الجَدّة عند عودتي.    I’ll visit (my) grand mother upon my return.

زواجي منها لم يعجب الأسرة.   My marriage to her displeased the (=my/her) family.

استقبله كلّ الأقارب والجيران.   All (his) relatives and neighbors welcomed him.

b. Time and times, with days of the week, time of day, part of a day, seasons, routine daily activities:

يوم الخميس في الساعة الثانية والنصف            on Thursday at 3:30

c. Geographical names,  It is used  in some place names and geographical features:

اليابان، العراق، اليمن، القدس، الرياض، الفرات، الصحارى

d. Adverbial expressions of place and time:

الآنَ، اليومَ، الاسبوع القادم،                         now, today, next week

الى الأمام، الى الوراء، في الداخل والخارج        up front, to your back, inside, outside

e. With titles and names, except in direct address

الملك عبدالله     King Abdallah       الدكتورة نوال السعداوي   Dr. Nawal Al-Saadaawi

الرئيس اوباما    President Obama                     الشيخ محمد عبده         Shaikh Muhammad Abdo

البابا شنودة      Pope Shunudah     الاستاذ نهاد الموسى Prof. Nihad Al-Musa         

But: كيف حالك، يا استاذ أحمد  How are you, Professor Ahmad?

f. Expressions of quantity with adjectives expressing quantity or amount , such as  كثير، عديد، قليل،   , followed by مِنْ ,  which mean many/much, various, a few,

لا اعرف الكثير من امور السياسة.    I don’t know much about things political.   
واجه العديد من المشاكل.                           He encountered a lot of problems.

يعرفون العديدَ من الأمثال العربية.   They know many Arabic proverbs.

2. ال الجنسية او ال التي للجنس  ‘Generic ‘the’ in Arabic’     

  1. Note the following sentences in the Basic Text of Lesson  7:


 ففيها الافتتاحيّاتُ التي تناقش … ، وفيها الأنباء العالمية والمحلّيّة، وفيها ايضا التعليقات …

In it there are leading articles which discuss.. , world and local news, and also commentaries.

We have here verbless sentences whose predicates are ‘existential’ and placed first, and we are accustomed to the subject of such sentences being indefinite as in  في المكتب طاولة كبيرة. Here, however, the subject has ال. On closer examination, it is clear that the particle is not the definite article, it is the generic article, known in Arabic as  ال الجنسية او ال التي للجنس , which indicates the general or ‘generic’ class (جِنس genus, class) of nouns, singular or plural, such as ‘news’, commentaries’, ‘editorials’, etc. , a class for which English does not use the article

.Another case where the particle is used in this way occurs in this lesson  in the third paragraph:

غير ان هناك بعض المدارس والمعاهد ِ الخاصّة الأهْليّة

but there are privately  owned schools and institutions

This could be ambiguous. If the context had  المدارس  refer to previously mentioned schools as in    هذه المدارس  or  مدارسها , the construction with   هناك  could not be used. In this lesson, however, the article is generic and the sentence means ‘there are some schools’; with هذه المدارس  or  مدارسها , the meaning is ‘some of these schools’ and ‘some of its schools’.

Here is another example (taken from the last paragraph of lesson 12):

… فـَعـُقـِدت المؤتمرات ووضعت الخطط المشتركة …

Conferences were held, and shared plans were laid, …

English generic nouns may be singular definite, like ‘the lion’ in:

 The lion is the king of the beasts.      الأسد ملك الحيوانات.

or indefinite plural as in:

Libraries are (The library is) the heart of the university

where no specific library or university is referred to, but all libraries in general

b. Several other examples of  ال الجنسية have occurred in this book  (see for example lessons 1 and 2, where we have items such as  اللحم، البصل ، الصناعة، الشِعر etc.. Once again, it is to be noted that English does not use the article in these cases.   In English the singular concrete noun is usually defined by the definite article, whereas plural concrete nouns are indefinite, as in “Today books are available in incredibly many forms.

  •  In Arabic ال الجنسية  is used with nouns referring to institutions, customs, routine activities and predictable activities and objects It is thus used with these items:

abstract  nouns:  القراءة والكتابة    ‘reading and writing’, التعليم ‘education’ ,  

الديموقراطية   ‘democracy’  ,  الحب  ‘love’ ,        التقدّم  ‘progress’    الغضب   ‘anger’

food items:  الشاي   ‘tea’,   الحليب (اللبن)  ‘milk’,    القهوة   ‘coffee’

academic subjects: التاريخ  ‘history’   الجغرافيا،  ‘geography’,  الهندسة   ‘engenering’

names of languages: (Chinese) العربية، الفرنسية، الصينية

It may be useful to compare the use of the article in the two languages in the following:

 في المدرسة  in/at school                                     

بعد العشاء after supper       من الشروق الى الغروب from sunrise to sunset    

في الربيع in spring        الغداء في الساعة الثانية والنصف Dinner is at 1:30.

يتناولون ثلاث وجبات: الفطور والغداء العشاء     They take three meals: breakfast, dinner and supper.

  • Another case where the article is used in this way occurs in this lesson 8 in the third paragraph:

غير ان هناك المدارس والمعاهد ِ الخاصّة الأهْليّة

but there are privately  owned schools and institutions

This could be ambiguous. If the context had  المدارس  refer to previously mentioned school as in    هذه المدارس  or  مدارسها , the construction with   هناك  could not be used. In this lesson, however, the article is generic and the sentence means ‘there are some schools’; with هذه المدارس  or  مدارسها , the meaning is ‘some of these schools’ and ‘some of its schools’.

These nuances are important to distinguish and ought to be in full control of students seeking the “Superior” level of proficiency, especially when it comes to productive skills.

3. الاسم الموصول الـ  ‘The Relative Pronoun “al-” ’

We encounter this usage mostly with participles and adjectives, used with verbal force singly, in an  ‘ اضافة غير حقيقيّة  ‘adjectival idafa’, and in  نعت سببيّ  (for these see notes in the previous lesson). Here are examples

.

كان الطلاب المتفوّقون الراغبون في التخصّص في الفِقـْه …  ينتقلون …

Advanced students who wished to specialize in Fiqh transferred to …

مُؤيـّدوه القائمون به والعاملون على إنجاحه

those who support it and are taking charge of it and those who are working to make it successful

الكتّاب الواسعي الشهرة          well known writers (“whose reputation is widespread”)

القواعد المعمول بها        the rules in force (“that are worked with’)

 الاحزاب السياسية المسموح بها قانونيّا            the parties that are officially recognized

المجلاّت المتميّزة المحتوى   magazines that have specialized content

You know of course that some of these adjectives and participles have come to be used strictly as nouns; in this case the “al-”  is the definite article. Some are used  with verbal force. Still others can be used with both meanings and can be treated as either. Here are other examples.

العارفون منكم يخبرون الجاهلين                   Those who know should inform those who don’t.

الصالح والطالح                                     The good and the bad.

المعروف عنه أنه …                                What is known about him is that …

الغريب أننا مكثنا في مكاننا      What is strange is that we stayed put.

من الصعب ان نفهم هذه السياسة   It is difficult to understand that policy.

من الجدير بالذكر…                                 It is worth mentioning …

الأحسن أنْ …                                       It is best to … (“the best to do is …”)

الأنكى من كلّ ذلك أنه …  What is worse (lit. the worst thing of all), is that he …

GRAMMAR  NOTE 3  Coordinated Noun Phrase as مضاف معطوف

Let us examine the expression   تشجيع وتيسير التعليم  .

According to the strict rule, the مضاف  in an إضافة  should consist of one single noun only, not a coordinated noun phrase of two or more items , and hence the example should read  تشجيع التعليم وتيسيره   . This rule still applies; however the rendering with the coordinated noun phrase as  مضاف   is widely used today and seems to be gaining ground.

Lexical Note 1 ذو ‘possessor, owner (of)’

Observe the following examples and adaptations of items that occur in the Basic Text:

هذا المعهد ذو طابعٍ دينيٍ    This institution has a religious character.    

طابعٍ دينيٍ  هناك مدارسُ ذاتُ There are schools that have a religious character.

وخاصّةً من  ذوي الدخلِ المحدودِ         …especially among those with limited income

لطالباتِ ذواتِ المؤهّلاتِ الممتازةِ         to women students who have excellent qualifications

للوصول الى مركزَ ذي اهمّيّةٍ كبيرةٍ      in order to reach a  position of great importance

للوصول الى مراكزَ ذاتِ اهمّيّةٍ كبيرةٍ     in order to reach positions of great importance

  1. These illustrations show the masculine and feminine singular forms of the noun ذو possessor (of) in the nominative, then their masculine and feminine plural forms in the second two citations, and in the next to last phrase its masculine singular genitive, and in the last phrase the feminine singular form ; the full declension is given below. 
  1. ذو always occurs as a مُضاف to (“in a genitive construct with”) a noun denoting a quality which it attributes to the modified noun as a part of its identity or character, as in the examples above, or to a physical object literally as its ownership. or of things when its  مضاف اليه  is an item that one can own, such as money in ’ذو مال كثير‘  , a shirt ’ذو قميص أزرق‘, eyes  ’ذو عينين زرقاوين‘.
  1. ذو is usually an attributive modifier in apposition with the noun but may also function independently as in illustrations 1 (predicate) and 3 (object of preposition) above. As an attributive modifier of a noun, ذو agrees with that noun in number, gender and case; the noun that follows it agrees with the noun it modifies in definiteness. As an independent substantive it means “the one(s) who/that which” and agrees with the noun it refers to in number and gender but takes the case required by its function in the clause. Note the translations in the illustrations above, which include a verb (“has”), a relative pronoun and a verb (“that have”,  “who have”), and a preposition (“with”, “of”).

Declension of ذو

 MasculineFeminine
SingularDualPluralSingularDualPlural
  Nominative مرفوع             ذو              ذَوا           ذَوُو\أُولو                 (’uuluu)                              ذاتُ                  ذَواتا         ذَواتُ          
Genitive مجرورذي  ذَوَيْ  ذوِي           ذاتِ         ذَواتَيْ           ذَواتِ   
Accusative منصوبذا           ذاتَ  
  1. The feminine singular form has become an independent noun (substantive) in its own

right with its own plural, ذاتٌ – ذَواتٌ , and has the meanings “person, personality; the same, the selfsame; -self” (see the Arabic-Arabic Dictionaries   المنجد والمعجم العربي الأساسي or Wehr’s Arabic-English Dictionary).  These dictionaries provide under this entry a long list of contexts and meanings, as well as other words derived from it, which makes an interesting study in word derivation.

5. الأسماء الخمسة /“The Five Nouns”

The noun ذو is a member of a group of five nouns that consist of two rather than three letters and, like ذو, are declined with و, ي, and ا representing the three cases. They are ذو, ابٌ father, أخٌ brother,  فمٌmouth and حمٌ father-in-law. Thus for ابٌ we have ابوin الرَفْع the nominative case,  ابيinالجَرّ the genitive and  اباin النَصْب the accusative. The form  فم is replaced by the form فو when it is a مضاف (the first term of an idafa, “in construct state”): فوهُ his mouth, في فيهِ in his mouth. The noun حَمٌ (plural أحْماء) as a مضاف (“in construct”) adds the long vowels for the case endings to the two-letter base:  حمو، حمي، حما as in حضروا مع حميك  They came with your father-in-law. 

6. “ذو /  ذات” تعبيرات شائعة ب

a. Some well known figures and names with  ذو  :

المعروف (Macedonia) ذو القـَرْنـَيـْن وهو لقب الاسكندرالاكبر، القائد المقدوني

ذو النون هو ا لنبيّ “يونُس”  المذكور في القرآن واسمه في الكتاب المقدّس “يونان” 

ذو القـِعـْدة  وذو الحِجّة هما شهران من السنة الهجريّة والثاني هو شهر الحَجّ ويسبقه الأول  

b. Some expressions with forms of   ذو :                                                          

انسان ذو بال = انسان ذو شأن =  انسان مهم                                                                             

ذو فيه = كلامه

قريب/أقرِباء  ذو/ ذوو قُربى =                              

ذووه = اقرباؤه

ذوو   الشأن = من لهم  نفوذ كبير

 (اكثر) من ذي قـَبـْل= (اكثر) من ايّ وقتٍ مضى

3. Some expressions with the noun  ذات  :

الذات = النفس   ‘self’

حبّ الذات = الانانية

الاعتماد على الذات      ‘self reliance’  

    الثقة بالذات    ‘self confidence’     

ذات الشيء/المدير/الحكاية = الشيء ذاته/ المدير ذاته/ الحكاية ذاتها = الشيء/المدير نفسه/الحكاية نفسها

ذات البـَيـْن = ما بين افراد من خلاف او صداقة

في حدّ ذاته    ‘in  itself’

ذاتَ يوم/ليلةٍ/مرّةٍ = في ذاتِ يومٍ/ليلةٍ/مرّةٍ = في يومٍ/ليلةٍ/مرّةٍ

ذات اليـَمين   وذات الشمال = جهة اليـَمين وجهة الشمال    

LEXICAL  NOTE 2.

  رَغْمَ  ‘in spite of, despite, although, nonetheless, even though’ 

رَغْمَ   has several variants with the same meaning:

من ، برَغْمِ، بالرَغْمِ من/عن، رَغْـمَ ، رَغْما ً عن على رَغْمِ ،على الرَغْم.

They can be followed by a noun in the genetive  or  مصدر of both kinds صريح  in the genitive or  مؤوّل.

رفض الموضوع رغمَ كلِّ حسناته.   He rejected the matter despite all its merits.

اتّخذوا العربية لغةً رغم أنهم ظلّوا على دينهم.     They adopted Arabic as their language, though they kept their religion.

لم تحصل على منحة رغم تفوّقها.                  She did not get any grants in spite of her superior performance.

سار الناس في الشوارع رغم الغوغاء والفوضى   People walked the streets despite the din and the anarchy.

الفكر عندنا لم يضف جديداً رغم النهضة           Our thinking brought nothing new in spite of the renaissance.

تُشَكِّلُ بعض الدول كروسيا مثلاً قومية واحدة بالرغم من اختلاف الأديان فيها كما ان سويسرا تشكل قومية واحدة ايضا بالرغم من اختلاف اللغات فيها.

Some countries, like Russia for example, have a national entity, despite religious diversity; so does Switzerland despite language diversity in it

They follow the main clause, as in the examples above, or they may precede it, in which case, the main clause is introduced by  إلا ّ أنّ، فـإنّ ، غيرَ أنّ ، او فـَ :

فبالرغم من تفوّقها في دراستها الا انها/فإتها لم تحصل على منحة 

In spite of her superior performance, she was not given a grant.

وعلى الرغم من ان طه حسين فقد بصره في طفولته، غير أنّه استطاع ان يواصل دراسته في كُتّاب القرية والأزهر والجامعة المصرية و  السّوربون

Though T. H. lost his eyesight in his childhood, yet he managed to pursue his studies in

the village school, in Al-Azhar, in The Egyptian University and in the Sorbonne.

In addition, the construction can be used parenthetically  within the main clause:

من الجدير بالذكر انَهم  بالرغم من هذا  كلّه قد  حافظوا على كيانهم.

It is worth mentioning that, in spite of all of that, they maintained their identity.

كانت ولا تزال رغم صِغَر سنّها رئيسة تلك الشركة.

She was and still is, despite your young age, the head of that company.

Here are a few common expressions and an idiom:

فعلت ذلك رغمًا عنّي.                               I did that against my will.

على الرغم منه                                                   without wanting it.

لم يفعل ذلك الّا رغماً.             He does that only with great reluctance.

فعلتْ  ذلك رغمًا عن أْنفي       She did  that against my will or in defiance of me (lit. against my nose).

Other adversatives or concessives include : 1. غير أنّ  and أنّ   إلاّ   على أنّ  and  بَيْدَ أنّ ‘however, but’  مع أن ‘in spite of the fact that’ سِوى أنّ ‘but, except that’   which head an independent statement that  follows the statement they contrast:

يجب أنْ نكون معطائين. بيْد أنّ العطاء له حدود   We should be generous. However, generosity has its limits.

وطر ما فيه عيب سوى     أنّه مرّ كلمح البصر    an objective that had no fault except that it passed like the twinkling of an eye

…

LEXICAL  NOTE 3. Adverbial Constructions with  حَيْثُ 

The particle  حيثُ   is always in this one indeclinable form. It may occur by itself as head of a construction, preceded by the prepositions  الى ،  من , preceded by the preposition  ب   , or followed by  ما .It introduces an adverbial clause with a basic locative meaning, but has numerous meanings.

1.  حَيْثُ  by itself:

It is mostly locative:

a. when followed by  a perfect or imperfect verb.  Here it has various meanings:

      (i) non-restrictive ‘where’, i.e. ‘and there’ or ‘in which’, or   وهناك  , when preceded by a locative word, as in the first two examples below,  and restrictive ‘where’, i.e. المكان الذي في , when not, as in the third example:

انتقل الى “المدرسة” حيث تدرّس العلوم الدينية.    He transferred to a ‘Madrasa’, where the    

religious sciences were taught.

عاد الى مدينة يافا حيث ولد ونشأ.                  He returned to Jaffa, where he as born and brought up.

قابلتها حيث لا يمكن ان يرانا احد. I met her where no one could see us.

      and (ii) with the meaning ‘since’, ‘in that’, ‘in as much as’, as in:

لم أغادر آنَذاك حيث لم أجد مكاناً أمكث فيه.        ‘I didn’t leave then, since I couldn’t find a place to stay.’

Here the meaning is that of  حيث أنّ   ,  equivalent to    إذ أنّ  =  لأنّ  

b.  when followed a noun phrase in the nominative which is an elliptical equational sentence whose existential predicate is elided:

زرتُ المنطقة الداخلية  حيث الجبالُ العالية.        ‘I visited the interior, where the high mountains   are.’

إبقَ حيث انت.                                       ‘Stay where you are.’

2.  حيث    , preceded by the prepositions   من  and  الى  .

a.  Followed by a sentence, من حيث   and   الى حيث   mean ‘from where …’ and ‘to (the place) where…’, respectively:

اتتنا هذه المشكلة من حيث لا  ندري.                   The problem got to us from we know not.where.

اذهب الى حيث تريد .                                     Go wherever you want to go.

b.  Followed by a noun phrase, mostly in the nominative, من حيث   takes on the figurative meaning ‘where that is coming from’, ‘from that perspective’, ‘from the point of view of’, ‘as regards’, ‘because’:

من حيث المبدأ  والعقيدة                                in terms of principle 

من حيث الحجم والانتاج            from the perspective/in terms of size and productivity

c.   حيث من  , may be followed by  noun clause with  أنّ   , with the same meanings as b. :

آذاني الموضوع من حيث أنّي لم أتوقَّعْه منه         The matter hurt me in that I did not expect it from him.

3.   حيث   preceded by the preposition   ب 

With or without a following  أنّ    بحيث ( أنّ )  means ‘ in such a way that’, ‘ such that’,’ so that’. The sentence in 1:9-10 in the Basic Text could read:

كان مقتصراً على الرجل بحيث لم يكن للمرأة منه نصيب كبير…التعليم  …

Education was restricted to men such that women had no big part in it.

which can also read:

كان مقتصراً على الرجل بحيث أنّ نصيب المرأة منه  لم يكن كبيراً…التعليم  …

                  men such that women’s part in it was negligible.

4. حيث أنّ   ,  equivalent to    إذ أنّ  =  لأنّ  in which  the clause that follows indicates that it is an explanation of the clause that precedes:

لا يقبلون على التعليم المهنيّ اقبالهم على التعليم النظري،  حيث انّهم يرونه وسيلة للوصول …

They do not seek vocational as much as they do academic education, since they see in the latter a means to reach …

This indicates that the clause that follows is an explanation of a sentence that precedes:

ساهمت هذه المعاهد … في النهضة التعليمية حيث أنّها ربّت أجيالاً من المثقّفين.  

These institutions contributed to the educational revival since/in as much as they educated generations of educated people.

5.  حيث    followed by the indefinite relative pronoun  ما 

  حيثما ,  which is followed by a verb mostly in the perfect,  means ‘wherever’:

سوف نتعاون مع العاملين على السلام حيثما وُجِدوا/نجدُهم.   We will cooperate with those who work for peace wherever they are found.

حيث  is used in the same way.

حيثما  can also have conditional meaning.  When it appears before the main clause the verb after it and in the main clause is usually in the perfect or in the jussive; when it follows the main clause, only the verb after it follows this rule, athough this is not always strictly held today as can be observed  in the example above, with the timing of it usually the same as that of the main clause.

 حيثما ذهب/يذهبْ ترك]تركْ وراءه تقدير الجميع.Wherever he goes/went he leaves/left behind appreciation by all.

سأبقى بجانبك حيثما كنت.   I will be by your side wherever you are.

The same rules apply in the case of other conditional adverbs such as أيْنَما ‘wherever’,   حينَما ‘whenever’ ,  أيُّما‘whichever’, كَيْفَما  ‘however’ 

LEXICAL  NOTE 4  حينَ 

  1. The word أحيانٌ/أحايينُ   –   حين occurs as a noun meaning ‘time’ and is used as such  a. independently in instances like:   

 حينُها حانَ ‘its time has come’, where it is in the nominative;

b.  in prepositional phrases, where it is in the genitive, such as:

 =  بعض الأوقات في بعض/ بعضَ الأحيانِ ‘sometimes, occasionally (“in some of the times”) , غالباً في غالب/أغلب/معظم الأحيان =  ‘most of the time, in most cases’,

في حينِه= في وقته/ في موعده المناسب  ‘ in his/its time’،

منذ ذلك الحين  ‘since that time’،

، من حينٍ لآخر من حينِ الى حين/الى آخرَ  بين حينٍ وحين/ بين حينٍ و آخرَ،  ‘from time to time, once in a while’, 

في/من/ الى ذلك الحينِ ‘at that time/from that time on/ until that time’,  ;

and c.  in the accusative case as in حيناً  ‘once, one day, for some time’ and احياناً ‘at times’, حيناً كذا واحياناً كذا  ‘sometimes this and at other times that’

  • However it is used as a conjunction followed by a verb in the perfect or imperfect and as such takes several forms, all of which introduce time clauses:

a.   حينَ= عندما  ‘when, at the time when’

(i) It immediately precedes a verb in الماضي   or  المضارع , which can be replaced by  a مصدر صريح:

…حتّى سنة 1908 حينَ أُنشئت الجامعة المصريّة.    until 1908 when the Egyptian University was founded

في نهاية الاسبوع حين تزدحم كل هذه الأماكن     in the weekend, when all these places become crowded

تأثّرت بهم حين حضرت دروسهم                 I was influenced by them when I attended their classes.

تأثّرت بهم حين حضوري دروسهم  =           

(ii). It precedes an elliptical equational sentence:

حينَ اليأسِ  والعذابِ           ‘in time of despair and torment (“when there was despair”)

(iii) . Other conjunctions that behave like  حينَ   with the same meaning are  وَقْتَ، يَوْمَ ,

all of which can take on the adverbial forms ، يَومَئذٍ حينَئِذٍ، وقْتَئْئِذٍ ‘at that time, then’, and two of which also occur as حينَذاك، يومَذاك  again with the same meaning .

b. =  بينما/ في الوقت الذي  في حين (أنّ)  ‘when, whereas’

It may be followed directly by  a verb in الماضي   or  المضارع or by a noun clause with أنّ :

صوتك مليء بالسخرية في حين اقول لك…          Your voice is filled with scorn when I tell you…

It is to be noted that  في حين (أنّ)  can also have contrastive/adversative meaning:

قد رأينا في … ايبيريا قوميتين … في حين (اننا) رأينا انّ كلاّ من الولايات المتحدة وروسيا و… قومية واحدة

We saw in …Iberia two nationalities, whereas we saw that the US, Russia, and …,  each constitute one nationality.

على حين  is used in the same way.

c. حينما  ‘when’ , ‘at the time when’, ‘whenever’

It is followed by a verb in the perfect or imperfect:

اشعر بكثير من الحزن حينما استمع الى الأخبار عن سوريا.

I feel a great deal of sadness whenever I hear new about Syria.

في نظري لقد أخطأ تَ حينما رفضت الاجتماع برئيس اللجنة.

In my opinion you made a mistake when you refused to meet with the head of the committee.

1. حينَذاكْ ‘at that time’

We saw in Lesson 1 that some nouns of time may be followed by   إذٍthen to mean “at that time, then …”. Some of these nouns of time may be followed by the demonstrative ذاك  that to express the same idea, “at that time, that day, then”. The most frequent are  آنَذاك, يومَذاك and  حينَذاك. ذاك   itself may be preceded by  إذ  to mean the same thing:

كانت سائدة حينَذاك/إذ ذاك/ حينَئذٍ          It was prevalent at that time.

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الصحافة العربية وتطورها

المواقع الإلكترونية: إيجابيات وسلبيات

GRAMMAR NOTE 1      الاضافة غير الحقيقيةوالنعت السببي

 1.  الاضافة غير الحقيقية   False Idaafa. / The adjectival/participial construct

We have encountered so far in this book two types of  اضافة constructions: one whose first term,  المضاف  , is a noun and whose second term,  المضاف اليه , is also a noun that shows  relationships of possession, origin, container, naming, etc., and one whose first term,  المضاف  , is a  (verbal noun) مصدر (verbal noun) , and whose second term,  المضاف اليه , is either a subject and/or predicate (with intransitive مصدر. v.n.),  or agent and/or object (with trans. v.n.) of  the first.  These are called  إضافة  حقيقية  ‘ “real”  اضافة ’.

Let us now examine the following underscored constructions the first three of which which occur in this lesson:

كانت (الصحيفة) بعيدةَ الأثر      It had a far reaching effect (“it was far in effect”).

مِن الصحفِ ا لعربيةِ الواسعةِ الانتشارِ             one of the widely distributed Arabic newspapers (“ wide of distribution”)

ان بعضَ الجرائدِ …  رسميةُ الطابعِ               Some newspapers are official in character (“official of character”)

هذه الفتاة معقودة اللسان           This girl is tongue tied (“ tied  of tongue”)

Like the other اضافة  constructions, they consist of two terms the second of which is in the genitive, but they differ from  حقيقية   اضافة, in many important ways to be specified below, and hence, in contradistinction to them, are called إضافة عير حقيقية  ‘false or “unreal”اضافة’.

They correspond to a few English expressions such as ‘hard of hearing’, ‘quick of temper’.

The properties of  إضافة غير حقيقية are as follows:

a. The first element (المضاف) is mostly adjectival (which in its form can be a qualitative adjective   صفة مُشَبَّهة, like بعيد    , an active or passive participle, like واسع   ‘wide’ or  مفتوح  ‘open’, a  نسبة  adjective, like  رسميّ  ‘official’, a color adjective, like  أبيض  ‘white’, etc. ), but can be a participle with verbal force, especially a passive participle.

b. It differs from   حقيقية اضافة in two main respects: (i) it does not express possession or some such relationship, and (ii) itsمضاف   can take the definite article, even when مضاف اليه  has one.

c. Like other adjectives, this اضافة  can serve as predicative (in the first, third, and fourth  examples above), as attributive (in the second example above where it modifies  الصحفِ  ), or as حال , as in:

جاء الى امريكا حديثَ السن       He came to America young “ young of age”.

            ترى الرجال دائماً مرفوعي الرأس        You always see the men  with heads held high “high of head”.

ِمن الصحفِ ا لعربيةِ الواسعةِ الانتشارِ  one of the widely distributed Arabic newspaper

..  رسميةُ الطابعِ         إنّ بعض هذه الجرائدَ ..           Some newspapers are official in character.

d. In terms of concord or agreement, the adjectival مضاف , agrees with its referent  in gender, number, case, and definiteness, exactly as an adjective would, except that being an  اضافة  it does not take  تنوين   and drops the  نون  of the  مُثَنّى (dual)  and  جمع مذكّر سالم (sound masculine plural) . Thus,

                  الَولدُ/َ/ ِ الحديثُ/َ / ِ  السنّ      the young (“young of age”) boy

                  البنتُ/ َ / ِ الحديثتةُ /َ / ِ  السنّ   the young (“young of age”) girl

                    رجالا حديثي السنّ                young (“young of age”)men          

الرجلان القبيحا الوجه                   the two (“ugly of face”) men

However, even when used attributively, the definite article on the adjectival مضاف  is often  dropped in Modern Standard Arabic.

e. The construction as a whole qualifies a preceding noun, but the adjective itself qualifies the following noun. Thus, in the first example in c. above,   it is the age that is ‘recent, young’ but it is ‘he’ who is young of age, and  in the second  example, it is the head which is raised, but it is the men whose  heads are raised high.

f. For the حقيقية اضافة غير  to be well-formed, the second term  اليه   المضاف  must be something that reflects the nature, character, or identity of the مضاف  . Thus,

         رجل  مكسور  الشبّاك*                    a broken windowed man

would not be acceptable, but

رجل مكسور القلب      a broken hearted man would.

Similarly,

طالب قليل الأدب/الحظّ        a discourteous / unlucky (“of little courtesy/luck”) student is OK, but    طالب قليل الكتب       is not.

g. in coordinated حقيقية اضافة غير a pronoun may replace the repeated اليه  مضاف:

صغير السن او كبيره          young in age or old

h. finally, There are a few expressions in MSA with adjectives having nouns annexed to them which are not حقيقية اضافة غير but are used as nouns: Here are some of them:

جزيل الشكر          abundant thanks

كامل الحريّةّ          full freedom

في مختلف المناطق والعصور                      in various regions and times

2.   النعت السببي

A construction with meaning similar to حقيقية اضافة غير  is one where a clause is used instead of a phrase. So, instead of   صحيفة واسعة الانتشار   we can have the following with no change in meaning:

صحيفةٌ انتشارُها  واسعٌ   (“a newspaper whose circulation is wide”)

صحيفةٌ   واسع ٌ  انتشارُها     (“a newspaper wide is its circulation”)

This latter construction is called  النعت السببي .  In it, the adjective or participle which is in first position syntactically modifies the antecedent or preceding noun, but logically modifies the following noun.

Properties of النعت السببي

1. Agreement

a.. In both of these examples, we have an indefinite relative clause modifying the indefinite noun  صحيفة . With a definite antecedent, we will need to have a definite relative clause with a relative pronoun; that pronoun called الاسم الموصول  ‘relative pronoun’ is  ال  with an adjective (or participle) in first position in the clause (See note 3 in this lesson). Thus, we have,

الصحيفة التي انتشارُها واسعٌ

في الصحيفةِ التي انتشارُها واسعٌ

الصحيفة ُ  الواسعُ انتشارُها

في الصحيفةِ الواسع ِ انتشارُها

b.. You will notice in these examples that with النعت السببي we have agreement (of the adjective or participle) with the antecedent, that is the head noun, not only in definiteness, but also in case.

c.. However, agreement is with the following noun,  always its subject,  in gender and number.

في الكتابِ  الواسعة ِ شهرتـُُه   in the newspaper whose reputation is wide spread   

قابلنا الطلابَ/الطالبات  الأغنياءَ آباؤهم/هنّ        We met the students whose parents are rich.         

 You will have observed no doubt that the noun that follows the adjective or participle is always in the nominative. Also, it contains a pronoun that agrees with the antecedent.

To summarize: The adjective or participle at the head of النعت السببي  agrees in case and in definiteness with the referent, but in gender and number with the following noun.

2. Structure

a.  النعت السببي in the examples above has adjectives in the first position. In addition we may have participles, both active and passive:

من الامور السابق ذكرها وتنفيذها   of the aforementioned and formerly    executed  matters

الرجال المحظورة  تسميتـُهم كثيرون    The men whose naming is forbidden   (“who it is forbidden to identify”) are many.

It should be remembered that  اسم المفعول of a verb that governs an object by means of a preposition is always masculine singular.

مع النساء المحكوم على ابنائهنّ بالموت            with the women whose children are sentenced to die.

3. Function

Finally, in all the examples above, النعت السببي  is used attributively, as a noun modifier. But like all adjectival constructions, it can also serve as predicate and as حال .

هؤلاء الطلاب أغنياءُ آباؤهم These students have rich parents (“are parent-rich).

وجدت طلاّب هذه الجامعة قويّة ً عزائمُهم          I found the students at this university resolute  (“having firm intentions”).

And, again like other adjectival constructions, it can also be used as a nominal, without a referent or antecedent, with all the functions thereof.

 ويل للقساةِ قلوبُهم                 Woe to the hard hearted!

GRAMMAR NOTE 2

المفعول المطلق   ‘Cognate Accusative’    

As you will remember, the verb in Arabic (or one of its derivations, i.e. verbal noun, active participle, passive participle, or adjective) may be followed by its own verbal noun  مصدر , mostly indefinite, and in the accusative case منصوب  or    في حالة النصب ,  which  serves as adverbial complement to the verb or its derivatives typically to indicate the manner in which the action is performed . It is called المفعول المطلق ‘the absolute object’, better known in English as ‘cognate accusative’, examples of which you have run into many times in this and other books. In this lesson we run into a construction with the verbal noun that has not occurred before:

جمهور الطلاب لا يقبلون على التعليم المهني اقبالَهم على التعليم النظري

Before we proceed to discuss this construction, which we present in the third point below, let us briefly review what we know about المفعول المطلق:

1. a.  The most frequent occurrence of   المفعول المطلق  we encountered was as  المصدر  with modifiers, such as an adjective or  جملة وصفية :

تساعد على فهم المعنى وعلى قراءة الكلمة  قراءة صحيحة

It helped to understand the meaning and to read the word correctly (“with correct reading”)

وتغيّرت اوضاعهم تغيّراً شاملاً      Their conditions change completely.         

وتحاول معظمُ هذه الحكومات … توجيه الطلبة توجيها يرفع من اهمية التعليم المهني.

حبّه لها عميق عُمقاً لا يقدّ َر                His love for her is immeasurably    deep (lit. is a love of  immeasurable depth)

وان الحكومات العربية مهتمّة بهذا النوع من التعليم اهتماما كبيرا.

The Arab governments have deep concern for education.

b. المفعول المطلق may appear in an  إضافة  as  مضاف اليه  , in the genitive, modified by the مضاف , which  could be:

(i)  the word   كلّ   

كان حريصاً كلَّ الحـِرص على إتمام واجباته.      He is resolutely intent on completing his duties.

(ii)   مصدر

اعرفه تمَام المعرفة.    I know him perfectly well (“with completeness of knowledge”).

(iii) an elative:

استقبلوه أروعَ استقبالٍ.          They received him in  splendid fashion.

عوقب شرَّ عقابٍ.       He was given the worst kind of punishment.        

(iv) the word  أيَّ  or أيَّما                        

عانقها ايَّ عناق      He embraced her passionately (lit. with what an embrace!)

اورقت أيّما ايراقٍ     It leafed and what leafing!

c.  المفعول المطلق  may sometimes have the definite article, in which case it may modified by a preceding demonstrative:

لم تهتمَّ بالموضوع الاهتمامَ الكامل الذي كنت أتوقـّعه.

He did not take as much interest (“the total interest”)  in the matter as I expected him to.

ضحكت تلك الضحكة البريئة التي عهدتـُها فيها    She laughed that innocent laughter  that I had come to expect.

d. المفعول المطلق , in addition to being a verbal noun, can be , اسم مرّة ‘a noun of single occurrence’, in the s., dual, or p., or  اسم نوع ‘a noun of a kind’, as in :

وابتسموا لها ابتسامة حلوة…   They smiled at her sweetly (“they smiled at her a sweet smile”)

جرع جرعتين من يدها      He gulped two mouthfuls from her hands.

نظرت اليه نظرات مُحـْدِقة      She fixed her glance on him.

كان يهُزّه هزّاتٍ عنيفة.        He was severely shaken (“severe shakes shook him”

2. The verbal noun may occur alone, without modifiers, to express intensity, emphasis of the core meaning of the verb or verbal element it modifies; a literal translation is of little help, so you can get the meaning of the following from an idiomatic rendering of the context:

حفظ القرآن وأتقنه إتقاناً       He learned the Qur’an and mastered it perfectly

غبّ الشراب غبّاً         He gulped the drink avidly.   

مزّق الأوراق تمزيقاً          He ripped the papers up.

3. As seen in this lesson,  the verbal noun may appear in an إضافة  as مضاف الى فاعله او مفعوله (i.e. followed by its subject or object) .  The meaning conveyed here is one of comparison, similitude,   the idea being ‘in like manner to’:

ان جمهور الطلاب لا يقبلون على التعليم المهني اقبالَهم على التعليم النظري

‘They do not commit to technical education the way they do to theoretical education (lit. in a manner similar to their commitment to …’

مرّ  مرَّ البرق          He flashed by (lit. like lightning).

مرّ مرَ الكرام       He brushed by, passed as if nothing happened               (harmlessly as noble people do).

هبط عليه الحادث هبوط الصاعقة    The event hit him like a thunderbolt.

In a real sense, then,  اقبالَـَهم  is equivalent to  كاقبالِهم  or  كما يقبلون,  مرَّ

  كما يَمُرّ البرق , and    كما  يمرّ الكرام  .

Grammar Note 3 

 التَمْييز (also   التَبْيين and التَفْسير) ‘Accusative of Specification’

التمييز consists of  a noun, generally a مصدر , or a nisba adjective (one  ending in (-يٌّ, always indefinite and in the accusative case; it follows the modified word and elaborates on and delimits its features and characteristics.  The construction means “with respect to, in regards to, as regards” and may qualify verbs, adjectives, and nouns.

1.كمصدر  التمييز

1.1 As verb modifier:

لم أرَ مثلها حسناً وجمالاً            I never saw the likes of her in grace and beauty.

لا يختلف لباسهم شكلاً ولا لوناً What they wear does not differ in shape or color.    

امتلأ قلبه خشوعاً وخضوعاً واجلالاً    Their hearts were filled with beauty, submission and respect.

يشرحون النص اسلوباً ومعنىً       They explained the texts with respect to its style and meaning.

Widely used with تمييز are verbs that denote a change in size or number, like زاد  and ازداد ‘to increase, grow in size’ and قلّ ‘to become few’.

مما زاد بغداد جمالاّ …           Of the things that increased Baghdad in beauty …

أخذوا يزدادون عدداً ونشاطاً       They increased in number and energy.

Compare the sentences below on the left with those to the right. How do they differ in construction and in meaning?

لم أرَ مثلها حسناً وجمالاً                              لم أرَ مثلَ  حسنِها وجمالِها

لا يختلف لباسُهم شكلاً ولا لوناً                      لا يختلف شكلُ ولونُ  لباسهم

يشرحون النصَّ اسلوباً ومعنىً                       يشرحون اسلوبَ ومعنى النص

مما زاد بغداد جمالاّ                                    مما زاد جمالَ بغداد

أخذوا يزدادون عدداً ونشاطاً                 أخذ عددهم ونشاطهم  يزدادان                      

Now, how would you insert استخدام اللغة الانجليزية ‘the use of the English language’ after ازداد العالم … as a تمييز construction, taking into consideration  the statement above that a تمييز word is always indefinite and in the accusative?

Well, the تمييز  verbal noun in this case cannot be followed directly by its object–in other words it cannot be a مضاف الى مفعوله  مصدر  ‘a verbal noun as the first term of an idafa’: the object of the مصدر will have to be introduced by the preposition   لِ , called  اللام لتقوية العامل (لِ for the reinforcement of the agent) thus:

ازداد العالم استخداماً  للغة الانجليزية      The world has increased its use (in the use) of the English language.

1.2 As an adjective modifier:

a. with regular adjectives

عظيمٌ شأناً   هذا المعهد         This institution is great in importance.

طويلٌ قامة ً هذا اللاعب              This player is tall in stature.

This construction with adjectives is rare in modern فُصْحى , however. Much more common in this case is the forming of اضافة غير حقيقية   ‘an adjectival idafa’ with the adjective as its first term.

هذا المعهد عظيم الشأن        This institute is great in status.

عرفت اللاعب طويل القامة         I got to know the player who is tall in stature.

again with the appropriate endings on the adjective.

b. with elative adjectives. You will remember that in Arabic we express the comparative degree by using the masculine singular form of the elative, alone or followed by the prepositional phrase with  مِن ‘than’ اكبر (من). For the superlative we use a definite elative, i.e. one that has the definite article (الكُبرى  /الأكْبَرُ) or a pronoun suffix ( اكبرهم//اكبرها )or is the مضاف in an اضافة

الطلاّب/اكبر المدن/ الأنهار).

Where no elative form exists, e.g., in adjectives from derived verbs, we have no option in Arabic but to use the elative of adjectives of size or degree such as  اكبر، اكـْثـَر أشَدّ، احسن  and others, followed by تمييز , naming the quality to be compared. Here are some examples:

  • in the comparative

هو اكبر منّي سِنّاً واعظمُ شأناً واوسع نفوذا.ً       He is older than me, of greater status and wider influence.

اخي اكثر اعتماداً على نفسه منّي.   My brother is more self-reliant than I am.

الظلم اكثر سَلْبا للحرّيّة من السجن.       Injustice is more depriving of freedom than a prison.

  • in the superlative

اكثر الصحف تأثيراً  وأحسنها توجيها.ً هذه    This is the most influential newspaper and it is best at guidance.

هم أقدم العرب تاريخاً في امريكا.   They are historically the earliest Arabs in America.

سمير اكثر اخوتي اعتماداً على نفسه.   Samir is the most self-reliant of my brothers.

الظلم هو الاكثر سلبا للحرّيّة.     Injustice is the most in denying  freedom.

Note again here the use of لِ in this last example.

Now let us examine the following sentence that occurs in lesson 12:

الزراعة في سورية و… أكثر اعتماداً على الأمطار منه على مياه الأنهار. …

What does the underlined pronoun refer to and how is this best understood and best rendered into English?

The masculine singular pronoun does not refer to الزراعة nor to the Arab countries mentioned, and that is obvious; it refers to اعتماداً. Thus, a literal translation of the Arabic sentence will be ‘Agriculture in … is more in reliance on rain than in reliance on river waters’, whereas an acceptable English rendering would read ‘Agriculture in … relies more on rain than (it does) on river water.’

c. with adjectives of color, which have the same word pattern as elative adjectives, i.e.  أفْعَلُ. Here Arabic uses the same construction as with elatives (“more” or “most in redness”) to express comparison. Thus,

وجهُهُ  اكثرُ احمراراً من وجهي       His face is redder than mine.

1.3  As a noun modifier

You will encounter examples of تمييز following an indefinite noun which refers to a measure of some kind, be it a unit of weight, capacity, area, or enumeration; the تمييز noun specifies the that part of the item being measured:

اشتريت كيلو بصلا ً        I bought a kilo of onions.

اشتريت رطلاً زيتا ً         I bought a rotl [roughly, a pound] of (olive) oil.

This construction is rare nowadays. It is very common instead of the تمييز as a noun to have a prepositional phrase with مِن + item being measured or, more common still, to use an  اضافة  with the unit as مضاف and the item as the second term, as in ربع كيلو من البُنّ  or  كيلو بُنٍ ٍّ  ‘a kilo of coffee beans’.

Very extensively used with  تمييز , however, are the numerals 11 – 99 and compound numerals with these as their last digits, such as 232.

  سنُّه يتراوح بين خمسين وثلاثة وخمسين عاماً

You will recall that the numerals 3 – 10 as well as primary numerals (i.e. not derived etymologically from other numerals) likeمئة  and ألف form anاضافة  with the following counted noun, which is in the genitive: ثلاثةُ كتبٍ ‘three books’.

Associated with numerals is the question wordكم  ‘how much? how many?’ the answer to which is often a numeral. As you already know, كم is always followed by a singular definite noun in the accusative:

كم ولداً لك؟ كم يوماً قضيت في لبنان؟ كم مرّةً  ردّدت هذه الأبيات؟

2. نسبة  التمييز

Of very common occurrence in Arabic is the use of نسبة adjectives as تمييز,  Here are examples taken from this and the following lesson:

يُعرَف عالميّاً باسم…        It is known universally by the name …                       

كما أنّ تلك الدولة كانت عظيمة الشأن اقتصادياً وحضاريّاً .

In addition, that state was of great importance economically and culturally.

لعبوا دوراً فعّالاً سياسيّاً وحضاريّاّ     They played an effective role politically and culturally.        

اصبح الاندماج كاملاً لُغويّاً واجتماعيّاً        Assimilation became complete linguistically and socially.

Lexical Note 1: ظروف الكيفية – النسبة  ‘Manner Adverbial with Nisba Adjectives’

How do we express Manner Adverbials in Arabic?

There are several ways to do that. We have a grammar note (note 2) in this lesson about a highly used construction to express that idea(المفعول المطلق) . In this note we will discuss how it is expressed

  1. A large number of nisba adjectives, i.e. adjectives that have the suffix –iyy, which are always masculine, indefinite and in the accusative, of  which there are examples in the Basic Text, are used in Modern Standard Arabic to express manner, which usually answer questions with  ’كيفـ‘.

تحدّثت معه شخصيّاً.                                     I talked to him personally.

تقدّمت البلاد اقتصاديّاً في الآونة الأخيرة.              The country has prospered economically lately.

Though as indicated a large number of nisba adjectives in this form carry the meaning of ‘manner’ it should be remembered that other nisba adverbs may carry the meaning of time and place adverbials. Here are examples:

time                                                                  place

اسبوعيّا   ‘weekly’                                               محلّيّاً      ‘locally’           

يوميّاً      ‘daily’                                                     عالميّاً’globally’

حالِيّاً       ‘presently’

Additionally as we can see in Grammar Note 3 in this lesson, the nisba adjective in the accusative can also serve as تمييز ‘accusative of specification’, which answers the question ‘with respect to what, in what context’

  2.   In this connection, however here are two other ways to express manner in Arabic:

a. prepositional phrase  consisting of a preposition and a noun with the meaning of ‘manner’ followed by an adjective as in the following examples:

عبّر عن رأيه بشكل واضح. He expressed his opinion clearly (lit. in a clear form’.

يجب ان يعاملوا شعوبهم بطريقة ديموقراطية          They must treat their people democratically (in a democratic way.

ابدى رأيه باسلوب عالٍ           He presented his view in high style.

b. sentences where the main verb indicates the manner of acting, behaving, treating (such as  أحسن’to do well’ , اساء ‘to do badly’,أكثر ’to do frequently’, أجاد ‘to do properly’) etc. followed by an action,  activity, behavior etc., frequently a verbal noun:

أساء معاملة جيرانه.     He maltreated his neighbors (lit. he did badly the treatment)

احسنت الحكومة استغلال مواردنا الطبيعية.             The govt. exploited our natural resources well.

سارعوا في ترك اراضيهم.                             They left their lands hurriedly (lit. they hastened to leave..

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أهل الجنة

إحسان عبد القدوس ١
إحسان عبد القدوس ٢
مكارم الأخلاق في الإسلام

GRAMMAR NOTE 1 . الخصائص النحوية للفعل:فاعله ومفعوله ‘Syntactic properties of verbs:  Types of Subjects and Objects’.

In earlier lessons we discussed the semantic properties of verbs and how the semantic class of verbs affects the meaning of their perfect and imperfect forms. You have also become familiar, in the course of your study, with the syntactic properties of verbs, i.e.  how they ‘govern’ other elements in the sentence: the  subjects they take. the number of objects they require, directly or through a preposition, and whether they take any objects  at all.  You undoubtedly realize that, in addition, you need to know what types of objects and subjects (constructions, structures) a particular verb takes. You are quite familiar with most of these, so this note will serve as a review, which is an essential and reinforcing component of the learning process, of what you have seen and know with examples where deemed necessary.

1. الفاعل ‘The Subject’.

The basic structure of a Verbal Sentence is a verb and a subject. Verbs take one subject only (it can of course be a coordinated construction.  Since a verb in Arabic has a component that indicates various persons, a verbal sentence may consist of a one word verb such as  ذهبتم ‘You (m.p.) went’. But, naturally, the subject may be expressed. So what constitutes a subject in this case? It can be:

  1.  a noun (a common noun, a proper noun, a verbal noun, a numeral), or a word that functions like a noun (an adjective, a participle),

أكل الصبيُّ التفّاحة                                  The boy ate the apple.

تمّ الوصولُ الى حلّ للمشكلة                        A solution to the problem was reached (lit. reaching a solution was completed.

يودّ الكثيرون منهم الرجوع الى بلادهم   Many want to return to their country.

قام المـُتـَقـّفون بحملة واسعة     The educated began an extensive campaign.

دقـّت الخامسةُ الاّ ربعاً            The clock struck quarter to five (lit. the five less a quarter rang).

  •  a noun phrase : noun + modifier such as an adjective, participle, numeral, a demonstrative, a relative clause, or a series of these,  or  an إضافة 

بقيت تلك العادات القديمة المُتأصّـِلة الى يومنا هذا  These old ingrained habits have                                                                                                        remained to this very day.

دخل أصحاب البيت يبتسـِمون                      The landlords went in smiling. 

  • a pronoun (personal, demonstrative, interrogative, relative):

مَن لا يقبل هذا الحلّ او ذاك؟    أرضى بهما       Who does not accept this solution or that?  I accept both.

ايّ ُ مشكلة اوصلتنا الى هذه التيجة     What problem led us to this result.

تمّ الذي كنت اتمنّاه ولم يحدث ما كنت أخشاه.      What I wished for came to pass and what I feared never happened.

كم بلغك من مدفوعات                               How many payments did you receive (lit. reached you)?

  •  a clause (a relative clause, i.e. one introduced by a definite or indefinite pronoun), or a noun clause, i.e. one introduced by حروف مصدريّة such as  أن or أنّ   orالمصدرية  ما)

سرّني ما نشرته الجريدة اليوم                      I likeي (lit. it pleased me) what the newspaper published today

يعمل  يجب أنْ           He has to work (lit. that he work is a must)

بلغني أنّك قادم غداً    I learned (lit. it reached me) that you were coming tomorrow.

Since these subjects are all of common occurrence and their nature (personal or impersonal, human or non-human) mostly predictable, they have not been indicated in entries of new verbs in our section in  ب. المفردات الجديدة     القسم الأوّل : التمهيد  , with one exception: when the subject is a noun clause, the verb is identified by being followed directly  by  الحرف المصدري أنْ  او  أنَّbetween square brackets [  ] . Thus, for example:
بدا يبدو( ل ِ) [أنَّ]  ‘It seems (to …) [that] …’

طاب  ــِـ ل ِ [أنْ] ، طيبة  ‘It pleases (lit. to ..) [to] …’

Needless  to say here that when the subject is a noun that is inflected, it is put in the nominative. Also, some verbs take more than one type of subject as with  حلا  in item 16 of the preparatory sentences of this lesson, or with  سرّ and others:

انّه قد نجح/ أن أراه سرّني منظره/                 ‘the way he looked/that he succeeded/to see him/ pleased me.

حلا  له المنظر/ حلا  له انْ يراها                   The sight gave him pleasure. It gave him pleasure to see her.

2.  المفعول به  ‘The Object’

As you know verbs that take an object are called   افعال مـُثـَعَدّية ‘transitive verbs’; there are of course verbs that take no object, called  افعال  لازِمة  ‘intransitive verbs’. With every verb introduced in the preparatory sentences in this book, these properties of verbs are given, in addition to the stem vowel of the imperfect for the non-derived form of the verb (see example 23), together with specific prepositions that some verbs are used with.  Like the subject, the object can be any of the items discussed above: a verb in Arabic may take for its object a noun (or noun phrase, including an إضافة  ) or a pronoun of all kinds, a clause (be it relative or noun clause with أن or أنّ   or ما  . In addition,

a.  A verb may take a preposition before its object. Several general comments are in order.

(a) For some verbs, the preposition may be optional, sometimes with only a slight difference in meaning. Thus, هزّ راسه =هزّ برأسه ‘he shook his head’, اعلمها=اعلم بها ‘I know it’.

(b) Some verbs occur only in combination and association with particular preposition without any change in their basic meaning. Thus  ساعد  means ‘help’; in ساعد على ‘help in (doing something)’, the preposition  على does not change its meaning but merely extends its coverage so to speak. The meaning of the preposition may sometimes be closely associated coincide with that of the verb it is used with. The verb  اقترب  ‘come near to(a destination)’ is followed by the preposition  من one of whose basic meanings is ‘some distance from a destination’, while the verb  ابتعد ‘distance oneself from’ is followed by the preposition عن    which means ‘away from’ and so is  دافع  ‘defend, push away’ which is also associated عن. For the same reason the verb  أشار  ‘point in the direction’ is followed by the preposition  الى . A verb that may require the idea of accompaniment is followed by the preposition  ب  whose basic meaning is ‘by means of, with’ as in قتله برصاصة   ‘he killed him with a bullet’,  عامله باللطف

‘he treated him with gentleness or gently’.

(c) Some verbs may take more than one preposition with differences in meaning. Thus in addition to خاف منه  we can also get خاف عليه   ‘worry about’.

(d) Some verbs in combination with a preposition form a single unit whose meaning is different from that of the verb and other verb-preposition units. Such units are called verb- preposition idioms. These are abundant in English (just think of the combination ‘put up with’; in Modern Standard Arabic one can argue that they do exist, but a lot of time that depends on how different the meaning of the individual verb is thought to be from the verb-preposition idiom. And this in turn depends on how well the student knows and controls the range of meanings that certain verbs carry. With beginners and in the early stages of learning that range is very limited and it is necessary to treat many, if not all, such verb-preposition combinations as ‘idiomatic’ on the basis of the meaning of the verb as it occurs in the text where it is introduced and the necessity of conveying that meaning in English.. As you progress in the language, and acquire a solid understanding of the meanings of each preposition and wider control of the range of meanings and nuances of verbs, you will be aiming for less reliance on English and translation and more confidence in not only extracting meanings from texts but also in the production of Arabic discourse and tournures, whether they are analyzed as idioms or not.

Verbs must be learned together with their particular prepositions; to help in this endeavor, we have identified such prepositions whenever a new verb is introduced, in parentheses if they are optional, with a slash when different prepositions are used with the same verb, and a different subentry in case the prepositions supply a different meaning. Verbs must also be learned with the type of objects they take;

object:

لا اعرف متى جاء ومن اين حضر وكيف وصل وهل سيقيم معنا مدةً قصيرة ام طويلة

‘I do not know when he arrived, from whence he came, how he reached this place, and whether he will stay with us for a long or short period of time’.

c. Some verbs can take more than one type of object. One such verb occurs in our lesson: the verb  نَسِيَ . Here are examples:

نسيتَ صلاتَك وصومَك

نسي أنّه لم يعد طالباً في مدرسة ثانوية بل اصبح طالباً جامعياً .

He forgot that he was no longer a secondary school student but is now a college student.

نسي أنْ يغلق باب مكتبه فدخله اللصوص وأخذوا حاسوبَه

He forgot to lock his office door, so thieves entered and took away his computer.

نسي متى عاد وكم يوماًغاب ولماذا ترك في أوّل الأمر.

He forgot when he returned, how long he was gone and why he had left in the first place.

d. As you will remember, there are verbs that take two objects. These were presented and discussed in Lessons 4 and 5, which you may want to review. The first object in most cases a noun phrase, represented  in our vocabulary entry in the New Vocabulary section as  ه ; the second, represented by a second ه or any type of object(see item 13 أنسى  ه  ه / أنْ / أنّ  ،

 in the New Vocabulary section in this lesson ).

Needless to say that each verb must be learned, assimilated, and used with the type of object(s) and subject it takes. With every new verb introduced in the New Vocabulary section in Part I B in this book, these properties of verbs are given, in addition to the meaning of the verb and  the stem vowel of the imperfect for the non-derived verbs (see examples 23): for the object, the number and type  together with specific prepositions that a verb takes. (see item 4 حسب, item 11   طمأن , items 12  أنسى  نسي , and for the subject, the type when it is a clause with أنْ /أنّ  or specific items of vocabulary  that can serve in that role ( see item 8  

استحال  , item 10  حلا, and   item 13  صدر 

3. Order of Subject and Object within a sentence with a verb

In most cases, with verbs in first position the order is verb – subject– object. As we saw in lesson 2, in  ساد حياتَهم النظامُ القبلي the order of subject and  object is may be reversed. It is of course possible to say here  حياتَهم ساد النظامُ القبليّ with no change in meaning. Presumably the order is reversed because the focus is on  الحضر  and the writer wants to have the pronoun referring to it in حياتَهم not to be too far from it. Most often, however, this happens when the subject is a long sequence of words as in:

 الذي تحدّثنا عنه والذي …   ساد حياتَهم النظامُ القبلي

As we know, the subject or object can be brought into first position, as subjects in a nominal sentence, called  in Arabic ,   مبتدأ , with a corresponding  ‘returning pronoun’ left behind.

    2. 1:4. Clause as direct object.

We know that verbs can take nouns and pronouns as direct objects, but this text has an example of an أنْ-clause as a direct object:  تريد ان تملكَ قلبَه ‘she wants to possess his heart.’ The verbs in these أنْ-clauses are, of course, in the subjunctive mood after أن ْ, and these clauses always follows verbs of ordering, requests, necessity, etc. After other verbs denoting facts or existing conditions or verbs of asking, as in لا ادري لم جئت  ‘I don’t know why you came’, the object clause has a verb in the indicative and ان is not used, as in لم يعد يعرف ماذا يفعل ‘he (no longer) knew what to do (“what he would/should do”). 

A special feature of these أنْ-clauses is that they can be replaced by cognate verbal nouns, as in لم يستطع ان يصبر which is equal to لم يستطع الضَبرَ , الضَبرَ being the cognate verbal noun of the verb ضَبَرَ to be patient’. The أنْ-clause is called مضدر مُؤوَّل (“explanatory verbal noun”)

Syntactic properties of verbs:

In earlier lessons we discussed the semantic properties of verbs and how the semantic class of verbs affects the meaning of their perfect and imperfect forms. You have also become familiar, in the course of your study, with the syntactic properties of verbs, how they ‘govern’ other elements in the sentence, i.e. the number of objects they require, directly or through a preposition, and whether they take any objects at all. You undoubtedly realize that, in addition, you need to know what types of objects and subjects (constructions, structures) a particular verb takes.

We will take up objects first. Consider the following examples with the verb نَسِيَ which occurs in this lesson (item 23).

                                  نسوا محفظتهم        They forgot their wallet.

                      نسوا انّك هنا           They forgot that you were here.

              نسوا انْ يقرأوا النص          They forgot to read the text.                                   نسوا اين وضعوها              They forgot where they had put it.

As in English, a verb in Arabic may take for its object a noun or any nominal: a noun phrase, pronoun, an adjective, a clause with /أنْ/ or /أن!َ/, or a sentence headed by an interrogative word (an indirect question). With every verb introduced in the preparatory sentences in this book, these properties of verbs are given, in addition to the stem vowel of the imperfect for the non-derived form of the verb (see example 23), together with specific prepositions that some verbs are used with,

In the same way, verbs determine the type of subject they require. Verbs take one subject only (it can of course be a coordinated construction); that subject can be: (1) a noun phrase, as with أكل:أكل الولدُ التفّاحة   ‘the boy ate the apple’;  (2) a clause with / أنْ/, as required, for example, by يَجِبُ :  يعملَ ان يجب ‘he must work, (lit. “that he work is a must”); (3) a clause with أن! e.g., with بلغ: بلغني أنّك قادم غداً ‘I learned (“it reached me”) that you were coming tomorrow’; (4) a noun phrase or a clause with /’an/, as with  حلا  in item 16 in the preparatory sentences of this lesson: حلا له المنظر   ‘the sight gave him pleasure’ or حلا له انْ يراها  ‘it gave him pleasure to see her’ or (5) a noun phrase or a noun clause with / أنْ /or / أن!َ/, as in  أن أراه / أنّه نجح /سرّني منظرُه  ‘the way he THE looked/that he succeeded/to see him/ pleased me. ARABIC IN THIS LINE IS CONFUSING.

1.  ظروف الكيفيّة ‘Manner Adverbial’

A number of prepositional phrases occur in the Basic Text modifying a verb and expressing manner; they correspond to similar English phrases as well as to adverbs in    –ly, like “easily” and “quickly”. Here are some comments on these and similar manner adverbials:

  1. These constructions, which are of very wide occurrence in Modern Standard Arabic, are usually followed by a مصدر and occur most often with the prepositions في and   ب:

ردّت الروح في خوفٍ                              The spirit responded with dread.

قالت في رجفةٍ…                                    She said with trepidation…

اجاب في دهشةٍ…                                   He answered in consternation,

يتكلّم العربية بصعوبةٍ                               He speaks Arabic with difficulty.

قرأها بسرعةٍ                                        He read it quickly.

تبادلا القبلاتِ بحرارةٍ                               They exchanged kisses warmly.

طرق الباب في عنفٍ                                He knocked at the door vehemently.

With the preposition في, the adverbial in principle expresses the manner or condition (whether mental or physical) of the actor, whereas with the preposition ب  it describes the nature of the action—remember that one of the basic meanings of ب is “by means of (instrument)”, as in ضربه بعصاه  ‘He hit it with his cane’. The prepositions are often interchangeable, but not always; it all depends on the verb. Thus, we can say فتح الباب بهدوء /في هدوء  ‘He opened the door quietly’, but most likely you will see يعيشون في حيرة they live in distress/anxiety and  يسيرون ببُطْئٍ  they walk slowly. ; it is arguably unlikely to say  *حضر بسرعة ‘he came quickly’. There is a fine line to be drawn here: sensitivity and extended exposure to their usage will provide you a good feeling for the difference.

Another preposition that is used in manner adverbials is على. Here are some examples:                                        

على مهل  ‘slowly’

على عجل ‘quickly, in a hurry’

على الدوام ‘continually’

على الفور ‘immediately’

على الإطلاق ‘absolutely’

على الأرجح ‘most probably’

 The مصدر in a manner adverbial phrase, as in the examples above, is most commonly indefinite; elsewhere, when it is used in an abstract or generic sense, it is definite, whether a quality or an activity. Thus, we say يُعرفون بالشجاعة والوَقار ‘they are known for courage and dignity’ but تصرّفوا بشجاعة ووقار ‘they behaved with courage and dignity’; in English in both cases the abstract noun is indefinite.

2. Here are prepositional phrases with a definite (generic) مصدر which serve as manner adverbials:

بالإجماع  ‘unanimously’

بالصدفة  ‘accidentally’

بالتحديد  ‘specifically, to be precise’

بالتأكيد  ‘definitely’

بالكامل  ‘completely’

بالضبط  ‘exactly’

بالفعل  ‘really, actually’

In the course of the last two centuries, a large number of indefinite مصدر/verbal nouns have come to be used in the accusative case/منصوب or في حالة النصب as independent manner adverbial expressions. Underlying are aمفعول مطلق   construction (e.g.  عمّ عموماً to be fully comprehensive.  You will recognize some of the following:

فِعـْلاً  actually, indeed                                     خـُصوصاً  specifically, particularly

حَقًّا   truly, really                  مـُباشرة ً  immediately, straight away

قَـَطْعاً absolutely, definitely                              عـُموماً  generally

حـَتـْماً inevitably                                               أصْلاً  originally, basically

خاصّة ً especially, particularly                                  

Some manner adverbials are followed by the preposition required by their source verb:

نـَظـَراً لِ  ‘in view of’                                      بـِناءً على  ‘on the basis of’

وِفـْقا ً لِ  ‘according to’        فَـَضْلاً عن   ‘aside from’, to say nothing of’  

طِبقا ً لِ  ‘in accordance with’    عِوَضاً عن  ‘instead of, in exchange for’

إضافةً الى  ‘in addition to, as well as’             نـِسـْبةً الى   ‘regarding, in comparison with

اسـْتـِناداً الى/لِ  ‘based on’                                عـِلاوة ً على  ‘in addition to’

The مصدر may be modified by an adjective or an  إضافة construction:

يتكلّم العربية بصعوبة جَمّة     He speaks Arabic with great difficulty.

قرأها بسرعة البَرْق     He read it with lightening speed (lit. the speed of lightening).

1. Following are some nouns with the meaning of ‘manner, way of doing, form’ that are used in prepositional phrases to function as manner adverbials. The “manner” part is conveyed by means of the modifiers of these nouns. We will illustrate this usage with the first noun. The others will follow suit:

بِصورةٍ  in a…form as in بصورةٍ واضحةٍ clearly (“in a clear form”),  بصورة مستمرّةٍ continuously, بصورة كاملة completely, بصورةٍ غيرِ مُتـَوَقــّعةٍ unexpectedly,

 بصورة رسميّة officially, بصورة دائمة permanently, بصورة لم تخطر على بالٍ unexpectedly (“in a way that didn’t occur to anyone), بصورةٍ ما. in some form or other.

بطريقة in a…way

بشكل  in a…form

بصفة  in a…manner

بوجه  in a…manner

باسلوب in a …style

3. The construction denoting  كيفيّة/manner is to be distinguished from a حال, in that the latter mostly expresses the state of its antecedent  صاحب  while the event or action is taking place, whereas the former refers to the action itself without necessarily referring to the state of the actor. Thus  طرق الباب في عنف  does not indicate the person was harsh or vehement but that the knocking was rough, but  طرق الباب بشيء من العجرفة   ‘he knocked at the door with some arrogance’ does. It goes without saying that the meanings may be quite close in some cases as when a feeling is expressed, such as أجاب بخوف   ‘he answered in fear’, where the responding was given in fear and conceivably the person responding was himself في حالة خوف  ‘in a state of fear’. In some cases the constraints of translation may obscure the difference.

The Writing of ء Hamza                                                                                                                                                                  

The first thing one learns in the study of Modern Standard Arabic is the Arabic writing system; in practice, however, most learners do not learn how to spell words with hamza in it.  Hamza is, as you know, the name of the Arabic sign ء that represents the consonant glottal stop /’/, as in أكل /’akala/.  As understanding how hamza works not only helps you write Arabic correctly but also provides important clues to the reading of unvoweled texts, it is important to have a clear understanding of how it is written.

Hamza may be written over a “seat”/كُرسِيّ –ا alif, و waaw or ي yaa’–which then has no pronunciation value of its own, or it may be written aloof—on the line without a seat. As a seat ي  loses its two dots:  هانئٌ/haani’un/ happy, glad and    تَهْنِئة /tahni’atun/ congratulations. The choice of seat depends on (a) its position in the word and (b) the vowels that precede or follow it.

A. Hamza in word-initial position 

In this position the only seat is ا alif. If the following vowel is ـi kasra, then hamza with its kasra is written beneath the alif; otherwise, hamza is written above the seat:

إِسْلامٌ ’islaamun submission                        إِيجادٌ /’iijaadun/ creating, creation 

 أُكتُبْ/’uktub/ write!                                      أُولى /’uulaa/ first (fem.)           

أَكتُبُ /’aktubu/ I am writing                          آنِسة /’aanisatun/ young lady; Miss (see D. madda)         

B. Hamza in word–medial position

1.  after a short vowel, /i u a/

Here you must bear in mind the relative strengths of the three vowels:

a. if there is an  ـِ /i/ kasra on either side of the hamza the seat is ي yaa’ which, as a seat, is written without its two dots:

   يَئِسَ/ya’isa/ he became desperate  سُئِلَتْ /su’ilat/ she was asked            

 بَئِسَ  /ba’isa/ he became miserable           فِئةٌ – فِئاتٌ  /fi’atun-fi’aatun/ faction-s, bloc-s               

b. if there is no kasra but there is an  ـُ /u/ ḍamma, then the seat is و waaw:               

سُؤالٌ /su’aalun/ question                              بَؤُسَ /ba’usa/ he became bold   

سَؤولٌ always asking questions, inquisitive    فُؤادٌ /fu’aadun/ heart; Fuad

رُؤْيا – رُؤىً /ru’yaa – ru’yan/ vision-s, dream-s

If the choice of و waaw as seat results in having two waaws in succession, the seat may optionally be ي yaa’ instead of و waaw, or aloof after a non-connector letter:

مَسْؤولٌ or مَسْئولٌ responsible                 رُؤوسٌ or رُئوسٌ  heads                         

c. otherwise the seat is أُ alif:                                                               

 سَألنا /sa’alnaa/ we asked                           رَأْسٌ /ra’sun/ head/ 

مَأْمَنٌ /ma’manun/ a place of safety          

As in b. above, if hamza is followed by waaw  its seat may be waaw or yaa’:

رَؤوفٌ  or رَئوفٌ  /ra’uufun/ merciful, compassionate

2. after a long vowel, /aa, ii, uu/

After the non-connector letters ا /aa/ and و /uu/ and adjacent to a kasra the seat is ي, as you might expect; if there is no kasra but there is a ḍamma, the seat is و ; otherwise, hamza is written aloof:

سائلٌ /saa’ilun/ questioner; beggar                  سوءٌ   evil, ill; calamity (nom.)

تَساؤُلٌ /tasaa’ulun self-questioning                   سوءٍ (gen.)

ساءَلَ /saa’ala/ he questioned, interrogated       سوءًا(acc.)      

If hamza comes between two alifs, then it is written aloof (on the line) between them, as in قِراءاتٌ readings, to avoid two alifs in succession.

After the letter ي, whether representing long vowel /ii/ or the consonant /y/, hamza is written over ي as its seat.

بَطيئَةٌ /baṭii’atun/ slow (fem.)             شَيْئانِ /shay’aani/ (two) things

بيئة /bii’atun/ milieu, surroundings, environment 

3. after a consonant

Following a consonant, or, in terms of the writing system, after ـْ sukuun, alif serves as hamza’s seat:

مَسأَلةٌ /mas’alatun/ question, problem               مَرْأىً – مَراءِ /mar’an – maraa’in/ sight-s; vision-s;                                                                        

C. Word-final position.

1. Here only the vowel preceding hamza affects the choice of seat; after a short vowel the same  priorities as above obtain: kasra first, then ḍamma and last fatḥa determines the choice of seat.  Illustrations:

هانِئًا هانِئٍ،    هانِئٌ،  happy, glad      مُبْتَدِئٌ /mubtadi’un/ beginner; novice  

لُؤْلُؤًا    لُؤْلُؤٍ،    لُؤْلُؤٌ،  pearls                    

مَبْدَأً     مَبْدَإٍ،      مَبْدَأً،  principle

The accusative words هانِئًا and لُؤْلُؤًا receive an alif after the accusative ending ـَ fatḥa as expected but accusative مَبْدَأً does not because it already ends in alif and two alifs cannot be written one right after the other. Notice that ء hamza is written below alif when followed by kasra, as in مَبْدَإٍ above, the same as it is in word-initial position.

2. After long vowels, word-final hamza is written on the line, without a seat.

ماءٌ، ماءٍ، ماءً water                              ، مَساءً مَساءٌ، مَساءٍ evening

بَطيءٌ، بَطيءٍ، بَطيئًا slow                  يُسيءُ، أنْ يُسيءَ he harms, does harm (سوءٌ); that he do harm

سُوءٌ، سُوءٍ، سوءًا calamity, misfortune عِبْءٌ، عِبْءٍ، عْبْئًا burden

In the examples above, when  hamza is followed by ḍamma or kasra it is written without a seat; when followed by fatḥa, the accusative-marker alif is added after a non-connector letter (ا، د، ذ، ر، ز، و, as in  جُزْءًا, and after a connector letter hamza is placed over a dotless ي as a seat, ـئـ, as in عِبْئًا burden, to avoid two alifs in succession.

3. If there is no vowel preceding word-final hamza—that is, hamza is preceded by a consonant = a letter written with ـْ sukuun over it—then it is written on the line without a seat.                 

جُزْءٌ part, portion             شَيْءٌ thing                                   ضَوءٌ a light      

جُزْءٍ                                شَيْءٍ                                                                              ضَوْءٍ     

جُزْءًا                                شَيْـئًا                                               ضَوءًا         

Note. When a word with a word-final hamza receives an ending making the hamza word-medial you will see much variation in the choice of seat:

Word-final hamza:          With plural suffix:                       “its light”:           

قرأ  he read (perf.)           قرأوا they read                               ضَوْؤُهُ                        

                                          ضَؤئهِ      ضوأه

                                            

                                                                                                                                                                               

D. Maddaآ : The sequence ’a’C > ’aa

When two hamzas are separated by a short vowel and are followed by a consonant, as in أَأْكُلُ* /’a’kulu/ I eat (cf. يأْكُلُ /ya’kulu/), the second hamza is deleted and the short vowel is doubled to compensate for that deletion, maintaining the original length of the word:

*’v’C (4 units) > ’vC (3 units) > ’vvC (4 units)

The resulting long vowel will be represented by one of the three “letters of prolongation”, ا , و   and  ي. In this case, however, the alif  is written horizontally over another alif:آ  

This process is purely phonetic and takes place with any form of any part of speech that fits the formula, as illustrated here:

Broken plural: أمَلٌ hope –  أَأْمالٌ* > آمالٌ hopes

Elative form:   أَأْخَرُ* > آخَرُ other

Form IV verb, imperfect: أُأْمِنُ* > أُومِنُ I believe

Form IV verb, perfect: أَأْتَيْتُ* > آتَيْتُ I brought, gave 

Form IV verbal noun: إِأمانٌ* > إِيمانٌbelief, faith 

E. همزة القطع وهمزة الوصل

The glottal stop—hamza—is a full-fledged consonant whose presence or absence affects the meanings of words ; compare سأل to ask and سال to flow, or سأل to ask and سَعَلَ to cough. This hamza is called همزة القَطْعِ, the disjunctive hamza, or hamza of separation: if the two adjacent vowels are not separated the meaning of the word changes.     

At the same time, there are words which begin with two consonants, an unpronounceable combination that needs a helping vowel to break up that consonant cluster.  To illustrate, “his son” in Arabic is بْنُهُ /bnuhu/, beginning with two consonants.  If it follows a word ending in a vowel, there is no problem: وَبْنُهُ /wa-bnuhu/ and his son, لِبْنِهِ /li-bnihi/ his son’s. Otherwise the

helping vowel i is prefixed—but this vowel needs a glottal stop to make it pronounceable, as an utterance cannot begin with a vowel: إِبْنُهُ /‘ibnuhu/.  This glottal stop that serves only to facilitate pronunciation is called همزة الوَصلِ, the connective hamza. همزة الوصل, which is only found in word-initial position, is often omitted, the vowel sign alone being written.  The helping vowel is kasra except for the definite article, where it is fatḥa, and Form I imperative verbs that have the stem vowel ḍamma.

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بغداد

جولة العربية في أسواق القدس القديمة
مدينة عربية: الرياض
مدينة عربية: الرباط
ألف ليلة وليلة بقلم سمير عواد
قصة الملك العادل

GRAMMAR  NOTE  1  الماضي ‘The Perfect Tense’

The Perfect Tense may have the following meanings and functions:

  1. a. It expresses a completed action, an Event,  as in a narrative—it answers the question, What happened?  What took place? Here are some examples from the Basic  Text of Lesson 1 (for other examples look in lessons 6 and  11, which are narratives):

جلس ‘he sat down’

قام الى اهله ‘he (up and) went to his family’

سألوه ‘they asked him’

تمّ الزواج ‘the marriage took place/was performed’

انتظر ساعة ‘he waited for an hour’

خرجت من المطبخ ‘she came out of the kitchen’

This of course includes negative perfects as well, which are mostly expressed with لم, like:

لم يستطعْ    ‘He found himself incapable of, he was unable (at that point) to’

If you take all the perfect tense verbs in main clauses out of a narrative and string them together you will have a skeleton of the plot.

Here the English verb and the Arabic verb are in contrast: The English past tense can denote either a single event (“he ate with us yesterday”) or a past custom or condition (“he always ate alone”),  whereas the Arabic verb can only denote an event (تغدى معنا البارحة). Compare:

I wrote my parents a letter last Sunday about my new job.

“I wrote” = an event = perfect tense: كتبتُ                     and

I wrote my parents a letter every Sunday when I was in college.

“I wrote” = customary activity = past imperfect: كنت أكتبُ

b. A perfect may also express an event whose results are still in effect, where English uses the present perfect tense:

هل ركبت جَمَلاً؟                                    Have you ridden a camel?

لم ارَ في حياتي امرأة بمثل هذا الجمال.            I have never in my life seen a woman of such beauty.

لم ازر شيكاغو حتى الآن.                          I haven’t visited Chicago as of now.

لم تنسَه في حياتها.           She hasn’t forgotten him all her life,

This applies in the case of verbs of motion (‘to come, to go’):

جئتُ للحصول على شهادة.       I have come to get a degree.                       

  • The perfect is used as optative to express a wish (positive or negative), blessings, prayers, or curses, and is equal to English “would that…”, “may [such-and-such happen]”, as in:

باركَكَ الله                                              ‘(May) God bless you!’

والدي، رحمه الله …                       My father, God rest his soul …

كفانا الله شرَّه              ‘May God protect us from the harm he will bring’.

قاتله الله                                              (lit. May God fight him! Damn him!)

لعنهم الله                                             (lit. May God curse him! Damn him!

In this usage the perfect is negated by لا, as in

لا سمح الله                                            ‘Heaven forbid!’ 

It is worth mentioning that in more recent Standard Arabic the use of the imperfect with optative meaning, following colloquial usage, shows up more and more in writing.

الله يلعن الشيطان!                                   (lit. May God curse the devil!

الله يُكرمُك!                (lit. May God honor you! May God be gracious to you?

  1. Verbs that make a declaration— effecting changes in the formal or official status of a person or thing, referred to as performative verbs–are usually in the perfect tense, and may be passive. They carry the meaning of “consider it done”.

(In English they are usually first person singular or plural present tense. A minister might say “I pronounce you husband and wife”, at which point the couple is officially married). Here are examples:

فصلناك من اللجنة.                     we (hereby) fire you from the committee.’

اتّفَقْنا.ا                             ‘We (herewith) agree.’ ‘Agreed! It’s a deal’

قُبلَت الاستقالةُ. ُ                   ‘The resignation is (hereby) accepted’.

زوّجتك إيّاها.            (said at a Muslim wedding) You are hereby married.

Notice that English often has “hereby” when using such verbs.

Verbal derivatives may also carry performative force, as with انا شاكرٌ لك ‘I am grateful to you, I thank you’ and شكراً ‘thanks’.

For review, note that in Arabic the imperfect tense is the tense used with:

  • verbs that make assertions, committing the speaker to a particular stand or belief,:

اعترف بعدالة القضية.            ‘I acknowledge the justice of the cause’

  • verbs used  as directives, causing the hearer to do something:

 اتحدّاك ان تعيدَ ذلك ‘I dare you to do that again’

and(iii)  verbs of expression, expressing the speaker’s psychological state regarding the issue at hand: اعْتَذِر ‘I apologize’ and  اشْكُرُك  ‘I thank you.’

  1. The Perfect also has a present (and future in some cases) meaning with verbs of  understanding, knowing, liking, thinking:

أفهمت ما أقوله؟                                     Do you understand what I say.

نعم فهمت.                                           Yes, I do.

  1. In subordinate clauses which follow verbs in the perfect, perfect may mean past perfect:

بعد انْ غادرت فكّرت مَلِيّاً في السؤال الذي وجّهته اليّ

After I left, I thought for a long time about the question he had addressed to me.

          (ii) The perfect tense in a subordinate clause retains its basic meaning of a completed event but the timing will depend on the type of subordinate clause it is in–a relative clause, where it will often refers to past time, or a conditional clause where it probably refers to present time, etc.

This may have been covered in an earlier note, but if so, it bears repeating.

  1. In conditional sentences the verb in both the conditioning clause and the result clause are mostly  in the perfect with mostly a present or future meaning:
  1.  in real, possible conditions with اذا، إن, the verb that follows is in the perfect , while in contrary to fact and hypothetical conditions with لو   conditioning clauses may be either both perfect or both jussive, with the perfect having a present or future meaning.
  1. This is also the case with the perfect in temporal clauses withا  اذ  meaning ‘when’ and اذا ما  ‘whenever’ which have a present or future meaning.
  • With the indefinite relative pronouns مَن ‘who, whoever’ ما  ‘what, whatever’, where both the main and the subordinate clauses are either perfect or jussive:

الله معك في كلّ ما قابلت من صعوبات             May God be with you in all the difficulties you meet.                      

من شبّ على شيء شاب عليه                      The way you grow up is the way you grow old.

افعلوا ما شئتم/كما شئنم

d.   after adverbs followed by the indefinite particle ما  like اينما  كُلَّما حيثما مهما متى ما  (see lesson 3 Lexical note 2)

   في اي وقت شاء   The perfect verb شاء   ‘is used in this expression in the place of the imperfect to give the verb the character of definiteness by implying that it has already been exercised’. The imperfect may also be used here.

A NOTE ON  لم يمضِ ‘(time) did not pass’: The Jussive of Defective Verbs.

Defective verbsالفعل المُعْتَلّ الآخِر/ are probably the trickiest of all to conjugate and nowhere more so than in the jussive mood/المضارع المجزوم,   Here is a brief reminder of how it goes.

First, the jussive mood/الفعل المجزوم of sound verbs is formed by deleting the short vowel ـَ a on any subjunctive form unless it is part of the inflection نَ , the feminine plural ending; to re-phrase it, change فتحة to سكون except on feminine plural forms of the subjunctive.   To illustrate first with the sound verb كتب – يكتب ‘to write’ and then with three defective verbs (only the affected forms are given):

Strong Verb: كتب – يكتبُ ‘to write’

 Jussive                                 –  Subjunctive                     

لم اكتبْ  ‘I did not write’       أنْ اكتبَ  – ‘that I write’             

لم تكتبْ  ‘you did not write’  تكتبَ  – أنْ ‘that you write’                                                                   لم يكتبْ  ‘he did not write’    يكتبَ  – أنْ ‘that he write’

لم نكتبْ  ‘we did not write’   أنْ نكتبَ  – ‘that we write’

Defective verbs:     

Jussive                                  –  Subjunctive

لم ادعُ ‘I did not call’            –  أنْ ادعوَ  ‘that I call’ 

لم ابقَ ‘I did not stay’           –    ان ابقى  ‘that I stay’     

لم امضِ ‘I did not continue’ –  ان امضيَ ‘that I continue’ 

The jussive of defective verbs is formed by shortening the long vowel of the subjunctive stem: ى aa becomesـَ  a, ي ii becomes  ـِi and و uu becomes ـ ـُu.  This involves dropping a letter in each case, leaving only a vowel sign/حركة. Defective verbs, exemplified here by دعا – يدعو ‘to call’ and مضى – يمضي ‘to continue on’, thus have long vowels in the imperfect indicative and subjunctive but, following this rule, lose the long vowel in the jussive. With a fully-voweled text this is no problem, since the حركات are visible, but most all texts are unvoweled and this can be a problem.  Suppose you come across لم يمت in a text–how do you read it?  Well, how can you read it?  You have to know that يمت could be based on a doubled root, as in لم يمُتَّ ‘he did not spread (s.th.)’, or on a hollow root, لم يمُتْ ‘he did not die’ or a defective root,لم يمْت  which doesn’t exist. 

When you come across a very short verb form in the imperfect tense in a context that requires or permits the jussive mood, then you proceed through a similar process of elimination.

And while we are at it, remember that with hollow verbs   الفعل الأجْوّف/verb forms with no suffixes shorten the long vowel in the jussive as in  

Jussive                                  –  Nominative

لم اقُلْ ‘I did not l’                     أقولُ‘I say’ 

لم أكَدْ ‘no sooner had I …’         أكادُ  ‘I almost …’     

لم أنَمْ                               أنامُ  ‘I sleep’

لم أسِرْ                             أسيرُ ‘I walk’

 افعال تأخذ مفعولين أصلهما مبتدأ وخبر 2..  ‘Verbs with two Objects in a relationship of subject and predicate  

In lesson 4 we discussed  a class of verbs with two Object Complements: Causatives of transitive verbs with one object, and Verbs with the specific meaning of giving. In this lesson we will discuss another class of verbs with two Object Complements,  verbs  whose two object complements stand to one another in a relationship of subject and predicate.  These are also of two kinds:

1. Verbs whose two objects are nouns that bear to each other a true equational relationship (i.e. one where the first equals and “is” the second). These include (i) verbs like لقّـّب  ‘name, surname (or nickname)’, دعا   ‘name’,  سمّى   ‘name, call’, whose second object may alternately take the preposition  ب  and (ii) verbs like  عيّن  ‘appoint’, اختار  ‘choose, select’,  اتّخذ   ‘single out, adopt, take s.o. for’, انتخب ‘elect’, whose second object may alternately take the preposition ك ‘as’.

Here the order is always first object followed by second, and only the first may be pronominalized and only the first can become the subject of the passive verb. Here are examples:

سَمّوْا ابنَتـَهم الكبرى فاطمة َ/سَمّوْها بفاطمة           They called their eldest daughter/her Fatima.

سُمِّيَت فاطمة َ/ بفاطمة                                        She was called Fatima.

لُقـِّب( بـ)أمير البحار         He was surnamed ‘the admiral’.

انتخبوا رئيس حزب اليمين رئيساً للوزراء/           They elected the head of the party of the   right prime minister.

انتخبوه رئيساً للوزراء/اُنْتُخِب رئيساً للوزراء        They elected him prime minister/He was elected prime minister.

عُيـِّنت ثاتشر سفيرة ً/كسفيرةً لبلادها في غانا        Thatcher was appointed her country’s embassador to Ghana.          

2. Verbs that take aمصدر مؤوّل  ‘noun  clause with  أنّ ’ as their object but can also occur without  أنّ ,  where the subject after أنّ serves as first object المفعول الأوّل,  and the predicate as second object المفعول الثاني  . The first object is always a noun (or pronoun) and is in the accusative, and the second can be a noun, adjective, or participle, in which case it takes the accusative marker, a prepositional phrase, or a verb (in both الماضي  and  المضارع المرفوع) . Such verbs as ظنّ ‘think’, رأى ‘see, perceive, deem’ ,  عرف ‘know/recognize s.o./s.th. to be, حسِب ‘reckon, consider, deem, assume’, اعتبر ‘consider’,  زعم  ‘regard, take s.o. for or to be, claim’, تصوّر ‘imagine’ , خال ‘imagine, consider, deem s.o. to be’, وجد  ‘ find s.o. or s.th. to be’, mean mostly knowing, having or leaning towards an opinion, considering, believing, and are known as افعال القلوب  ‘verbs of the heart’ (heart here refers to the mind and the intellect and not to emotions or feelings).

ظننتُ الحبَّ قائماً بينهما     I thought love existed between them.

حسِبتُ العلم كنزاً لا يفنى      I reckoned knowledge to be a lasting treasure.

وجدناه أهلا للاحترام والثناء     We found him to be worthy of respect and praise.

Here again the order is always first object followed by the second, and only the first may be pronominalized and become the subject of the passive verb.

Some remarks

Here again, it is important to have the following comments in mind as we consider, study, and try to retain and use these verbs.

but not

اعتقدها قاسية القلب*         I believe her to be (lit.her) hard hearted.

On the other hand, we also have a verb of this same semantic class, عدّ ‘consider, regard, think’ which is not normally used with   .أنّSo we have:   

عددتموه واحداً من أقرب الأصدقاء.                     You considered him one of your closest friends.

but not,

*عددتم  انّه  واحدا من أقرب الأصدقاء               

b. Some of the verbs of this subclass may have different meanings in different contexts. Thus, the verbs  رأى and  وجد  with أنّ refer to mental activities and are acts of the mind, such as deeming and finding ‘s.o. or s.th to be …’, respectively  ; without أنّ they may may have the meaning of افعال القلوب  , but it may refer to the organs of sense as افعال الحَسّ ‘verbs of the sense’, and mean ‘see with the eyes’, or ‘come across, hit upon’, respectively. In the latter case, the second complement after the first object is not a second object but a  حال. The line of demarcation is much clearer in the case of the verb سَمِع  , which is preponderantly a verb of the heart with أنّ ‘learn, be told’ but a verb of sense ‘hear (with the ears)’, without أنّ. With other verbs it is more difficult sometimes to tell a second object from a حال . Much depends on the context and whether the second construction lends itself to such an interpretation; it is a second object for sure, when it is clear that the first object is or is taken to be the second. Thus,

ظننتُه صديقاً لى/يعرف العربية/قد ترك وظيفته              I thought him to be a friend of mine/him to be one who knows Arabic/he had left his job.

Compare this sentence with:

عرفته قاضياً عادلاً           I knew him to be a fair judge or

I knew him as (at a  time when he was) a fair judge.

رأيتهم لا يعرفون للحريّة معنىً        I perceived them to be people who did not know the meaning of freedom.

c. As you know several of these verbs can do without a second object:

علمت القضيّة             I got to know the problem.

d. With some of these verbs, the first object and the subject of the verb may be identical, but only if both are 1s., in which case the first object has the meaning ‘myself’:

رأيتُني أتخبّط.           I saw me (myself) wandering about, lost.

e. Once again here, what we said about these verbs and their government applies to their derivatives:  مصدر ‘verbal nouns’ and  اسم الفاعل واسم المفعول ‘active and passive participles’, (wherever these have not taken on the meaning and usage of  nouns, of course.

انا مُصرّ على اعتبار  أخيك قائداً مثاليّا.               I insist on considering your brother a model leader.

لم أقل شيئاً مُعتبرا السكوتَ أفضلَ من الكلام.        I said nothing, considering silence better than talking.

f. In the passive, it is the whole clause with أنّ or the first object, i.e.when the verb is used without أنّ  , that becomes the subject of the passive verb.

وُجِدتم أهلا للاحترام والثناء. You were found him worthy of respect and praise.

عُرِف قاضياً عادلاً.         He was known to be a fair judge or

He was known as (when he was) a fair judge.

g. Finally these verbs with two objects are to be distinguished from verbs that take two accusatives, but their two complements do not stand to each other in any of the relationships we described here or in lesson 4. Such verbs, like زاد   ‘add to, increase’, take an object and a complement in the accusative that answers the question ‘with respect to what, in terms of what’ (called   تَمْييز in Arabic, to be discussed in lesson 7). Here is the example we find in this lesson:

ممّا زادها (مدينة بغداد) جمالا ً حدائقها.               What has added to its beauty …(lit. what has increased it in beauty)                                   

Once again, an earlier statement with respect to differences in the meaning and usage of various verbs bears repeating: only the use of a dictionary, careful study, practice, patient learning, frequent use and extensive exposure can teach the learner of a foreign language, any foreign language, and help him or her retain these details.

3.The Passive Participle/الاسم المفعول.  In the previous lesson we discussed active participles; it would be well now to have a glance at passive participles, first the forms and then their usages.

Form I verbs are the most basic forms of verbs in Arabic, and the derived verb conjugations are built on them.  For example, Form I verb وضُحَ ‘to be clear’ can be put into the causative Form II verb وضّح to mean “to cause to be clear, make clear, clarify, explain’.  Form I active participles have their own private shapes different from those of the derived Forms.  The Form I active participle pattern is فاعِلٌ and its variants, as you know, and the passive pattern is مَفْعولً, as in فاعل ‘making’ and مفعول ‘made’ from فعل – يفعل ‘to do, make’.

The rule for forming all the derived verb participles goes like this, illustrated by Form II قدّم ‘to present; to offer’, Form VI تناوَل ‘to reach for and take’ and VIII انتخب ‘to elect’:

0: Imperfect indicative:                  يقدِّم                 يتناوَل                ينتخِب                                                                                                                                           1. Select the imperfect stem:       -قدِّم                      -تناوَل               نتخِب –                          

2. Prefix مُ-:                                      مُقدِّم                 متناوَل                منتخِب                                       

3. Change the stem vowel where necessary           

            for the active to i:            مُقدِمٌ’presenting’ متناوِل ‘taking up’    منتخِب   ‘electing’                                                                 

            for the passive to a:        مُقدَم  ‘presented’ متناوَل  ‘taken up’       منتخَب ‘elected’

The meaning of the passive participle is “having undergone )the action of the verb(” or “having been put into  or assumed (the state or quality denoted by the verb)”; the technical term for this meaning is patient, one who has suffered or undergone the action of the verb. Thus the underlying meaning of مقدَّم is ‘having been presented’, of متناوَل is ‘having been taken’, and of منتخَب is ‘having been elected’.

The passive participles of verb-preposition idioms retain the preposition to specify the meaning of the phrase; the structure is illustrated by the following phrase based on وَثِقَ – يَثِقُ بِ ‘to trust, have confidence in’:

 دراسةٌ موثوقٌ بها ‘a trustworthy/reliable study’

Here the past participle itself is invariable–it is always masculine singular, while the pronoun object of the preposition is what agrees with the modified noun.  Here are two more examples:

القوانين المعمول بها ‘the laws on the basis of which (governments) have been operating’

 علمه وجهده غير مرغوبٍ فيهما في وطنه الام’his education and efforts are not favored in his mother country’

A secondary meaning of the passive is potentiality of action; for example, مأكول can mean either ‘(having been) eaten’ or ‘edible’ and مقبول can mean ‘accepted’ or ‘acceptable’. This feature is found in the verb as well, where the passive can have potential meaning, as in شيء لا يُصَدَّقُ ‘something unbelievable (“not to be believed”)’ and لم يحدثْ شيءٌ يُذْكَرُ ‘Nothing remarkable happened.’

Finally, some passive participles develop fixed meanings and become nouns, taking the plural patterns that nouns rather than adjectives take, like مكتوب ‘message, note’ (“that which has been written”) with its plural مكاتيبُ and مفهومٌ – مفاهيمُ ‘notion-s, concept-s’. The word معلوم is interesting: as a passive participle it means “known”; as a noun it means “fee; duty, tax” (Tunisia), and with the feminine suffix, معلومة, it means ‘a known or given fact, a piece of information’ with the regular plural معلومات meaning ‘knowledge, information; data’.

Derived passive participles may also mean noun of place, like مخيَّم ‘camping ground, camp’ from خيَّم ‘to pitch tent, encamp’ and مُستشفىً ‘hospital’ from استشفى ‘to seek a cure’.  In this usage the derived passive participles differ from basic Form I verbs, which have the special pattern مفعلة/مَفعَل (or مفغِل with most verbs whose imperfect stem vowel in ـِ i). The plural of all of these patterns is مَفاعِلُ.

مكتبٌ – مكاتِبُ ‘office-s’ from كتب – يكتُب ‘to write’

مدرسةٌ – مدارسُ ‘school-s’ from  درس – يدرُس ‘to study’

مجلِسٌ – مجالسُ ‘seat; session; council’ from جَلَسَ – يجلِس ‘to sit down’

مقهىً – مقاهٍ from the root of the noun قهْوة

Lexical Note 1  جعل

This verb has several meanings and connotations, some of which will be given below. In this connection, we should keep several things in mind as we progress in the mastery of the language. As you must surely have already realized, words assume a number of meanings other than the one that occurs in a particular text. The English translation (or the Arabic synonym) that is given in the new word section very often applies to the particular context in which it occurs in that lesson and that English word may itself carry a whole lot of other meanings that do not apply to the Arabic word in that lesson. Beginning with lesson 11, no English translation is provided, except in cases where an Arabic synonym is not within your vocabulary at this point in time; that gets you one step further in the acquisition of Arabic, which is to rely on your previous knowledge and the context. But even here, the Arabic synonym that is given may not provide the full range of meanings that the new word has. Here again to acquire that we need to rely more and more on the context, dictionaries and other useful instruments of learning. To help in that endeavor, beginning with lesson 16, the meanings of certain new words are not given at all and you are to figure them from the context. Once again, please remember that different meanings, nuances etc. are expressed through particular syntactic structures as. in the case of  جعل   as a verb of beginning, and as pointed out in the grammatical note in this lesson on verbs with two objects, through the use of different prepositions, and even, in many cases, the very same word or construction in a different context. Best wishes as you seek to reach the Superior level in Arabic and beyond. 

The verb جعل has several meanings. Here are the most common:

1. to begin an event or an action, i.e. as one of  افعال الشروع   ‘verb of beginning’. As explained in Lesson 4 Grammar Note 2, two conditions apply: it can only be in الماضي , and it must be followed alone or with its subject by  a verb in المضارع   with an identical pronoun subject.

حين رآني جعل يعاتبني.       When he saw him he began to reproach me.

2. to induce/cause someone to do or act, when followed by an object and a verb in  المضارع   with the same subject as that object:

جعلهم يقرأون بصوت عالٍ.   He made them read with a loud.voice.

جعلوهنّ  يلبَسن غطاءً على رؤوسهنّ              They made them wear a cover over their heads.

3. to set or make a rule, a principle, or establish a new fact as in وضع ، خصّص:

اجعل لكلّ شيءٍ وقتاً.                                Set a time for everything.

جعل الدستور لكلّ ولاية مجلساً خاصّاً              The constitution set up a special chamber for every state.

جعل بغداد عاصمةً للدولة.       He made Baghdad the capital of the state.

4. to turn s.th. into, transform

جعل الطين ابريقاً                                   He made a jar out of clay.

5. to appoint to an office

. جعلوه رئيساً لحكومتهم     They made him head of their government.

جعلها وزيرة للخارجية.                             He made her Secretary of State.

6. to  think, deem, believe, maintain s.o./s.th. to be …

جعل من الحبّة قُبّة.      He deemed a granule a dome (he exaggerated)

جعلوا العجل الهاً لهم.        They made the calf their god.

7. to put, get s.o. / s.th. into a specific state or condition
الدموقراطية تجعلنا مطمئنّين على حقوقنا واموالنا Democracy makes us feel secure as to our rights and property.

2. تتابع  اوتسلسل الأحداث  sequence of events

The following construction occurs in this lesson:

لم يمضِ … حتـّى…   ‘It was not long before…; no sooner had he …until…’

There are a number of expressions in Arabic that convey this same or similar idea of  ‘It was not long before…; no sooner had he …until…’ ‘no sooner … than’ ‘it was not long before …’ .They are of high frequency occurrence and you are very likely to come across them in your readings, especially in news reports and narratives.  Here are the most common:

  1. ما كاد/لم يكَد/لا يكاد + فاعل + فعل (مضارع)+فاعل  حتّى …

Here the two subjects in the main clause are identical.

ما كدتُ أ ُغلِقُ الباب حتّى سمعنا صريخاً مُدْوِياً.  I hardly closed the door when we heard a loud scream.

2.   ما إنْ + فعل ماضي/مضارع  حتّي …

ما إنْ أَغلق الباب حتّى سمعنا صريخًا مُدْوِياً .      He hardly closed the door when we heard a loud scream.

ما إن تبلغ الطائرة المطار حتّى يشعر المسافرون بالطمأنينة

No sooner does the plane reach the airport than the passenger’s  heart is filled with serenity.

3.  ما لَبِثَ/لم يلْبَثْ + فاعل1 +  أنْ + فعل ماضي +فاعل1   . . .

Here again the two subjects are identical.

… غير أنّ خوفي لم يلبث ان اختفى  .     However, it wasn’t long  before (lit. it did not tarry long (until))  my fear disappeared.

ماضي ؛ 4 + ما هو/هي إلاّ انْ:

ما هي إلاّ أنْ تركوا بلادهم  وهاجروا              It was not long until they left their country and migrated.

ما هو إلاّ انْ + فعل ماضي حتى ..

ما هو إلّا  انْ سمع زوجته حتّى اخذ يبكي No sooner had he heard his wife than he …

ما هو/هي إلاّ + ظرف زمان حتّى..

ما هو/هي إلاّ يوم/ثوان/ٍساعات حتّى أدرك القضيّة كلَّها

It was not long (lit. a day/a/few seconds/hours before he understood the whole story.

إلاّ  أنّ3  ‘however, albeit, but’

We discussed إلاّ in lesson 1 (see Lesson 1 Lexical Note 3) as an exceptive   اسـْتـِثـْناء  to  a previous negative main clause.  إلاّ, in addition,   followed by a clause with  أنّ , occurs mainly  after an affirmative sentence, or a whole preceding discourse with the adversative  اسـْتـِدْراك  meaning of ‘but’, ‘however’, ‘whereas’.  Thus,

لم يغادر احد مكانه على الطائرة خوفاً من ذلك الراكب. إلاّ انّي فقدت صبري واتّجهت نحوه قائلاً…

No one on that plane left his place out of fear of that passenger. However, I lost my patience and headed towards him saying …

سمـّاها “دارالسلام”. إلاّ انّ اسم بغداد غلب عليها  

He named it “Dar Al-Salaam”, but the name “Baghdad” prevailed (lit.overcame it).

4. حرف الجرّ “الكاف ”    ‘The preposition كَ ’.

This preposition, like other prepositions, may be followed by a noun phrase, the relative pronoun ما , and the subordinators  أنّ و أنْ , and in certain fixed lexical items. Like one- letter prepositions, such as ل  or  ب , it is prefixed to the word that follows it, and like the preposition  حتّى , it cannot be followed by a pronoun suffix.

1.  كَ followed by a noun phrase is used to mean:

a. ‘similar to, like, such as’ i.e. with the meaning of  مثل:

وجهها كالبدر= مثلُ البدر     Her face is (beautiful) like a full moon.

الحياة كالبرق (مثلَ البرق) تمضي بسرعة         Life like lightning passes quickly.

لموضوع معيّن كالأدب      to a particulr topic, such as literature.

b. ‘as’, ‘in the capacity of’:

ذهب لزياة القدس كسفير لبلاده                     He went to visit Jerusalem as his country’s ambassador.

جاهد كبطل ومات كشهيد    He fought as a hero and died as a martyr.

c. ‘as … as …’ in a simile:

فهو كالموت قويّ                                    For it is as strong as death.

وجهها أبيض كالثلج                                 Her face is as white as snow.

 كَ is also used in the following lexical items:

a.ا كهذ  and the other forms of the demonstrative to mean ‘like this one/these’

لن اتزوّج فتاة كهذه                                  I will never marry a girl like this one.

b.كذلك   ‘too, also’,

جئت متاخّرا وجاءت متأخّرةً كذلك                 I came late, and she came late also.

 c.  كذا which occurs

  as  كذا  ‘such and such a thing’ when following a noun or ‘such and such a number’ when preceding a noun,

سيحضر في يوم كذا وشهر كذا                     He will  be arriving on such and such a day and such and such a month.

سيأخذ كذا يوم ويتناول كذا موضوع                It will take such and such number of days and will deal with such and such number of topics.

 as  كذا وكذا    ‘such and such (unspecified content)’,

قالت عنّي كذا وكذا                                  She said such and such about me.

  as هكذا  ‘this way, in this manner, like this, and such’,

لا اسمح لك ان تستعمل اسمي هكذا                 I won’t allow you to use my name in this way.

ظلّ يعذ ّبني هكذا حتى الصباح                     He went on tormenting me this way until morning.

2. كما         

Here كَ  is followed by الاسم الموصول ما   ‘the indefinite pronoun ما ’  and whatever can occur as its صلة (see Lesson 2 GRAM 4) to mean ‘just as, in the same way as, same as’.

It thus may be followed by:

a. a sentence, which can be جملة فعلية  with the verb in  الماضي  or  المضارع   or                   جملة اسمية  ,    to mean ‘as’

لست الآن كما كنت من قبل                         I am no longer as I used to be.  

هي في رَيَعان الشباب كما يقولون                  She is in the prime of youth, as they say.

يتشاجران كما هي الحال كل َّ يوم                   The two of them quarrel as the case is every day.

The verb in the main sentence is often repeated after كما :

يعاملني كما يعامل عدوّاً له       He treats me as he treats an enemy.

or

to compare between two sentences, the second sentence being introduced by words such as كذلك or فإنّ :

كما يدافع الانسان عن اطفاله كذلك يثور الدُبّ(= فإنّ الدبّ يثور) ليحميَ صِغارَه

Just as man defends his children, so the bear flares up to protect his little ones.

A variant of this usage is the use of  كما أنّ :

كما أنّ الانسان يدافع عن اطفاله كذلك يثور الدُبّ (= فإنّ الدبّ يثور) ليحميَ صِغارَه

b. a prepositional phrase:

جلسنا سويّا ً كما في الماضي                       We sat together as in former days.

كما في الصورة                                     as in the picture

c. a pronoun:

عليك أن تقبله كما هو                               You must accept him as he is.

d. a noun clause with أنّ   ‘as also, just as’

هو رجل فاضل كما أنّه ابٌ حنون مثاليّ            He is an honorable man, and also a tender, ideal father.

كما أنّ  may occur at the beginning of a sentence juxtaposed to a previous sentence with the meaning ‘in addition, just as/in like manner, at the same time’ …

كما أننا يجب ان نميّز بين أجنبي وأجنبيّ    …    In like manner we must differentiate between one kind of alien and another.

e. the conditional particle  لو  ‘if’, followed by a verb in  الماضي  or a noun clause with أنّ to mean ‘as though, as if’

تصرّف كما لو أصيب برصاصة    He behaved as if he had been hit by a bullet.

يبدو كما لو أنّي أراه الآن                           It seems as if I were seeing him now.

3. كأنّ ‘it is/was as if, as though …’is naturally followed by a noun phrase

أسرعت الى الخروج كأنّها على موعد هام         She rushed out as though she had an   important appointment

It is often preceded by   واو الحال  and/or followed by ما with the same meaning ‘as though, it is as if’.

وكأنّه لا يعرف اين هو   يبدو   He seems as if he does not know where he is.

                                                    .

4. كَأنّما  ‘as if’  is followed by جملة فعلية او جملة اسمية :

اكتشف شيئاً جديداً  كأنّما      as if he has discovered something new.

اسرعت …الى الخروج كأنّما هي على موعد هام She rushed out as though she had an important appointment.                                                                                         

The  ما  neutralizes the effect of  أنّ  on the noun that follows it which is  مرفوع وليس  منصوباً  .

5. كأنْ ‘such as’ followed by فعل منصوب ‘a verb in he subjunctive’    is used to illustrate or exemplify a preceding statement

كانت تعرف كيف تُسكتها كأنْ ترفع صوتها قائلةً …

She knew how to shut her up by saying …

 5.  مِمّا ‘a matter which, something that’

The word مِمّا  is composed of preposition مِن ‘one of , some of, or (from) among (the things)’ and the indefinite relative pronoun  ما  ‘that, which’ (see lesson 2  Grammar Note 3). It has two interpretations:

a. The first, which we saw in Lesson 3 Grammar Note 1, means ‘one of, or some of, among the things that  …’, comes at the beginning of a sentence and serves as predicate to a subject that follows and that indicates what those things are and has no antecedent. Here is an example of it  مما  that occurs in the Basic Text:

مما يزيد بغداد جمالاً حدائقـُها … وبيوتـُها … و…                                                         What adds(lit. among the things  that add) to B’s beauty is  its gardens, its  homes, and …

Here is another example:

مما اقلقني وأزعجني أنّه لم  يعد الى بيته وانه لم يخبر احداً بسفره  وأنّه ترك وراءه زوجة واولاد.

Among the things that worried me and disturbed me are that he did not return home, he did not tell anybody that he was leaving, and he left behind a wife and kids.

b. The other, which also occurs in the Basic Text is  one where the indefinite relative pronoun  ما  ‘which’ refers back mostly to a preceding sentence or to several preceding sentences, sometimes called in grammars of English ‘sentential which’, and translates ‘a thing which …, all of  which …’. We have the following example in the Basic Text:

مما جعل الاتصال بالبلاد…ميسراً … ‘a thing (i.e. the fact that Baghdad lies on the river Tigris and …) which facilitates contact with the countries …’.

Here is another example:

رفض ان يصرّح بشيء ممّا أثار غيظ الجميع.     He refused to make any statement, which provoked everybody’s anger.

Another construction which conveys this same meaning is the expression الأمر الذي ‘something which (lit. a matter which’), most probably a calque from Western languages:

عملت على المشروع ساعات طويلة، الأمر الذي انهكني وسبّب لي مشاكل كثيرة

‘I worked on the project for long hours, which exhausted me and caused me lots of problems’.

(ii) the other, where مما  means ‘one of, or some of, among the things that  …’, comes at the beginning of a sentence and serves as predicate to a subject that follows and that indicates what those things are. Here is the other example of مما  that also occurs in the Basic Text:

مما يزيد بغداد جمالاً حدائقـُها … وبيوتـُها … و… What adds(lit. among the things  that add) to B’s beauty is  its gardens, its  homes, and …

Here is another example:

مما اقلقني وأزعجني أنّه لم  يعد الى بيته وانه لم يخبر احداًبسفره  وأنّه ترك وراءه زوجة واولاد

Among the things that worried me and disturbed me are that he did not return home, he did not tell anybody that he was leaving, and he left behind a wife and kid

بل.6   ‘rather, yet, but, even, moreover’

بل  is an adversative particle, mostly used with the above meanings. It frequently  introduces an affirmative contrast to a preceding negative, but sometimes a negative contrast to an affirmative sentence or parts thereof. Here are some examples  (the contrasted elements are underscored),

ذاع اسمها لا بفضل مكتباتها فقط  بل لمكانتها في … أيضاً

It became famous not only by virtue of its libraries and …, but also because of its place in …

عاشت اكثر من والديها بل جاوزت التسعين        She lived longer than her parents and even exceeded ninety years.

اثّر تأثيراً عظيما غير مقتصر على النواحي الدينية  بل  شاملاً النواحي الاجتماعية

It had great impact which was not confined to religious considerations, but which also included social aspects.

بل frequently follows sentences having  the words  فحَسْب ‘not only, no more, that’s all’, and  فَقَط ‘just, no more’ to convey the meaning of ‘not only … but also’:

لا اذكر الحادث فقط بل كلَّ تفاصيله.                        I recall not only the event, but all its details also.

The sentence that follows it is frequently preceded by إنّ

هو ليس مجرّد كلام بل إنّه حقيقة   It is not mere words, but it is the truth.

اهتممت بالموضوع بل انّي شعرت بالراحة عند سماعي هذا الكلام.

I was interested in the subject; indeed, I felt at ease upon hearing those words.

بل has no governing function and exerts no effect on the case endings of words that follow it. Like other conjunctions, The noun, adjective, or participle that follows it  takes the case of the noun, adjective or participle in the main sentence that is being contrasted, as can be seen in the third example above . Here are other examples:

المشكلة ليست السياسةَ بل المالَ والمصالحَ.        The problem is not politics, but rather money and personal interests.

لم يسكت خوفاً من المتكلّم بل احتراماً للحاضرين. He kept quiet not out of fear but out of respect for those present.

الاوضاع صعبة بل متعبة الى ابعد حدّ The circumstance are difficult, indeed  exhausting to the extreme.

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ظهور الإسلام وانتشاره




سور من القرءان (الفاتحة)
سور من القرءان (الإخلاص)
سور من القرءان (الفلق)
سور من القرءان (الناس)

Lesson Three                                                                    

1.The لا of categorical denial/ لا النافية للجنس (“لا for the negating of the category”)

The phrase لا فضلَ in line 8 up in the Text means “there is no preference/superiority”; the negative particle لا followed by an indefinite noun in the accusative case without nunation means “there is no…”  We saw another instance of this usage in Lesson 1: لا بدَ لي من الزواج بهده المرأة ‘I must marry this woman!’ which literally means “There is no escape for me from marrying this woman.”  Some common expressions are

لا مفرَّ ‘it is inevitable’ (“there is no escape”)

لا شكَّ ‘no doubt’     ;     لا بأسَ (بِهِ) ‘OK’ (“there is no harm/injury in it”)

لا شكرَ على الواجب ‘No thanks [are to be given] for [what is] a duty.’ (polite response to شكراً)

2. The Active Participle/اسم الفاعِل

The active participle/اسم الفاعِل, also called “verbal adjective”, is an adjective derived from a verb by regular rule; if derived from a transitive verb it may have verbal force—that is, take an object, as in مقدِّمٌ هَدايا ‘presenting gifts’—and if derived from an intransitive verb it denotes the quality or characteristic carried by the verb, like جميلٌ ‘(having become) handsome’.  Some participles can also be made into nouns, with specialized meanings and plural forms different from those of the corresponding verbal adjectives: compare زائِر – زائرون ‘visiting’ and زائر – زُوّارٌ ‘visitor)s(’.

You should know how to derive participles by now, but what do participles mean? The active participle may have any of the following meanings: an activity in progress, or progressive action, like داهِبٌ ‘going’; prediction of coming action or state, or future action, like مُسافِرٌ ‘departing, going to depart’; or a condition or state resulting from a completed action, or perfective state, like فاهِمٌ ‘having come to understand, understand(s)’ and ناشِفٌ ‘(having become) dry’.

It is possible to correlate the meaning of the active participle with the semantic class of its verb as presented in Lesson 1, “Verbs, Type of action”, as follows:

1. Stative Verbs. All statives have participles with perfective meaning: that is, “having entered the state of…”, “having become”…; statives can be sub-classified as follows:

qualitative: those statives that denote a quality or characteristic and so are intransitive, like وَسِعَ ‘to be wide, spacious’ have active participles that correspond to ordinary adjectives, like واسِعٌ ‘wide, spacious’.  Qualitative participles may also take “non-canonical” forms (forms other than فاعِلٌ), like فَعْلٌ، فَعَلٌ، فَعِلٌ، فَعيلٌ, such as  صَعْب ‘difficult’,  حَسَن ‘good’, كَريم‘noble’.

impersonal: qualitative verbs that take a clause or verbal noun as subject, like  يجب – واجب ‘is necessary, must’ – ‘necessary’.

Note: qualitative and impersonal verbs do not occur in the imperative mood.

statives: all other statives take the “canonical” form of the active participle, فاعِلٌ , and may be transitive or intransitive, like  اعرف أساميهم =  انا عارفٌ أساميهم ‘I know their names’,  مُحْتَوٍ على = يحتوي على‘contains, containing’,  مجيدةٌ العربيةَ ‘good at Arabic’.

As statives are devoid of action, the imperfect indicative verb, like the active participle, does not have progressive meaning: صَعْبً على ‘difficult for’ and يَصْعُب على ‘it is difficult for’.

2. Activities are verbs whose action stays the same throughout the period of its activity: they do not produce a result or conclusion or lead to a terminus, like استعمل ‘to use’ and انتظر ‘to wait’; they can occur with expressions denoting extent of time, like “he waited for an hour”. Their participles and the imperfect indicative both may have progressive meaning: مستعمل ‘using’ – يستعمل ‘he uses, is using’ and منتظر ‘waiting’ -ينتظر ‘he waits, is waiting’.

A good test to see whether a given verb is an action or a stative verb is to see whether it can be used in a response to “What are you )doing(?”  For example, to test the following verbs, “to have (to own, possess), to want, to wait, to think, to know” we can ask the following questions; the asterisk * denotes an incorrect usage of the verb:

*What are you having in you handbag?  “to have” is stative.

*What are you wanting with that book? “to want” is stative.

What are you waiting for? “to wait” is an action.

What are you thinking about? “to think” is an action.

*What are you knowing about the Comoros Islands? “to know” is stative.

3. Acts are actions that produce a result from or conclusion to the activity; they occur with time expressions denoting the end of the time period of the action, like “He read the book in an hour.”  The imperfect of act verbs may have progressive meaning.  There are two subclasses of acts, developmental and accomplishment verbs.

Developmentals are change-of-state verbs, denoting “becoming (quality or characteristic)”; the participle has perfective meaning and, as qualitative verbs, Form I developmental verbs may have non-canonical forms of the active participle (i.e., forms other than فاعل): احْمَرَّ ‘to turn red, redden’ مُحْمَرٌّ ‘reddened, reddish’; يَكبُرُ ‘becomes/is becoming big, large’ – كبيرٌ ‘big, large’.  The changes denoted in these verbs are non-volitional—they come about not by desire but as a result of the natural course of events.

Notice the contrast between stative qualitatives and act developmentals: the imperfects of acts may have progressive meaning– يكبُرُ ‘is becoming large’ – كبير ‘big, large’–whereas stative qualitatives never have progressive meaning– يكرُمُ ‘is noble, generous’ — كريم’noble, generous’.

Accomplishments are acts that produce a desired result–that is, the subject is an agent with a goal in mind. The imperfect may have progressive meaning, while the active participle denotes a strong desire to do something, “fully intends to…” يدرس ‘he studies, is studying’ – دارِسٌ  = ‘will (definitely) study, is going to study’.

4. Inchoatives, the last semantic class, include three sub-classes: commencing, inceptive and movement verbs. They all have in common the beginning (“inchoation”) of an action or state as well as an imperfect tense verb that does not have progressive meaning; they are distinguished from each other by the meanings of their participles.

Commencing inchoatives denote the assuming of a temporary state or condition, unlike stative and act qualitative verbs, which are mostly permanent qualities. Their participles have perfective meaning, and may take non-canonical participial forms, like the  فَعِل and  فعلان patterns below.

 يَنسى’he forgets’ – هو ناسٍ ‘he has forgotten; he forgets’

يتعَبُ ‘he gets tired, tires’ – تعِبٌ, تَعْبانٌ  ‘tired’

Inceptive inchoatives are verbs that combine Activities and Acts: they may denote an activity or the inception of that activity; to illustrate, riding (a train) is an activity but one must first mount the train before it starts.  English uses two sets of verbs for such pairs of actions–“to wear” and “to put on”, “to sleep” and “to fall asleep”, “to ride” and “mount, get on”, etc., whereas Arabic uses an inceptive verb for both phases of the action, the inceptive act (perfective participle) and the continuing activity (progressive participle):

 يركب ‘he mounts, gets on; he rides’ – راكِبٌ ‘having gotten on, mounted; riding’

 ينام  ‘he falls asleep; he sleeps’ – نائِمٌ ‘(having fallen) asleep; sleeping’

  يلبَس‘he puts on, dons; he wears, has on’ – لابِسٌ ‘having donned; wearing’

Movement inchoative verbs include the features of inceptives but add the third feature of change of location–to go, move, travel, etc.  Thus, while the imperfect does not have progressive meaning, the participle may have perfective, progressive, or future (i.e., predictive) meaning.  To illustrate with سافَرَ ‘to travel, go on a trip; to leave, depart’:

 يُسافِرُ  ‘he travels (activity); he sets out, leaves, departs (inceptive act)’

مُسافِرٌ ‘having departed (perfective); traveling, on a trip (progressive); leaving, going to  leave (future)’

TABLE 1. VERB AND PARTICPLE CLASSES

Verb Class and FeaturesImperfect TenseActive Participle
1. STATIVES   [-action]     a. states       b. qualitatives [permanent        quality or condition]        [non-standard participle]        [intransitive]             [-imperative]     c. impersonals [clause or        verbal noun subject]       -progressive a. يعرف  ‘he knows’   b. يحسن ‘it is good’         c. يجبُ ‘it is necessary’            perfective هو عارف  ‘he knows (“is having learned”) حسن ‘good’         واجب ‘necessary’  
2. ACTIVITIES [-conclusion]    + extent pf time: لِمدّةِ “for”+progressive يستعمِلُ ‘he is using’progressive مُستعمِلٌ ‘using’
3. ACTS [+conclusion, result]     at a point in time: “in” في     a. developmentals [change        of state or condition]        [non-standard participle]        [-volition]     b. accomplishments+progressive   a. يكبُرُ  ‘it is growing large’     b. يدرس ‘he is studying’  a. perfective كبير  ‘(having become) large’     b. strong intent دارسٌ  ‘will study, will be studying’
4. INCHOATIVES [beginning an action, entering a state]    a. commencing [temporary quality or state]        b. inceptives: activity;        inception of activity      c. movement: change of location    -progressive     a.   ينسى’forgets’      يتعبُ ‘gets tired’   b. ينامُ ‘sleeps’;  ‘falls asleep, goes to bed’                                           c. يسافِرُ ‘travels; departs, leaves’        a. perfective:  ناسٍ ‘has forgotten; forgets’ non-canonical patterns: تعبان، تَعِبٌ  ‘tired’ b.  نائِم’sleeping’ ‘falling asleep,going to bed’ Perfective: ‘asleep’ c. مسافرٌ : perfective: ‘has set out, left’ progressive: ‘traveling’ future: ‘will depart, going to leave’

If we tell you that the verb ذهب ‘to go’ is a movement verb, then you automatically know that the imperfect, يذهب, means only “he goes” and does not mean “he is going”.  To say “he is going” you use the participle, هو ذاهب.

Surprisingly, perhaps, اجتمع ‘to assemble, meet’ is a verb of movement; this is logical, however, when you consider that it involves people’s movement from various locations to wherever the meeting place is. 

As a rule, when you have a semantic class of some sort there is usually a zero member as well.  Movement verbs include the verb بَقِيَ ‘to remain’, which is negative movement–not to go away.  Thus the imperfect يبقى is ‘he remains’ and the participle باقٍ is ‘staying, remaining; having stayed; will stay, will be staying’.

The question arises, Is it possible to predict what class a given verb will belong to?  In the final analysis you will have to ask a native speaker whether a given verb and its participle have progressive meaning or not, and then you can fit it into the scheme given above.  But make sure that your native speaker is giving you Standard rather than colloquial usage!   Here are some useful clues:

Given a qualitative verb–one denoting a permanent quality or characteristic–it will be either a stative or an act. If the Hans Wehr dictionary translates it with “to be” plus a quality (“to be good”), then it is a stative; if the translation includes “be or become” (“be or become small”) then it is an act and most likely always with the meaning “to become small”.

A last tip: If you learn a participle with a progressive translation then you can guess that it is either an activity verb or an inchoative and perhaps guess as to whether it is a pure Activity or might require an inceptive act to begin the activity; if it is an activity verb, then its imperfect verb may have progressive meaning, but if it is inchoative then its imperfect does not have a progressive reading.

Ernie, It is important to distinguish between structure one the one hand (i.e. the phrase or clause in which the participle is found and the role of the participle in that structure) and the function of the structure in the sentence where it occurs. Do we have terms to distinguish between them?

As the illustrations above show, the active participles of all qualitative, impersonal and developmental verbs function like all ordinary adjectives, without any verbal force, as in

 منظرٌ رائعٌ‘a splendid view’; أُممُ العالمِ المختلِفةُ ‘the various nations of the worldخَشَبٌ متحجـّرٌ   ‘petrified wood’,  هذا الموقعُ الهامُّ ‘this important location’

The transitive verbs of all other subclasses have active participles that have verbal force–that is, they may take a direct object an indirect object, a predicate, a prepositional phrase  (if the verb takes a preposition before its object), and other complements, depending on the nature of the source verb. It may also be a  مضاف in an  إضافة. .

جلس منتظراً زوجته  جلس منتظِراً              He sat waiting for his wife.’

السبب المؤدّي الى تقدّم العرب           the reason leading to the advancement of the Arabs.

The meanings of the participles given above are of indefinite participles; when the participle is definite the meaning becomes “one who…”, as in the phrase دارسو اللغة العربية  ‘those who study/are studying the Arabic language’.

Active participles with object and predicate complements and participial clauses are further discussed in Chapter 12.

The functions of phrases with participles in the sentence

Participles and their complements, like adjectives, may function as predicates, noun modifiers, and  حال  .

هذه البلاد واقعة تحت حكم اجنبي                   This country has fallen under foreign rule.

ما هي الامور الدالّة على التقدّم الاقتصادي         What are the things that indicate economic progress.

بعث فيهم شعوراً جديداً قائماً على مبادئَ عالية     It induced in them new feelings based on high principles.

ألّفوا كتبهم مستخدمين اللغة العربية                 They wrote their books using the Arabic language.

As will be seen later participial constructions, including those with verbal force, again like adjectives, can be used as nominals and hence can take on the functions of nouns.

(Ernie, what are the terms that will help us distinguish these from the participial nouns (those that are participles in forms but not in meaning as you indicate below?)

3. Participial Nouns. Participles are adjectives but some participles acquire fixed specific meanings and then function as nouns.  In English, for example, “building” is an active participle derived from the verb “to build”; it may occur in a phrase like “the group building the new dormitory”.  “Building”as a noun can refer to a concrete structure, “the tallest building in town”.  As nouns these words can be made plural, unlike participles: “tall buildings”.  In Arabic you will see the participle طالِبٌ in phrases like هو طالبٌ يدَها ‘He is asking for her hand.’ and the same word-shape used as a noun in الطالب الاجنبي ‘the foreign student’.  Arabic participles and nouns are distinctive in inflection as well, as participles take sound plurals– طالبون – طالبات ‘seeking, ones who seek’–while Form I participial nouns regularly take broken plurals–طلاّب, طلبة ‘students (masc.)’ and زائر- زوّار ‘visitor-s’ fromزائر ‘visiting’. Derived Form participles and nouns as a rule take sound plurals: مدرّس-ون ‘instructor-s’, مُغترِب-ون‘émigré-s’, مستهلِك-ون ‘consumer-s’.

1. Verbs meaning “about to”/افعال المقاربة

In Lesson 1 we took up auxiliary verbs and verbs of beginning/فعال الشروع; in this lesson we meet another subclass of auxiliaries, the verbs of “about to” (to do s.th.)/افعال المقاربة (also called “verbs of appropinquation”), for example, كاد يكاد (ان) ‘to be on the point of, be about to….’:

الفصحى تكاد تكون واحدة ‘Modern Standard Arabic has almost become (“is almost”) uniform.’

Unlike other auxiliaries (but like  ) this subclass of verbs meaning “about to” can appear in either tense, and may be followed by an imperfect indicative verb or by ان and a verb in the subjunctive:

كِدت اموتُ ‘I almost died.’

تكادُ انْ تقعَ ‘She almost falls.’

Another such verb is اوشك يوشك (انْ) ‘to be on the point of, be about to, all but’ which uses the Form I verbal noun وَشْك:  

اوشك الليلُ ان ينتهيَِ ‘the night was almost over’

اوشك ان ينتهيَ الليلُ ‘the night was almost over’

الليل يوشكُ ان ينتهيَ ‘the night is almost over’

The Form I verbal noun وَشْك is often used in the phrase على وشْكِ followed by a verbal noun/مصدر or أنْ–clause to mean “on the point of, on the verge of”:

كان الفلك على وشك الرحيل ‘The boat was on the verge of departing.’

Auxiliary verbs of beginning/افعال الشروع.  The verb بدأ ‘to begin’ exemplifies a group of verbs called the verbs of beginning/افعال الشُروع that are followed by a main verb in the imperfect indicative: بدأ يأكل, أخد يأكل, صار يأكل, all meaning “he began to eat.” Of these verbs only بدأ, may also be used in this sense in the imperfect. بدأ بِ  can take a verbal noun as an object with the same meaning: بدأوا بالأكل ‘they began to eat, they began eating.’

Lesson 4

Lexical Note 1

غير ‘other, unlike, non-’

This is a high frequency word in Arabic and has a variety of uses, functions, and meanings. It occurs mostly as the head of an اضافة followed by an adjective, a noun or pronoun,  or a clause, but can occur alone.

1. As a  مضاف

(1) Followed by an adjective or participle, it may mean ‘un-, non-, or not’ and  has the meaning of ليس .The adjective or participle as a  مضاف اليه ‘second term of an idafa’ is in the genitive and agrees in gender, number and definiteness with the noun it modifies; غير  itself takes the appropriate case for its role in the sentence. The اضافة , being adjectival, may function as predicate, an attributive, or حال modifier.

هذه الاقتراحاتُ غيرُ مقبولةٍ.    These suggestions are unacceptable.

في حادثتين  غيرِ سعيدتين                          in two unhappy incidents

لا تفيد التصريحاتُ غيرُ الواضحةِ.                  Unclear statements are of no use.

حضرواغيرَ مستعدّين للنقاش.      They attended not ready for a debate.

                                              

In the first example, غير مقبولة is خبر ‘predicate’, putting  غيرُ in the nominative,  مقبولة is feminine singular in agreement with the non-human plural noun  الاقتراحات. In the second example, غير سعيدتين is    صفة ‘attributive adjective’ and so  غيرِ  agrees with حادثتين   in case while سعيدتين agrees with it in number (dual), case (genitive) , and definiteness; the same rules apply in the third example to غيرُ الواضحةِ and here الواضحة is definite like التصريحاتُ. In the fourth example, غيرَ مستعدّين is حال  ,  غيرَ is in the accusative, and مستعدّين is m.p. like its صاحب , the subject marker in  حضروا .

It is worth pointing out that in the third illustration it is becoming common in Standard Arabic today to read and hear the definite article attached to غير rather than to the adjective. Thus,

لا تفيد التصريحاتُ الغيرُ واضحةٍ.                  Unclear statements are of no use.

(2) Followed by a noun, noun  phrase or أنْ/أنّ-noun clause, it generally means “other than, different from” . Several cases arise:

(a) the اضافة with غير is an independent phrase. غير here together with a preceding negative has the meaning of إلاّ  ‘no…but, none…except. only’ (see Lesson 1 Grammae Note 3) and as pointed out in that note is مرفوع

‘in the nominative’.

لم ينجح في الامتحان غيرُ صديقِك هنري          No one passed the test except your friend Henry.

(b) The اضافة is in apposition with a preceding noun. As an appositive  غير here has the meaning of سِوى  ‘other than’  :

لن يتزوّج امرأةً غيرَ سوزي      He will not marry a woman other than Suzie

لم يعد يعرف شيئاً يفعله غيرَ أنْ يبكي              He no longer knew what to do other than weep.

لم يحضر احدٌ غيرك الحفلة .       No one other than you attended the party (“some one other than you did not attend…”)

In these sentences  غير assumes the case of the noun it is in apposition with.

(c) The referent (preceding) noun is obviated by the context and omitted, in which case the  اضافةitself serves as an independent  noun phrase and assumes its appropriate functions and cases in its sentence:

لن يتزوّج امرأة غيرَ سوزي       He will not marry (anyone) other than Suzie.

لم يعد يعرف شيئاً يفعله غيرَ أنْ يبكي He no longer knew (anything) but to cry.

لم يحضر الحفلة أحد غيرك        No  one other than you attended the party  (“ one other than you did not attend …)

Here again غير has the meaning of and can be replaced by سِوى.

(d) غير is sometimes followed by a noun identical to its referent and means ‘different, dissimilar to’ and is thus the opposite of  مثل

هذه مدينة غيرُ المدينة التي كنت تعرفها.           This is a town which is a different town from the one you knew.

هذه المدينة غيرُ المدينة التي كنت تعرفها.          This town is not the same town you you used to know.

 (e) as an independent unit, غير followed by a noun translates ‘non-‘ as in:

تعليم العربية لغيرِ العرب                           the teaching of Arabic to non-Arabs

Such as unit, in an enumeration of items, takes a suffixed pronoun referring to these items and means ‘and others, et alia’:

الفرس والروم وغيرهم      the Persians and Byzantines and others/etc.

This اضافة (غير + ضمير) is frequently followed by البيانية او من لتحديد المقصود  من  (see Lesson 3 Grammar Note 5)

الخمر والسرقة والربا وغيرها من العادات السيئة. حرّم

It proscribed liquor, theft, and usury and other such bad habits.

 غير occurs in fixed expressions like وغيره ، وغير ذلك    following an enumeration of items to mean ‘and so forth’, ‘et cetera’, also  followed by  من البيانية as in the previous example:

وغير ذلك من الأمور/الأشياء                       and so forth

Widely used equivalents to these expressions are: وما اليه (من)، وما الى ذلك (من)

(f) It is  followed by مصدر مؤوّل بانّ ‘a clause with أنّ’.

 غير انّ ‘except that’, ‘though’, ‘but’ introduces a sentence that is in contrast to a previous sentence or paragraph:

قضى الاسلام على …. غير أنّه شجّع … على إكرام الضيف ومساعدة الغريب والأقرباء

Islam put an end to …; however, it promoted honoring guests and supporting the stranger and relatives.

In such cases, غير can be replaced by إلاّ .

and finally (g) It forms a prepositional phrase with من ، بِ ، على ، في , which can be followed by a noun, a verbal noun or a clause, meaning “without”  as in:

حضر من غير زوجته.                             He arrived without his wife.

غادر من غير ان يقول كلمة.                       He left without saying a word.

تحدّث ب/من غير توقـّف.                          He talked without stopping.

على غير معرفة منّي به                            without (my) knowledge of him

أجابت في غير خوف                               She answered without fear.

In all these instances the prepositional phrase may be replaced by

دونَ، بدونِ، من دونِ:

من غيرِ شَكٍّ=من دون شكّ=بدون شكّ= دونَ شكّ

2. As an independent expression or item:

(1)  الغير  ‘the other(s)’, ‘fellow men’ is synonymous with  الآخرون:

احترام الغير من ضروريّات الحياة                 Respect of others is one of the necessities of life.

(2) لا غيرُ/غيرَ/ليس غير  (in the nominative or accusative) ‘nothing but’, ‘only’, ‘no more’:

مبلغ هذا الشيك عشرون دولاراً لا غير             The amount of this check is 20 dollars only.

                              

مُخْتلِفٌ ‘different’, مُجَرَّدٌ ‘bare’ and كثيرٌ من ‘many’

In the last paragraph of this Text مختلف appears in two different syntactic constructions:

امم العالم المختلفة ‘the various nations of the world’

في مختلف القارات ‘in the various continents’

The adjective مختلف follows the noun it modifies in the first example but precedes it as the first term of an idafa in the second. As an attributive adjective it agrees with the modified noun in gender, number, case and definiteness, as usual, but as the first term of the idafa it always remains masculine singular.  The meaning is the same in both cases but the adjective is highlighted as an idafa first term.

Another common adjective that behaves like this is مُجَرَّدٌ ‘mere, pure, nothing more than’ followed by a genitive noun, as in

ليست مجردَ عواطف. ‘They are not mere emotions.’

مجرد often occurs in the combination بِمجردِ ما ‘as soon as, at the moment when’

The adjective كثيرٌ ‘much; many’ likewise is invariably masculine singular when it is followed by a prepositional phrase with من meaning ‘many of, a lot of’:

كثير من النساء ‘many of the women’

GRAMMAR

1. Verbs meaning “about to”/افعال المقاربة

In Lesson 1 we took up auxiliary verbs and verbs of beginning/افعال الشروع; in this lesson we meet another subclass of auxiliaries, the verbs of “about to” (to do s.th.)/افعال المقاربة (also called “verbs of appropinquation”), for example, كاد يكاد (ان) ‘to be on the point of, be about to….’:

الفصحى تكاد تكون واحدة ‘Modern Standard Arabic has almost become (“is almost”) uniform.’

Unlike other auxiliaries (but like كان) this subclass of verbs meaning “about to” can appear in either tense, and may be followed by an imperfect indicative verb or by ان and a verb in the subjunctive:

كِدت اموتُ ‘I almost died.’

تكادُ انْ تقعَ ‘She almost falls.’

Another such verb is اوشك يوشك (انْ) ‘to be on the point of, be about to, all but’ which uses the Form I verbal noun وَشْك:  

اوشك الليلُ ان ينتهِيَ ‘the night was almost over’

اوشك ان ينتهيَ الليلُ ‘the night was almost over’

الليل يوشكُ ان ينتهيَ ‘the night is almost over’

The Form I verbal noun وَشْك is often used in the phrase على وشْكِ followed by a verbal noun/مصدر or أنْ–clause to mean “on the point of, on the verge of”:

كان الفُلْكُ على وشكِ الرَحيل ‘The boat was on the verge of departing.’

2. The Passive Participle/الاسم المفعول.  In the previous lesson we discussed active participles; it would be well now to have a glance at passive participles, first the forms and then their usages.

Form I verbs are the most basic forms of verbs in Arabic, and the derived verb conjugations are built on them.  For example, Form I verb وضُحَ ‘to be clear’ can be put into the causative Form II verb وضّح to mean “to cause to be clear, make clear, clarify, explain’.  Form I active participles have their own private shapes different from those of the derived Forms.  The Form I active participle pattern is فاعِلٌ and its variants, as you know, and the passive pattern is مَفْعولً, as in فاعل ‘making’ and مفعول ‘made’ from فعل – يفعل ‘to do, make’.

The rule for forming all the derived verb participles goes like this, illustrated by Form II قدّم ‘to present; to offer’, Form VI تناوَل ‘to reach for and take’ and VIII انتخب ‘to elect’:

0: Imperfect indicative:                  يقدِّم                 يتناوَل                ينتخِب                                                                                                                                           1. Select the imperfect stem:       -قدِّم                      -تناوَل               نتخِب –                          

2. Prefix مُ-:                                      مُقدِّم                 متناوَل                منتخِب                                       

3. Change the stem vowel where necessary           

            for the active to i:            مُقدِمٌ’presenting’ متناوِل ‘taking up’    منتخِب   ‘electing’                                                                 

            for the passive to a:        مُقدَم  ‘presented’ متناوَل  ‘taken up’       منتخَب ‘elected’

The meaning of the passive participle is “having undergone )the action of the verb(” or “having been put into  or assumed (the state or quality denoted by the verb)”; the technical term for this meaning is patient, one who has suffered or undergone the action of the verb. Thus the underlying meaning of مقدَّم is ‘having been presented’, of متناوَل is ‘having been taken’, and of منتخَب is ‘having been elected’.

The passive participles of verb-preposition idioms retain the preposition to specify the meaning of the phrase; the structure is illustrated by the following phrase based on وَثِقَ – يَثِقُ بِ ‘to trust, have confidence in’:

 دراسةٌ موثوقٌ بها ‘a trustworthy/reliable study’

Here the past participle itself is invariable–it is always masculine singular, while the pronoun object of the preposition is what agrees with the modified noun.  Here are two more examples:

القوانين المعمول بها ‘the laws on the basis of which (governments) have been operating’

 علمه وجهده غير مرغوبٍ فيهما في وطنه الام’his education and efforts are not favored in his mother country’

A secondary meaning of the passive is potentiality of action; for example, مأكول can mean either ‘(having been) eaten’ or ‘edible’ and مقبول can mean ‘accepted’ or ‘acceptable’. This feature is found in the verb as well, where the passive can have potential meaning, as in شيء لا يُصَدَّقُ ‘something unbelievable (“not to be believed”)’ and لم يحدثْ شيءٌ يُذْكَرُ ‘Nothing remarkable happened.’

Finally, some passive participles develop fixed meanings and become nouns, taking the plural patterns that nouns rather than adjectives take, like مكتوب ‘message, note’ (“that which has been written”) with its plural مكاتيبُ and مفهومٌ – مفاهيمُ ‘notion-s, concept-s’. The word معلوم is interesting: as a passive participle it means “known”; as a noun it means “fee; duty, tax” (Tunisia), and with the feminine suffix, معلومة, it means ‘a known or given fact, a piece of information’ with the regular plural معلومات meaning ‘knowledge, information; data’.

Derived passive participles may also mean noun of place, like مخيَّم ‘camping ground, camp’ from خيَّم ‘to pitch tent, encamp’ and مُستشفىً ‘hospital’ from استشفى ‘to seek a cure’.  In this usage the derived passive participles differ from basic Form I verbs, which have the special pattern مفعلة/مَفعَل (or مفغِل with most verbs whose imperfect stem vowel in ـِ i). The plural of all of these patterns is مَفاعِلُ.

مكتبٌ – مكاتِبُ ‘office-s’ from كتب – يكتُب ‘to write’

مدرسةٌ – مدارسُ ‘school-s’ from  درس – يدرُس ‘to study’

مجلِسٌ – مجالسُ ‘seat; session; council’ from جَلَسَ – يجلِس ‘to sit down’

مقهىً – مقاهٍ from the root of the noun قهْوة ‘coffee’

3. Human collectives

Nouns like الحَضَرُ ‘the town dwellers’ are human collective nouns.  As human collectives, they refer to groups or classes of humans, they take masculine plural agreement, and they form unit nouns by means of the nisba suffix يٌّ-. (The nisba suffix regularly forms a feminine singular in يّةٌ- , and takes masculine and feminine sound plurals.)  Illustrations:

Collective              :                   الحضر   ‘the town dwellers’

Unit noun              :     حضري، حضرية  ‘a town dweller’

Plural of unit noun:    ضريون، حضريات ‘town dwellers’

Agreement:  الحضرُ يعملون بالتجارة والصناعة الخفيفة  ‘The town-dwellers engage in trade and light industries.

The unit noun is a nisba derivative: it accordingly my serve as either a noun, e.g., ‘a town-dweller’, or as a relative adjective, e.g., ‘settled, sedentary, non-Bedouin’.  The masculine plural of the relative adjective is equal in meaning to the collective noun itself: الحضريون equals الحضر.  Thus there are three ways to say “the sedentary poets” in Arabic:الشعراء الحضريون،  الشعراء الحضر and  شعراء الحضر.  Technically speaking, the last one means “the poets of the town dwellers” and the first two mean “the sedentary poets”; for all practical purposes, however, such differences in nuance are slight and can be ignored.

Other human collectives in this lesson are العرب ‘the Arabs’ البدو and ‘the Bedouins’; these two are exactly like الحضر except that they cannot form masculine sound plural forms of the nisba, the collective itself serving for plural adjective or noun: الشعراء العرب or شعراء العرب ‘the Arab poets’, الشعراء البدو ‘the Bedouin poets’.  Additional human collectives like الحضر are اليونان ‘the Greeks’; الانكليز ‘the English’; الامريكان ‘the Americans (the unit noun is امبيكي);  الفُرْس ‘the Persians (the unit noun is فارِسيّ);  اليهود‘the Jews’; البَربَر ‘the Berbers’.

Some human collectives also have broken plurals, e.g., اعْراب ‘(Bedouin) Arabs’, plural of عرب; التُرك\الاتراك ‘the Turks’; الكُرد\الاكراد ‘the Kurds’; الارمن\الارامِنة ‘the Armenians’.  This latter broken plural is of the pattern افاعِلةُ, which you have seen in words like استاذ\اساتذة ‘professor/s’.

مثل – أمثال

مثل  always occurs as  مضاف  in an اضافة  whose  اليه مضاف  is a s., d., or p. noun or pronoun. It serves as a noun, as a noun modifier , in which case it may appear as singular or plural, and as a prepositional.

1. مثل   as an independent noun phrase

Here it can fill the functions of a noun and is declined accordingly:

يجب ان تكون مكانة المرأة مثل مكانة الرجل.

لم ارَ في حياتي مثلَ هذا الانسان. “the likes of”

إنّ امثالَ هؤلاء الناس لا يظهرون في مثلِ هذه المناسبات. “the likes of”/ “such…as”

لم يحدّثنا احد بمثل هذا الكلام.     “such a…as”, “a…like this”

هل هذه اللغات مثل اليابانية؟.    “like”, “the same as”

2. مثل   as noun modifier

Here it agrees with the noun it modifies:

لها علاقة بالفنون مثل الرسم والتصوير.     gen  “like, such as”: prep?

أبرز علماء كثيرون امثال دارون و… و…     nom  “such as”?

هناك علماء مثل اينشتاين هربوا من بلادهم.      nom “like, such as”?

ما زالوا يستخدمون اللغات القديمة مثل اليونانيّة.  acc

لها مساوئ عديدة متل ازدحام السكّان.  nom.

As can be noticed from the examples above, the modification may be restrictive or non-restrictive. 

3.  مثلَ   as a prepositional

Here the phrase with  مثل  , always in the accusative, modifies the sentence that precede like an adverbial, signifying ‘in a way similar to/like’. Compare:

دخل الاسلام لكنّه احتفظ بلغته الاصلية مثلِ الكردية

Here are other examples:

في كلّ دين مذاهب مثلُ السنّة والشيعة .

يتصرّف الكبار الآن مثلَ الأطفال.

لم نعد نفكّر مثلَك. 

دخل الاسلام لكنّه احتفظ بلغته الاصلية مثلَ البربر.

توسُّع في معاني بعض الكلمات ‘Expansion in the meaning and uses of some words’

Several words occur in the Basic Text, whose meanings are expansions of words that we know:

1.  احاط به  . We have seen this word to mean ‘surround a place or s.o.’. However, one can surround, encompass other things. For example, we can say 

أحاط  بالموضوع  او  أحاط  بالأمر علماً He knew it thoroughly (from all sides).

أحاطني علما بالموضوع                            He informed me about the matter   (lit. he surrounded me with knowledge about it from all sides)

أحاط الموضوع بالكِتْمان        He concealed it (surrounded it with secrecy)

يحيط الموضوع بالغُموض     He obscures it (surrounds it with obscurity).

2.  سَريع . We know  أسرع ‘be quick, fast, hasten, hurry’  as inبه أسرعوا الى الترحيب  ‘they rushed to welcome him’ . The word سَريع indicates having the quality or feature of promptness, quickness, expeditiousness’

3. نافع  .  We know  نفع ‘be of use, benefit’. Well guess what  نافع  means.

4.  حِفاظ . This word occurs in this lesson and is المصدر  from the verb حافظ . You will remember that   المصدر  of Form III verb is most often  مُفاعلة  and we do have the word    مُحافظة. But we also know that for some Form III verbs,  فِعال is an alternative; of the verbs we have encountered the following have this alternative: دِفاع  ‘defense’ from  دافع , كِفاح  ‘struggle, fight’ from  كافح . This is not the case with other verbs of this Form, e.g.

شاهد ، سافر، قابل ، شارك ،  ساعد ، حاضر، طالب ، قاوم ، صادق ، راسل ، عاصر،

We have the verb  تابع , but  تِباع  is only used as an adverbial  تِباعاً ‘one after the other, in succession’. Wherever applicable, from hereon in that second form of المصدر  will  be provided with new words.

5. حوالَيْ . This word occurs in this lesson with the meaning of approximately, and has this meaning whenever followed by numbers or measures of any kind. However, it also has the other meaning of ‘around’, او من حَوْلِ حَوْل , that we find in  إحاطة ‘surrounding’ as in:

جلس واولاده حوالـَيـْه/حَوْلَه                        I  sat with his children around him.

This has the same meaning as:

جلس واولاده محيطون به

The form  أجمع  , ‘entire, all, whole’, which occurs as m. and f., s. or p.: m.s.    أجْمَعُ  , f.s.  جَمْعاءُ ,  m.p.  أجْمَعون   ,  f.p.   جُمَعُ ; the m.p. is declined  أجمعون – أجمعين but the others are diptotes. It normally  occurs in all its forms, after  كلّ  followed by a pronoun, the  مضاف اليه   being a pronoun referring to the head noun. In this case, it agrees in gender , number and case with the head noun.

جاء  ا لفريق كلُّه أجمعُ                              The whole team arrived (lit. all of them, the whole of them.

جاءت الجماعة كلُّها جمعاءُ                         The whole group arrived.

تحدّثت مع المراسلين  كلّهم أجمعين                I talked to all the

It can occur independently as a noun in apposition:

اجتمعنا بأعضاء المنظّمة أجمعين                   We got together with all the members of the organization.

عند إقامته في الصحراء سمع القبيلةَ َ جمعاءَ تغنّي   During his stay in the desert he heard the whole tribe sing.

It may occur in an  إضافة  followed by a pronoun  and preceded by the prep.   بِ :

قرأت مؤلّفاتِه  بأجمعِها          I read his writings in their entirety.

f. Synonyms for items in (c.) and (e.) above are:  بأ سْرِه   and  بأكمله

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دراسة اللغة العربيّة

اللغة العربية والظروف الحاضرة

Lesson 3 GRAMMAR NOTE 1.+ أسماء في الجمع  من التبعيضيّة ‘partitive min’+ plurals

Followed by a plural noun, which naturally can be modified by adjectives, participles etc.,  the preposition  من  signifies ‘one (or a number) of, some of, among’. This prepositional phrase is a high frequency construction used as predicate, usually preceding its subject, which you have encountered and which occurs in this and previous lessons. Here are some of its properties:

1. When the noun that follows the preposition is a non-concrete countable noun, the subject is usually a verbal noun or a nominalized clause (مصدر صريح او مؤوّل) . Thus,

من اسباب تسمية عصر ما قبل الاسلام بـ«عصر الجاهِلِيَّة» انّ معظم العرب كانوا لايؤمنون بالله

 Among the reasons for calling the pre-Islamic era ‘the era of ignorance’ is that most Arabs did not believe in God.

من اسباب ذلك رغبة العرب الشديدة في …        Among the reasons for this is the Arabs’ strong desire to …

It can also be a repetition of that concrete noun:

من المشاكل التي يواجهها دارسو اللغة العربية مشكلتان اساسيتان

Among the problems that students of Arabic face are two basic problems.

However, when the subject is a concrete noun, the noun after the preposition must be concrete:

من الكتب التي نقرأها كتاب “الأيام” لطه حسين    One of the books that we read is ‘Al-Ayyaam’ by Taha Hussein.

من أشهر هؤلاء الشعراء «أُمْرُؤ القَيْس» و…      ِAmong the most famous of these poets is…

2. The subject may also precede the predicate, unless it is indefinite (as in the third example above) or is  a   مصدر مؤوّل  as in the first example as in:

من اسباب ذلك . رغبة العرب الشديدة في …      The Arabs’ desire to …is among the reasons.

كتاب “الأيام” لطه حسين من الكتب التي نقرأها    One of the books that we read is ‘Al-Ayyaam’ by Taha Hussein.

3. We can quantify the items that follow the preposition, using the following constructions:

سبب من الأسباب/واحد من الأسباب/أحد الأسباب ‘one of the reasons’   

سببان من الأسباب /  إثنان من الأسباب            ‘two of the reasons’

ثلاثة من الأسباب/الأسباب الثلاثة                   ‘three of the reasons/the reasons’

كلّ/ بعض الأسباب                                  ‘all/ some of the reasons

4. A related construction is ممّا where ما is the indefinite relative pronoun (see lesson 5 lexical note 5)

ممّا يجب ذكره أنّ الطالب العربي يواجه …        Among the things that should be mentioned is the fact that the Arab student faces …      

2. المَصْدَرُ/The Verbal Noun

As you know, the verbal noun/المَصْدر is a noun that is derived from a verb; it is an abstraction naming the action, quality, or state of existence denoted by the source verb. It possesses the properties of the verb it is derived from, such as being intransitive, transitive with one or more objects, requiring specific prepositions before their objects or predicates, etc.  It is equivalent to English infinitives (e.g. “to use, to denote, to read”) or gerunds (e.g. “understanding, delivering, reading, using”).

As the مصدر /verbal noun is an abstract statement of the meaning of the verb it is derived from, it normally takes the definite article, as in the following illustration:

قلّ الاتّصال.                                         Making contact is now rare.

A transitive verbal noun requiring a prepositional phrase for its object will also take the definite article:

رغبة العرب في المحافظة على تراثهم.     the Arabs’ desire to preserve their heritage

When indefinite the verbal noun implies “some kind of, any kind of…” and often appears in adverbial prepositional phrases of manner:

لم يَلْقَ قبولًا.                                         It did not gain acceptance.

يظهر هذا الخلافُ بوضوحٍ…                       This difference clearly appears...

Many examples of مَصادِرُ occur in this lesson. In what follows we will briefly review the verbal noun phrase and its functions in the sentence.

a) Verbal noun phrases. As in the case of the English gerund, the verbal noun is often used alone but is also often followed by a subject (that is, a topic or an agent) or an object or both, as in

القراءة مُلْهِيَةٌ Reading is fun The verbal noun stands alone as clause subject and is nominative.

قراءةُ رسائِلِك ملهيةٌ  Reading your mail is fun. The verbal noun takes an object as the second term of an idafa, رَسائِلِك, which is in the genitive case.

ليست قراءةُ زيدٍ رسائلَك بملهيةٍ Zaid’s reading your mail is not fun. The verbal noun has an agent in the genitive case, زيدٍ, and an object in the accusative, رسائلَك.

To summarize, the verbal noun will have the case required by its function in the clause such as subject or object in the following sentences; the verbal noun itself may be followed by one noun which is in the genitive whether it is the subject or the object of the verbal noun; and a transitive verbal noun may take an agent in the genitive and also an object in the accusative or a prepositional object in the genitive. Further illustrations:

يسود اليوم استعمال الناسِ العامّيّةَ.        People’s use of the colloquial is predominant today.

عند دخولِهٍ المدرسةَ .on his entering school

دُهِشت من فوزِ فريقِنا بالجائزة.ِ   I was surprised at our team’s winning the prize. 

The verbal noun of a transitive verbal noun may have active or passive meaning, and its مضاف اليه will be either agent or patient (receiver of the action), as in قتلُ زَيدٍ Zaid’s killing (s.o.) or Zaid’s being killed.

Further, a verbal noun from a linking verb may be followed by a topic/subject in the genitive and an accusative predicate:

وذلك لكون العامّيّةِ في الأساس لغةً محكيّةً .That is basically because of the colloquial’s being a spoken language.

b) In addition to the usual functions of any noun phrase in the clause, such as subject or object of a verb, object of preposition, etc., there are some functions specific to verbal nouns, such as the مَفعول مُطـْلَـَق/cognate accusative, تَمْييز/accusative of specification and مفعول لأجْلِهِ/accusative of purpose or cause, as well as the حال/circumstantial construction. These topics have already been or will be dealt with in separate notes.

3. Nominalized Clauses. In most instances the verbal noun/مصدر is interchangeable with a nominalized clause (See…), after nominalizers such as أنَّ plus indicative that and أنْ plus subjunctive that (See…), and ما المصدرية /nominalizing ما (See…). Compare:

I will send him his books:

           عند دخولِهِ المدرسةَ on his entering school                     and

         عندما يدخلُ المدرسةَ when he enters school

وذلك:   لكون العامّيّةِ لغة ً مَحكيّةً = لأنّ العامّيّةَ  لغةٌ محكيةٌ    

          That is so:          because of the colloquial’s being a spoken language

        = because the colloquial is a spoken language.

Unlike English that-clauses, these أنْ– and أنّ–clauses can occur even after expressions of desiring, necessity, etc., as in

من المُمكِن  أنْ تُقرأَ = من الممكن قراءتـُه     It is possible to read it, it can be read.

يحاول استعمالَ الفصحى = يحاول أنْ يستعملَ الفصحى He tries to use Modern Standard

GRAMMAR 3  افعال المقاربة ‘Verbs meaning ‘about to, almost’

In Lesson 1 we took up the auxiliary verb عاد/لم يعد  and in lesson 2 the auxiliary verb  كان .  In this lesson we meet another subclass of auxiliaries, افعال المقاربة  ‘the verbs of ‘to be about to/on the verge of’(to do/doing s.th.), also called “verbs of appropinquation”. Two of these are of common occurrence كاد يكاد   and أوشك يوشك and here are their major properties:

1. Unlike most other auxiliaries (but like كان) they can appear in either tense, and may be followed by an imperfect indicative verb or by أنْ and a verb in the subjunctive. It is more common for كاد   to be used without ان and for أوشك to be used with it.

يكاد الحزن ينفرجُ                                   Sorrow is about to be dispelled.

اوشك الليلُ ان ينتهِيَ                                          The night is almost over.

اوشك ان ينتهيَ الليلُ                                The night is/was almost over.

الليل يوشكُ ان ينتهيَ                                          The night is almost over.

2. We encounter those auxiliaries in two constructions:

a. The auxiliary is followed by its subject then its predicate (with or without ان ). Here, like كان, the auxiliary is in the singular, and the verb in the predicate must agree with the subject of the auxiliary. It is also possible for the subject to occur in first position, in which case both the auxiliary (like all verbs) and the verb in the predicate agree with the subject.

اوشك الليلُ ان ينتهِيَ                                          The night is almost over.

الليل يكاد ان ينتهيَ                                  The night is almost over.

القرّاء اوشكوا ان لا يستعملوا هذه الحركات        The Arab reader hardly ever uses (almost does not use these vowels.

الفصحى تكاد تكون واحدة        Modern Standard Arabic is almost uniform.

كاد المعلّم ان يكون رسولا         A teacher is close to being a prophet.

b. The auxiliary is followed directly by ان and a verb in the subjunctive and is in the singular. As mentioned above,  كاد  is more likely to occur without  ان  than أوشك  is.

الناس هناك يكادون ان يموتوا جوعاً      People there are about to die of hunger.

c. Unlike كان ,  neither auxiliary can occur in the imperative.

d. The مصدر مؤوّل cannot be turned into مصدر صريح, without further modification.

5. Particular properties of each auxiliary:

a. كاد يكاد (ان)

The following observations apply to كاد يكاد but rarely if ever  to أوشك يوشك :

(i) كاد، يكاد  may be negated with/ لم  ، لا   ما , respectively, or they may have their predicate in the indicative negated by لاا :

كادت الطائرة ان لا تغادر المطار بسبب الأمطار  The plane was about not to depart from the airport because of rain.

 (ii) A construction of common usage is a sentence with a negative form of  كاد  followed by a sentence headed by the conjunction  حَتّى

ما كاد ينهي خطابه حتّى حَيـَّوْه  بهتاف عاصف.   No sooner did he finish his speech than he was greeted with wild applause.

(iii) كاد can be used elliptically after a sentence. Such usage is rare in Arabic, which in this situation typically would require a repetition of the predicate. Here is an example, taken from the Basic Text:

وقد انتشر هذا الاسلوب عند الجميع او كاد         This style is widely spread among all or about to be.

Cf

لا أعرفه انا ولا يعرفه أحد       I do not know him and neither does anyone else.

b. أوشك، يوشك

(i) أوشك but not كاد has an active participle form in use: موشِكٌ .

هم موشكون ان يغادروا البلاد نهائيّا                They are about to leave the country definitively.

(ii) أوشك but not كاد  can be followed by the preposition على . In this case it can take a مصدر whether صريح ‘verbal noun’ or مؤوّل  ‘أنْ clause’:

أوشكا على الانتحار/انْ ينتحرا                      The two of them were about to commit suicide.

(iii) It but not  كاد  has a Form I verbal noun وَشْك which is used in the phrase على وشْكِ followed by a مصدر whether صريح ‘verbal noun or مؤوّل  ‘أنْ clause’ to mean ‘on the point of, on the verge of’:

كان الضيف على وشكِ الرَحيل/انْ يرحَل             The guest  was on the verge of departing.

Note: (ii) and (iii) are the only cases of auxiliaries other than التامّة  كان where we can use both  مصدر   صريح ‘verbal noun’ or مؤوّل  ‘أنْ clause’.

(iv) Finally, أوشك but not كاد has an adjectival Form I form in useوَشيكٌ  ‘forthcoming, impending’, mostly used  as نعت سببي ‘adjectivalإضافة   (see Lesson 7 Grammar Note 1):

الحرب هناك وشيكة الوقوع                                War there is imminent .

1. أما . ف   ‘as for’.

When you want to highlight a word or a phrase in a sentence you can us this construction: place the noun to be highlighted after أمّا ‘as for’ with the noun in the nominative case, and then put the rest of the sentence after فَ.  To illustrate with the sentence

كان الحضرُ يعيشون في المدنَ ‘The sedentary people lived in cities.’  

If you want to highlight الحضرُ ‘the sedentary population’ in contrast with البدْوُ ‘the nomads, the Bedouin’, you remove الحضرُ from within the sentence and place it after أما in the nominative case: أما الحضرand place فَ at the beginning of the basic sentence without its highlighted word:

  أما الحضر فكانوا يعيشون في المدن

Finally, the highlighted word after اما   must be tied to the sentence after فَ : if the word that was removed was the subject of the verb, then the verb must be made to agree with the highlighted word, thus:

أما الحضر فكانوا يعيشون في المدن  ‘As for the Bedouin, they inhabited the cities’ where the verb was changed from masculine singular in the original to masculine plural in the final sentence.

If the highlighted word was not the subject of the verb, then a pronoun that agrees with it must be inserted to fill its place:

عاش عند البدو سنتين          ‘He lived with the Bedouins two years.’

اما البدو فعاش عندهم سنتين ‘As for the Bedouins, he lived with them for two years.’

The topic can be several things besides a noun: it can be a prepositional phrase, a noun clause (“an أن-clause”), etc.:

اما بالنسبة الى المناخ فالجو صافٍ ودرجة الحرارة معتدلة ‘As for in respect to the weather, the sky is clear and the temperature is moderate.’

اما انْ يقولَ ذلك فهذا مستَحيلٌ ‘As for him to say that/his saying that, that’s impossible.’

This kind of sentence is called a Topic – Comment sentence: اما introduces the topic and فَ  provides commentary about it. A common variant is to retain the same structure but omit اما…فَ  giving these versions of the two sentences above:

الحضر كانوا يعيشون في المدن ‘The sedentary, they lived in the cities’ = ‘The sedentary lived in the cities.’

البدو عاش عندهم سنتين ‘the Bedouins, he lived with them two years.’ = ‘he lived with the Bedouins two years.’`

In English we say “This one I want; that one I don’t.’  In Arabic we would say “This one I want it; that one I do not want it.’

 

3.  من … أنْ / أن

1.1 You are quite familiar by now with the following sentences from this and other lessons and are aware of the pattern here: a predicate (underscored), which in each sentence precedes  المُبتدأ .

من اسباب تسميته بـ«عصر الجاهِلِيَّة» ان معظم العرب كانوا لايؤمنون بالله

من المشاكل التي يواجهها دارسو اللغة العربية مشكلتان اساسيتان

من العادات العربية ان يخضع جميع افراد الاسرة للوالد

من التقاليد الامريكية ان تجتمع العائلة في يوم الشكر

من أهم أَحْداثِ القرن التاسع عشر انتشار الامبريالية

من اغراض هذا الكتاب تعليم العربية للأجانب

This construction with various variations is very widely used in Arabic today: here the predicate is a prepositional phrase consisting of the preposition  مِن  followed by countable nouns in the plural. Other types of words can occur as nominals, after  من  .  These include:

 1.2 adjectives:

من الجدير بالذكر ان التعليم في معظم المدارس حكومي تشرف عليه وزارات التربية والتعليم

It is worth mentioning that education in most schools is public, controlled by Departments of Education.

من الضروري جداً تَشْجيعُ الطلبة على دراسة اللغات الاجنبيّة

It is necessary to encourage students to study foreign languages.

               من السهل على طلاب العربية الجدد ان يخلطوا بين شَكْلَي الفاء والغين في وسط الكلمة.

It is very easy for new students of Arabic to confuse  الفاء والغين 

 من الصعب عليه الآن  ان يَصْعَدَ إلى رأس الجبل لأنه في السبعين من عمره.

It is difficult for him to climb to the top of the mountain because he is in his seventies.

1.3 Active Participles                                                                                                 

مِنَ المُمْكِن التنقل بين اوروبا وامريكا في ساعات قليلة

It is possible to travel between Europe and America in just a few hours

من الظاهر أنّ مبدأ «الحقُّ للقويّ» أو كما يقال بالانجليزية «القُوَّةُ هي الحَقُّ» هو المبدأ السائد بين الأمم والأفراد.

It looks like the principle that right reside with  the powerful, or as is said n English “might s right”a, is prevalent among nations and individuals.

1.4 passive participles      اسم المفعول                                                                                                                           

من المعروف ان الاوروبيين قدِ اقْتَبَسوا الأرقام العربية عن العرب

It is well known that Europeans have borrowed the Arabic numerals.

من المعتقَد ان قيام دول مختلفة في حدود معيّنة من اهم التطورات التي شهدها العالم منذ بدء التاريخ.

It is believed that the rise of nations with well defined boundaries is one of the most developments which the world has witnesses since the dawn o History.

1.5 elatives

من اهمّ نتائج هذا الامتداد ان الفصحى اصبحت لغة علم وفنّ وبحث وفلسفة

The most important result of this expansion is that Classical Arabic became a language of Science, Arts, and Philsophy.

من أصعب الأمور ان نحدد أركان أي قومية بدقة

It is most difficult to define the basic elements of nationality with any precision.

المضارع المرفوع  ‘The Imperfect Tense’

The Imperfect Tense in the indicative mood (المضارع المرفوع) has, as you know, a number of possible translations in Arabic. This text has several uses of the imperfect tense verb as a main verb:

  • habitual action, something that is done repeatedly or customarily:

وكان من أولئك الذين يخلطون بين القلب والمعدة ‘He was one of those who [typically] confuse their heart with their stomach.’

يوضَعُ، يُغَطّى، تُحَمَّرُ، يُضافُ إلَيْهِ ‘[whenever this dish is prepared] it is placed…, it is covered, it is browned, [there] is added to it’

  • generic action, an action that is predictable for a class of individuals or objects and serves

to characterize that class, as in “Dogs bark at cars” and “Winds blow from west to east.”  Proverbs often have verbs with generic sense, as in “Love conquers all” and “A stitch in time saves nine.”  The following verb is generic in function:

الاذن تعشق قبل العين احياناً .‘The ear sometimes falls passionately in love before the eye does.’

  • Stative verbs are verbs that denote a state, condition or quality, like “to want, to need, to matter”; they denote a lack of any activity and are sometimes called “actionless verbs”.  Basically they denote existence plus some additional layer of meaning; for example, “to have” means “to exist in possession of” and “to like” means “to exist with a liking for”.  A feature of stative verbs is that, since they do not denote actions, they are not put in the progressive construct: you can say “I have fifty dollars on me” but not “I am having fifty dollars on me.”  If a stative verb is used in the progressive it takes on a different meaning: “I am having a good time” = “I am enjoying myself”, an activity. Some stative verbs can be transitive, like “to have, to know” and can be used in the imperative form.

Curiously, “to want” cannot occur in the present progressive (“I am wanting to see that movie”) but does occur in the past progressive: “I was wanting to ask you this question:…” In this case the progressive takes on the meaning of volition—desire, intent.

The following stative verbs occur in the Text: 

هل تعرفها؟‘Do you know her?’ اعرف ‘I know’

تريدان تملكَ قلبَه .‘she wants to possess his heart.’

It is important to repeat that stative verbs never denote actions; the perfect tense, however, only denotes events (except, of course for كان): something happened.  So what happens when a stative verb is put in the perfect tense?  Tense trumps stativity: the stative verb in the perfect tense denotes the action of entering the state or quality denoted by the verb–a change of state.  Thus, the stative verb يَحْسُنُ in the imperfect means “is good”, but the perfect حَسَنَ  has the meaning “entered the state of goodness” = “became good”. “It was good”, of course, is expressed with كان: كان حسناً. Likewise, يَعْرِفُ means ‘he knows’ but the perfect عَرَفَ means “he came to know, learned, found out”.  So, remember: a stative verb in the perfect means “to acquire the quality or condition depicted by the verb”.

  • future.  In a context referring to a subsequent situation the imperfect verb may predict afuture action or state; in the following citation the verbs are in questions about future action:

هل يضحك؟ هل يبكي؟ ‘Shall he laugh? Shall he cry?’

Usually the prefix –سَ or the word سَوفَ precedes the imperfect verb to predict future action or state:

ستُسْعِدُني ‘she will make me happy, she is going to make me happy’

  • progressive: an action in progress, a continuing action, as in

 ماذا تفعلُ، يا زيد؟ ‘What are you doing, Zaid? and خليل ينتظر اخاه احمد ‘Khalil is waiting for his brother Ahmad.’

  • dispositional: disposed to or capable of doing the action: تتكلم العربية والكردية ‘She

speaks Arabic and Kurdish.’

  • narration: reporting an action as it takes place, or narrating the events in a story. In this  latter function it is equal to the perfect tense.  This is often called “the historical present’.

The meaning of a particular verb in the imperfect tense will depend on, first, its semantic class and then the context in which it is found.

1.  سواء 

How do we express ‘whether … or …, no matter whether …, regardless of whether …’

1. One of the ways is illustrated in the New Vocabulary section and in the Basic Text and involves the use of  سواء.

a. With equational sentences (i) it is very common to use the appropriate form of  كان after سواء , followed by the same disjunctive conjunction أو or أم , which in turn is followed by the alternatives, as in the following examples:

… الأكلات … سواء كانت لبنانيّة أم/أو اردنية     …the food, whether Lebanese or Jordanian.

الفصحى واحدة … سواء كان ذلك في العراق أم في مصر…

Al-Fus-ha is one, whether (lit. it is) in Iraq or Egypt.

 (ii) The use of كان is optional and can be deleted if its subject has a referent in, as in the first example above), or is a referent to (as in the second example), the sentence that precedes it. Thus, it can be deleted in the two sentences above and in the following sentence in the Basic Text: 

…شكل واحد لكل حرف سواء (كان) في اول الكلمة او …

… one form for every letter, whether at the beginning of the word or …

but not in: .

اذهب الى المحاضرة سواء كنتُ في العراق أم في مصر

Go to the lecture whether I am in Iraq or Egypt.

b. With verbal sentences, سواء  is followed by the verb, most often in the perfect:

سيبقى صديقاً عزيزا سواء بقي هنا ام غادر البلاد He will remain a good friend whether he stays or leaves the country.

c. The second alternative in either sentence type can be the negative of the first or its antithesis:  

سواء في العراق أم في غير العراق                 … whether in Iraq or in places other than Iraq

… سواء كانوا مصريين ام لم يكونوا   …, whether they be Egyptians or not

لن نغادر سواء هدأت الأوضاع ام لم تهدأ          We won’t leave whether things are quiet or not.

سنرضي بها سواء شئنا ام أبينا       We will accept it, whether we like it or not.

d. The expression with سواء may precede the main clause, which is then  introduced by ف  or فإنّ  :

سواء هدأت الأوضاع ام لم تهدأ فأننا لن نذهب     whether things are quiet or not we won’t go.

e. In Modern Standard Arabic, سواءً  is most commonly used in the accusative. In Classical Arabic,  سواء  is followed by the interrogative particle أ  in which case the whole sentence is considered the subject and سواء as predicate is put in the nominative. Thus, in the Qur’an we have the statement:

سواءٌ عندهم أأنذرتهم أم لم ننذِرْهم                  It is the same for them, whether you warn them or not.

2. The other way to express ‘whether … or not’ obviates the need for the use of سواء  by (i) putting the conjunction between two verbs, usually in the perfect, with one often the antithesis of the other, as in 

سنرضي بالأوضاع شئنا ام أبينا                    We will accept the situation, whether we like it or not.

لن استفيد منه قلّ ام كثر                             I will not benefit from it whether it be little or much.

or (ii) by putting كان  between predicates in the accusative:

يستخدمها الجميع مثـَقـَفـين كانوا ام غيرَ مثـَقـَفـين All use it, educated or non-educated.

Lesson 3 Lexical 7 P الخ اينما، حيثما، كلَّما

A number of conjunctions occurring in this lesson and other lessons and consisting of a question word, an adverbial, or a noun with an attached  ما  are of common occurrence in Arabic, most with an implied conditional meaning. Here are some comments:

1. اينما، حيثما ‘wherever’

These words, which are usually followed by the perfect, may follow the main clause or precede it.

تستطيعون ان تذهبوا ايـ(نما) شئتم وحيث(ما) وجدتم عملاً

You can go wherever you want and wherever you find work.

اينما اتّجهت وجدت أمامي عقبات                  Wherever I go I find obstacles.

As seen in these examples, following the main clause, both words can be used without  ما

When preceding the main clause  اينما، حيثما،  may also be followed by the jussive, in which case  the verb in the main clause is perfect or jussive. Modern usage seems to rarely follow this practice.

Others words like اينما، حيثما،   are: كيفما   ‘however, howsoever, be that as it may’ and

أيّما  ‘whatsoever, whatever’ (for this last see the note on أيّ ).

2. كلـَّما ‘whenever’

In many ways, كلـَّما behaves like اينما، حيثما in being followed by the perfect and in preceeding or following the main clause. However, in examples like the following,

كلّما تذكّرت هذه الحادثة شعرت بألم شديد في رأسي

Whenever I remember this incident, I feel great pain in my  head.

يظهر هذا الاختلاف كلّما قلّ الاتّصال                  This difference appears whenever communication decreases.

(i) it cannot be used without ما with the meaning of ‘whenever’, and is not followed by the jussive,

(ii) it may be used in consecutive clauses with the meaning of  ‘the more … the more’:

كلّما انتظرنا (كلّما) ساءت الأوضاع                The more we wait, the more conditions will worsen.

كلـَّما must be clearly distinguished from كلّ  ما    ‘all what’ where كلّ  behaves like a noun:

هذا كلُّ ما عندي                                     This is all I have.

أعطيته كلَّ ما طلب                                 I gave him all he asked for.

يتدخّل في كلِّ ما لا يعنيه                            He interferes in everything that does not concern him.v

3. بينما ‘while’

It indicates that the two clauses it joins take place simultaneously. It may precede or follow the main clause, and is followed by a verbal or nominal clause with the verb in the perfect or imperfect.

بينما كنت أقرأ إذْ بصوت مزعج يدوي             While I was reading, a disturbing voice resounded.

Like English, بينما   ‘while’ is also used with the meaning of ‘whereas’.

to contrast two statements

تستخدم الفصحى في الكتابة بينما تستخدم العامّية في الاتصال اليومى

Fus-ha is used in written materials, whereas colloquial is used in daily communication.

Other conjunctions like بينما are حينما ‘while, when, as’ and متى ما   ‘whenever’

Lesson 3  LEXICAL 2  وإن  ‘even though, although, even if’

You are familiar with the particle إن as a conditional particle. It can have another function when preceded by the conjunction  و  which in turn can be preceded by the particle  حتـّى ; it is followed by a conditional clause الشرط    جملة , but without an apodosis جواب الشرط  . The construction is concessive: What is meant is that the main clause will be true whether or not the condition is satisfied. The verb after it is perfect and appears as كان  in an equational sentence;  it usually follows the main clause, though it may sometimes precede it, in which case that clause will take the particle  ف .

… لهجات تختلف من بلد الى آخَر حتـّى     … (these are) dialects which differ from

وإنْ كان بينها اوجه شبه.         country to country, although there are similarities among them.

تلك عهود مضت وإن تركت آثارها.               These are eras that have gone, even though they did leave their imprint.

وإن تركت هذه العهود آثارها فإنّها قد ولـّت.       Although they left their imprint, these ears have glided away.

 Another particle so used with the same meaning is another conditional particle  لو  . It may be followed by the perfect or by أنّ .

لا يستخدم هذه الحركات عند قراءة الصحف والمجلّات مثلا حتـّى  ولو احتاج الوضع قراءة ً جهرية.

He does not use these vowels when reading … even if the situation needs reading them aloud.

استخدم العربية حتّي ولو أنّ ذلك سيسبّب لك حرجاً.Use Arabic even though this might cause you some embarrassment.

قم بالواجب حتّى ولو انّ ذلك من المستحيلات.     Do your duty, even though it may be an impossibility.

ولو  can be followed by a predicate of an equational sentence without the need for كان

انتظرني ولو قليلاً.                                  Wait for me, if only for a little while.

جرّبي هذا الدواء ولو مرةً واحدة.                   Try this medication, even once.

ذهب للمقابلة ولو بتردّد وحذر.                     He went for the interview, although with hesitation and cautiously.

1.  لو

In addition to its use as a conditional particle,  لو  has other functions:

a. It is used as an optative particle after some verbs indicating desire, wish, and wish, like ودّ  وتمنّىّ  , for something desired but unattainable.

It is followed by a perfect or imperfect verb and may be followed by a clause with أنّ  .

اتمنّى لو استطيع ان اقضي وقتاً اطولَ مع العائلة. I wish I could spend longer time with the family.

كنت اتمنّى لو استعرضنا جهودك في كل ميدان.   I would wish to cover your endeavors in every field.

تُفضّل  لو انّه يذهب الى القاهرة بدلاً من روما .       She would prefer that he go to Cairo rather than Rome.     

This clause with لو  can sometimes occur independently as an exclamation and as a sign of yearning for something: ‘If only … !’

لو كنتُ في مكانِك! آهِ  لو كنتُ في مكانِك          If only I could be in your place! If only!

لو يعلم!                                              If he only knew!

         b. لو  ,  and إنْ  as well, are used to introduce concessive clauses to mean ‘even though, even if’. They are often preceded by the conjunction  و  and  حتّى

as  حتّى ولو ،  حتّى وإن . (This  و  is not used when  حتّى   is preceded by  و  (. They are followed by verbs, mostly in the perfect. لو  may be followed by a clause with أنّ   :

يعبدون إلهاً واحداً وإن اختلفت أساليب العبادة.     They worship one God, every though worship rites differ.

يجب ان يمكثوا في الخارج سنتين حتّى وان تزوّجوا من امريكيات.

They have to live abroad for two years, even if they married Americans

الموت واحد حتى ولو كانت أسبابه مختلفة.                 Death is death even if its causes are many.

The clause with the particle often follows the main clause, but it may precede it, or occur parenthetically.  The main clause in this case is preceded by  ف  or  فإنّ

حتى وإن كانت الأقلّيّات قليلة العدد فإنّها تتمتّع بحرّيّاتها كاملةً .

هذه الأقلّيّات – حتى وإن كانت قليلة العدد –  فإنّها تتمتّع بحرّيّاتها كاملةً

Even though these minorities are small in number, yet they enjoy their freedoms fully.

An elliptical construction, implying the verb  كان  is often used with  لو ; in this case, it must follow the main clause :

يقضي وقتاً معنا ولو قصيراً.                        He does spend time albeit short.   

تصدّر زيتها ولو بكمّيّات محدودة.    It exports its oil, albeit in small quantities.

انتظرني ولو لبرهة قصيرة.                        Wait for me, if only for a short while.

         c. The clause with لو  is sometimes preceded by  كما  to mean ‘as if, as though’:

تتصرف وهي معه كما  لو كان زوجَها             While with him, she behaves as if he were her husband.

         d. It also follows  فيما   to mean ‘in case that, just in case’, and may precede or follow the main clause:

فيما لو قابلته  بلِّغْه  سلامي                In case you meet him, say hello to him.

سأزور المدرسة فيما لو كنت في بيروت            I will visit the school in case I am in Beirut.

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  1. Uses of كانَ

كان has two distinct functions: 1. as an auxiliary verb/فِعْل ناقص (“deficient verb”) and 2. as a main verb/فعل تامّ (“a full verb”).

  1. As an auxiliary, كان  ‘to be’ is used to change the main verb from present to past or to future timing

a. If the main verb is an imperfect tense verb, it simply shifts the time to past time; some familiar examples are

يعيشون        ‘they live; they are living’                           vs.

كانوا يعيشون ‘they lived, they used to live; they were living’

“They live” is of course habitual or customary in meaning and refers to now, and “they are living” is progressive, an activity in progress now.  In the past with كان it is equivalent to “they lived” or “they used to live” for habitual meaning and “they were living” for past progressive.

If the verb does not denote action–that is, is an actionless or stative verb–then either the English simple past tense verb is used to translate the two verbs or the main verb with “used to” may be used:

اعرفُها       ‘I know her’                        and

كنت اعرفُها ‘I knew her, I used to know her.’

b. The perfect tense verb denotes an action completed before the moment of speaking; used with the auxiliary كان it denotes an action that took place before another action also in the past did–your familiar past perfect tense.  In this case the particle قد must be placed before the main verb, and if a subject (a noun or an independent pronoun) is expressed it comes between the auxiliary كان and the main verb; compare

دخلت زوجتُه المطبخَ            ‘His wife entered the kitchen.’       and

كانت زوجته قد دخلت المطبخ ‘His wife had entered the kitchen.’

Note that in the perfect tenses the particle قَدْ occurs before the main verb.

c. Here is  كان and  its uses with imperfect and perfect tense main verbs.

(1) كان + imperfect tense puts the main verb in past time (i.e., before the moment of speaking):

Present habitual: يخلطون بين القلب والمعدة ‘they confuse their heart with their stomach’

Past habitual:  كانوا يخلطون بين القلب والمعدة ‘they confused their heart with their stomach’

Present progressive: مادا يقول المُذيعُ؟ ‘What is the announcer saying?’

Past progressive     : مادا كان المُذيع يقول ؟ ‘What was the announcer saying?’

Present stative: مادا تريد من المطبخ؟ ‘What do you want from the kitchen?’

Past stative     : مادا كنت تريد من هناك؟ ‘What did you want from there?’

Future: ستسبِّب ثورة ‘they will cause a revolution’

Future in the past: كانت ستسبب ثورةً ‘they were going to cause a revolution’

(2) كان + perfect tense creates the perfect tenses:

Past            :  خرجت زوجتُهُ من المطبخِ  ‘His wife came out of the kitchen’

Past perfect:  كانت زوجته قد خرجت من المطبخ ‘His wife had come out of the kitchen’

Future            : ستخرج من المطبخ                ‘she will leave the kitchen’    

Future perfect: ستكون قد خرجت من المطبخ ‘she will have left the kitchen’

Note that in the perfect tenses the particle قَدْ occurs before the main verb.

كان is the only auxiliary that can function as an auxiliary in both the perfect and the imperfect tenses and also take a main verb in either tense.

d. Negating auxiliary كان

(i) كان + قد

In this construction, the proper particle negates كان :

كانت قد بدأت عملها                            لم تكن قد بدأت عملها

She had not begun her work.          She had begun her work.

  كانت زوجته قد خرجت من المطبخ     لم تكن زوجته قد خرجت من المطبخ

     تكون الشمس قد غابت         لا تكون الشمس قد غابت

(ii) imperfect  كان +   

Here the negative particle may negate كان  or the verb that follows:

كنت اريد ان أسافر بالطائرة     لم أكن اريد ان أسافر بالطائرة/ كنت لا اريد ان أسافر بالطائرة

Idid not want to travel by plane   I wanted to travel by plane.                        

كنت اعرف شيئاً عن الموضوع    لم أكن/ما كنت اعرف شيئاً عن …/ كنت لا اعرف شيئاً عن …

I didn’t know anything about …   I knew something about the subject.

(iii) ) imperfect+ سَ+   كان

Here the negative particle negates كان

كان سيحضر لزيارتنا                                            لم يكن سيحضر لزيارتنا

 He was coming to visit us.              He was not coming to visit us.

e. Negative كان (mostly withما  but also with لم )may be followed by an imperfect  verb in the subjunctive preceded by لِ (called  لام الجُحود ‘the laam of denial’) to express the idea that something was not to be or an act would not happen:

ما كنت لِأطلبَ منه ايّ شيء او لِأحاول الاقتراب منه.      I was not going to ask him anything or to even try to get close to him.

لم يكونوا ليسمحوا له بدخول البلاد.      They would not allow him to enter the country.

ما كانت امّه لِتتركَه وحده.       His mother was not one to leave him alone.

لم يكن السلام ليتحقّقَ بعد هذه المواجهة.       Peace would not be /was not to be  realized after that confrontation.

2. As an independent verb كان is used to denote existence.  In this meaning it is typically used in the perfect tense, but is also used in the imperfect,  and, again, has two uses:

  1. كان الناقصة (“the deficient كان”). in the perfect or imperfect modifies an equational sentence and takes a subject in the nominative case and always has a predicate in the accusative, if it is a noun or adjective:

 كان امرؤ القيس شاعراً في العصر ما قبل الاسلام

‘Imru Ul-Qais was a poet in the pre-Islamic era.’ كان

قد يكون هذا الامر مفيداً.       This matter might be useful.

زملاؤه كانوا هم المسؤولين.   His colleagues were those who were responsible.

انها لن تكون الاولى في صفها.           She will not be the first in her class.

كان الناقصة can be optionally, though not usually,  inserted in a habitual or even a future context. In the latter case it may or may not be preceded by سَ/سوف

الصلاح يكون في معاملة الآخرين.    Righteousness is in the treatment of others.

متى تكون حفلة الزواج؟            When is the wedding party?

سيكون موعدنا بعد اسبوع [ن شاء الله            Our appointment will be a week from now, God willing.

It must however be inserted  after verbs  followed by أنْ  like اراد ، يجب،  , particles like لِ and after و]ن ، ولو ، سَواء (for which see Lesson 3 Lexical Notes 1 and 3)

حضر ليكون معنا في الاجتماع.   He came in order to be with us at the meeting.

كان   may take as a predicate a pronoun, bound or free:

لم يعد المواطن الذي كان. He is no more the citizen he used to be.                                

احمد الله انّه لم يكن انا.   Thank God it was not I (me).

Note that the verbal noun of كان  whether as an auxiliary or independent verb follows the same rules:

لم يكن راضيا عن الوضع لكونه مواطناً صالحاً.

He was not content with the situation, being a good citizen.

كون الحاضرين عرباَ لا يعني أنهم أجانب (او كونهم أجانب)    

Those who attended being Arabs does not mean they were foreigners.

b. As a main verb/كان التامة (”the complete كان”), كان takes only a subject in the nominative and means “existed, was”, and has no predicate.  An example that we have had is

لقد كان اتصالٌ بين القبائل العربية من جهة…  ‘There was contact between Arab tribes on the one hand and…’

Here are other examples:

وبعدها كانت الثورة وكانت الأحداث التي ذكرناها.

Afterwards, the revolution broke out and so did the events we described.

وكان ما كان، امّا هذا فلا يكون.

Then whatever happened happened, but this is not to be.

  كان التامةcan occasionally have for subject a noun clause with  أنْ followed by a verb in the perfect:

وكان ان اجتمعت الدول الغربية وقرّرت الوصول الى حلّ للقضىيّة.

And it so happened that the Western Powers met and decided to reach a solution to the problem.

وكان ان رفضوا اللجوء الى الى المحكمة وقبول الحلّ مهما كان.

And so it was that they refused to take the case to court and to accept the solution whatever it was.

ما كان منه الّا ان ترك البلاد وسافر.

He did nothing but leave the country and depart.

3. The Sisters of كانَ/ أخوات كان  . These is a number of verbs that, like كانَ, take an accusative predicate, such as أصبح – يُصبِحُ to become’, صار- يصير ‘to become’,  بقِيَ – يبقى ‘to remain’, ظَلّ – يظَلُّ ‘to remain’, ما زال and  لم يزلْ‘still be, be…yet’ and ليس ‘not to be’or serve as auxiliaries followed by a main verb in the indicative.

الحاصِل، صار مريضاً جداً  ‘In short, he became very sick.’

ظلّ يتكلم الى ان تعب المستمعون.                  He went on talking to the point that the audience got weary.

  لست اعرف شيئا  عنها ولست ادرى من هي. I know nothing about her and do not know who she is.’

2. الاسم الموصول العام Indefinite Relative Pronouns  مَن  و  ما

The pronouns مَن  و  ما occur as interrogatives meaning ‘who?’ and ‘what?’, as indefinite relative pronouns, meaning ‘whoever, the one(s) who, those who, he who’ and ‘whatever, the one(s) which, that which’ and in conditional sentences. We have had ample examples of them as interrogatives. We will deal with them here as indefinite relative pronouns. Here are examples:

شعروا انّ فيها ما يسيء الى حرّيّتهم               They felt there was something in it that hurts their freedom.

هذا كلّ ما قيل عنها                                 That’s all what was said.

من لا يريد الذهاب عليه ان يخبرنا     Whoever wants to go has to inform us.

لا اجد من يساعدني            I can’t find anyone to help me.

قُل لمن يدّعي في العلم معرفةً: … Tell anyone who claims to be knowledgeable …

ارسلت سعاد من يخبر اخاها بزواجها من سمير   Su’ad sent someone to tell her brother of her marriage to Samir.

هذه نتيجة ما أخفَوا.        This is the result of what they did not divulge.

 If we compare these with examples having the definite relative pronoun الذي , with which we are very familiar, we can quite easily note that  الصلة ‘the clause’ following the indefinite pronouns has much the same structure as that of the definite pronoun الذي, and that both noun clauses, whether  الصلة  + الذي (+ antecedent)  or  الصلة + مَن/ما  serve similar functions in a sentence, such as subject, predicate, object (direct, indirect, and of a preposition), مضاف اليه  , including an example of مضاف اليه to  كلّ etc., but never as مضاف .  From the examples above, the  distinction in meaning between مَن  and ما  is obvious: the former refers to persons and the latter to non-humans.

The indefinite relative pronouns, however, differ from the definite pronoun الذي in several respects, which it is important to know:

(i) they have only one form, whereas الذي occurs as التي، الذين etc.,

(ii) they never have an antecedent; in effect they serve as both antecedent and relative pronoun,

(iii) they differ in meaning: they are ‘indefinite’ in the sense that they do not indicate any one or any thing in particular,

(iv) pronouns and verbs (and nouns in some cases) referring to ما  are always m.s. and to مَن  are also m.s., but in contexts that are more particularized, they can be f.s. and m.p.; they are never dual,

هذا ما حدث فعلاً  ونحن  صغار                    That’s what actually happened when we were young.

ما يصعب عليّ فهمه هو ما يحدث الان في غزّة   What I find difficult to understand (lit. it) is (lit. it is) what is happening now in Gaza.  

في كل مجتمع هناك من هو راضٍ عن وضعه     In every society there are those who are

وهناك من لا يعجبه العجب             And there are those who are not              satisfied with any condition.

                                                     

يريد ان يتزوّج من هي اكثر منه مالاً               He wants to marry someone who (lit. who she) had more money than he.

تصرًفت كمن لم تعرف اين هي                     She behaved as someone who (lit.she) did not know where she was.

حاولت الاتّصال بكل من اعرفهم ويعرفونني       I tried to contact all those who I knew (lit. them and who (they) knew me.

(v) the object pronoun in الصلة  is frequently deleted when preceded by من او ما

هي دائماً تفعل ما تشاء(ه)        She always does whatever she wants.

دفعنا ثمن ما فعلنا وما لم نفعل                We paid for what we did and we didn’t do.

اعجبني من قابلت                                I like everyone I saw.

(vi) مَن  و  ما  cannot be deleted, whereas, as seen in the second note above, الذي must be when اthe antecedent is indefinite,

(vii) ما has many other uses, e.g. may be تعجّبية، مبهمة الخ (see lesson  …), whereas  مَن والذي do not,

(viii) when  governed by the prepositions من، عن، ب , they contract into one word, and with the first two the  ن  is assimilated into the  م  to form  ممّن ، عمّن  , respectively.

حدّثني عمّن/عمّا شاهدت اليوم.                     Tell me about whoever/whatever t you saw today.

قابلت عشرات ممّن يعرفون العربية.     I ran into tens of those who knew Arabic.

أليس للسيدات بمن فيهنّ الاجنبيات حقّ السير في الطرق؟

‘Don’t ladies, including those among them who are foreigners the right to walk the streets.’,

and finally (ix) the main verb in a sentence with  من  و  ما  is sometimes duplicated to convey  the idea that something of an indefinite nature happened and nobody knows who did it or who did what, somewhat like ‘what will be will be, what happened happened, something kind of happened’ that we encounter in English. Here are examples:

 مات من مات وهرب من هرب                    Some died and some ran away.

ثمّ كان ما كان في فلسطين         Then, what happened in Palestine happened.

صار ما صار وانتهت القصة      What happened happened. End of story!.

3. Verbs/فِعْل – أْفعال

a. Timing and Function

This Basic Text has many illustrations of different uses of the imperfect tense/الفعل المضارِع (”the verb that resembles the noun [in their tripartite inflections]”) in the indicative mood/ المرفوع and this is a good place to review the functions of the imperfect.  We will first give an overview of both the perfect tense verb/ الفعل الماضي and the imperfect/ الفعل المضارع.

The two tenses differ in two important ways: (i) the timing of the action—when does the action take place?–and (ii) the types of action they denote—is it an action in progress, or a habitual action, an event, or what? The following applies to all verbs in the language except كان ‘to be’ and لَيس ‘not to be’.

         (1) Timing of action

 In discussing the time indicated by the imperfect indicative you must forget about the Past, Present and Future tenses of English—the Arabic verb takes a different approach.  A significant factor is whether the verb in question is the main verb in the sentence or is the verb of a subordinate clause (a clause introduced by a subordinating conjunction, a relative clause, etc.:

               (a) Main verbs

The imperfect as the main verb in a sentence refers to the time of the utterance itself—that is, its time is the same as the moment of speaking or writing.  In this respect it is like the English present tense.

يدرسون العربية ‘They are studying Arabic.’

هل تعرف رقص الدبكة؟ ‘Do you know how to dance the dabka?’

The perfect tense verb of an independent clause denotes an action completed before the moment of speaking, as in

شاهدتُ هذا الفلمَ اليومَ. ‘I saw this movie today.’

شاهدته قبل عشرين سنةً  ‘I saw it twenty years ago.’

         (b) In subordinate clauses

            (i)  If the imperfect is in a subordinate clause it copies the time of the main verb. Compare:

يقول إنها تتكلم العربية. ‘He says that she speaks Arabic.’

قال إنها تتكلم العربية.   ‘He said that she spoke Arabic.’

The Arabic verb in the subordinate clauses above is imperfect in both sentences but is translated as present time after a main verb that is imperfect and is translated as past after a main verb that is perfect. In both sentences it denotes habitual or dispositional action (see (ii) (b) below.).

          (ii) The perfect tense in a subordinate clause retains its basic meaning of a completed event but the timing will depend on the type of subordinate clause it is in–a relative clause, where it will often refers to past time, or a conditional clause where it probably refers to present time, etc.

        (2) Type of action.

             (a) The Perfect Tense may have the following meanings and functions:

  • an Event, a completed action, as in a narrative—it answers the question, What happened? 

What took place? Some examples from the Text are

جلس ‘he sat down’

قام الى اهله ‘he (up and) went to his family’

سألوه ‘they asked him’

تمّ الزواج ‘the marriage took place/was performed’

انتظر ساعة ‘he waited for an hour’

خرجت من المطبخ ‘she came out of the kitchen’

This of course includes negative perfects as well, like

لم يستطعْ ‘he found himself incapable of, he was unable (at that point) to’

If you take all the perfect tense verbs in main clauses out of a narrative and string them together you will have a skeleton of the plot.

Here the English verb and the Arabic verb are in contrast: The English past tense can denote either a single event (“he ate with us yesterday”) or a past custom or condition (“he always ate alone”) whereas the Arabic verb can only denote an event (تغدى معنا البارنحة). Compare:

I wrote my parents a letter last Sunday about my new job.

“I wrote” = an event = perfect tense: كتبتُ                     and

I wrote my parents a letter every Sunday when I was in college.

“I wrote” = customary activity = past imperfect: كنت أكتبُ

  • An optative verb. The optative is used to express a wish, equal to English “would that…”, “may [such-and-such happen]”, as in باركَكَ اللهُ ‘(May) God bless you!’  In this usage the perfect is negated by لا, as inلا سمح الله!   ‘Heaven forbid!’ 
  • Performative verbs.  Sometimes the uttering of a verb is the very act itself; for example,  

you cannot promise something without saying “I promise.”  A minister might say “I pronounce you husband and wife”, at which point the couple is officially married. Such verbal acts are called performative acts.  In English they are usually first person singular or plural present tense, and in Arabic they are usually imperfect tense but some are in the perfect tense.

   Verbs that make a declaration–effecting changes in the formal or official status of a person or

thing–are usually in the perfect tense, and may be passive:

 فصلناك من اللجنة‘we (hereby) fire you from the committee.’

اتفقنا ‘We (herewith) agree.’ ‘Agreed! It’s a deal’

قُبلَت الاستقالةُ ‘the resignation is (hereby) accepted’. 

Notice that English often has “hereby” when using a performative verb.

   The imperfect tense is used for verbs that make assertions, committing the speaker to a particular stand or belief:

اعترف بعدالة القضية ‘I acknowledge the justice of the cause’

as well as directives, causing the hearer to do something:

 اتحداك ان تعيدَ ذلك ‘I dare you to do that again’

and verbs of expression, expressing the speaker’s psychological state regarding the issue at hand: اعتذر ‘I apologize’ and  اشكرك  ‘I thank you.’

Verbal derivatives may also carry performative force, as with انا شاكرٌ لك ‘I am grateful to you, I thank you’ and شكراً ‘thanks’.

1. تراكيب وصفية متتابعة

This is a topic we dealt with earlier (see Lesson 2 Grammar Note 2). There are several constructions with  جمل وصفية  in this lesson, which will help us review this important construction.

a.

لقب يدلّ على أهمّيّته.

اوّل معهد أنشئ خارج الإطر الديني.

In both of these cases, the pronoun that refers to the head noun (in bold) is the subject of the verb in   الجملتين الوصفيتين  (underscored).

b.

عملان رئيسيان هما قاموسه … وموسوعته.

Here  الجملة الوصفية  is an equational sentence which may not have occurred before, but which should present no problem; the resumptive pronoun is   هما  which is الجملة الوصفية   مبتدأ .

One more point. The head noun has two modifiers an adjective   رئيسيان   and a sentence  هما قاموسه … وموسوعته  , without a coordinator. This is very common in Arabic and is no stranger to English. In fact as we will see presently more than two such modifiers with no coordinator can occur. But first,

c يستند الى اسبابٍ منها التاريخ واللغة  الخ   .

Here الجملة الوصفية   is an equational sentence whose predicate is a prepositional phrase, and the resumptive pronoun is attached to the partitive prep. من     . Hence the meaning of it: ‘reasons some of which are’.

Here are other examples:

صوتا فيه قوّةُ الرحمة.

عُرف بخصائص منها حبّه لكلّ جديد.

d. ألّف كتاباً عن باريس  عنوانه “الابريز …”  وصف فيه الحياة في فرنسا. 

                  3                                  2            1

Here we have three modifiers to the head noun  كتاباً  .

(i)  عن باريس                             prep. phrase

(ii) عنوانه “الابريز”                     مضاف اليه )resumptive pr. (مضاف +         ‘whose’

(iii) وصف فيه الحياة في فرنسا )resumptive pr. + prep.)                        ‘in which’

Here are other examples of multiple modifiers in a series

قبائل  متعدّدة  لكلّ منها رئيس يدعى الشيخ  يخضع له افراد القبيلة .

سوق  قريبة  تدعى عكاظ   يبيعون فيها منتجاته.

مدارس  ذات طابع دينيّ خاص تسمّى كتاتيب يعلّم فيها القرآن .

ألّف كتاباً مشهورا عن باريس يقرأ ه كل من يهمّه الأمر  عنوانه “الابريز …”  وصف فيه الطهطاوي الحياة في فرنسا .

Notice that in addition to a series of modifiers for one head noun,  it is possible to have within modifying units nouns that are themselves head nouns and are modified. Thus,  the first sentence above then reads translates: (they were) numerous tribes to each of which there was a chief who was called “Sheik” and to whom every member of the tribe submitted.

A series of  modifiers of various kinds (such as ( صفة، نعت سببي، اسم فاعل  and a combination thereof without conjunctions can occur in attributive constructions, in predicates, and in جمل حالية, but not as مفعول لأجله.

Also, here are more examples of (i) above:

مدارس  للبنات 

شابّ  من مستواها

برامج  باللغة العربية

شغل مناصب من بينها منصب وزير التعليم    He occupied    positions among which is the position of Minister of Education.

e. أعظم عمل قام به

The resumptive pronoun is attached to a preposition which is obligatory in Arabic and part of the collocation  قام ب  ; the corresponding English verb does not have it.

إذ for, since, because, in view of the fact that

The particle إذْ in our Basic Text has causal meaning. As such it follows the main clause and is followed by all types of clause, including interrogative and frequently by a clause with أنّ.

للشعرِ مكانةٌ عظمي اذ كان سجلاّ لأعمالهم.        Poetry had a supreme role, because it was a register of their deeds.

جلس ساكتاً اذ لم يعرف ماذا يفعل.                 He sat silent for he did not know what to do.

لم يتكلّم إذ ما فائدة الكلام مع انسان جاهل؟         He did not speak, for what is the use of talking to an ignorant man?

سأرجع بسرعة إذ أنّ والدتي تنتظرني.             I will return quickly because my mother is waiting for me.

إذْ may also carry the meaning “when, at the moment that, as” to describe a situation occurring at the same time as another event and may precede the main clause.

سُرّ اذ دخل ووجدها واقفةً امامه .                  He was glad when he entered and found her standing before him.

There is the element of surprise and the unexpected in the use of إذْ, and this is especially when it is followed by the preposition بِ, and when it is preceded by a sentence with بينما while or contexts that indicate length of time, in which case it serves as a حرف مفاجأة particle expressing surprise and is equivalent in meaning to إذا بِ:


جلس يصغي الى الراديو إذْ بصوت ناعم يقول:    He sat listening to the radio, when suddenly  a gentle voice said:

Lexical Note 2  التَعَجّـُب ‘exclamation, admiration,  wonder, or suprise’

How do we express التَعَجّـُب in Arabic? Two ways:

1. The most common is to use ما  التَعَجُّبِيَة ‘  ’

a.’ما ‘ التعجّبية   is followed by the elative, i.e. the comparison form of the appropriate adjective أفعل, followed by the item to be admired, in the accusative. Thus,

ما أجملَ مدينتـَهم!                                   How beautiful is their town!

ما أصعبها!                                          How difficult it is!

b. When the elative does not exist, such as is the case with participial forms of derived verbs and with adjectives of color and defect, elatives such as أكثر    ‘more’, أقلّ  ‘less’,  أشَدّ  ‘stronger’, etc.  are used.  Thus, in admiration of البدو  in this lesson, one can say:

ما أشدَّ َ حبَّهم للصحراء!                   How strong is their love for the desert!

ما أقوى ايمانَهم بأنفسهم!                   How powerful is their faith in themselves.

c. Another way is to place the object of admiration after the elative and to follow it with the quality to be admired in التمييز  ‘the accusative of specification’ :

ما أشدَّ البدوَ إعجاباً بالشعر والشعراء!             How strong is the Bedouins’ admiration of poetry and poets!

d. Finally, as can be seen from the examples above, the object of admiration is always definite and cannot be نَكرة مَحضة  ‘an absolute (unmodified) indefinite’; it can, however, if it is modified in some way by means of an adjective or  جملة وصفية .

Thus,

ما أسعدَ زوجاً تحبّه امرأتُه!   How happy is a man whose wife loves him!

But how do we express التَعَجّـُب  for something past or something future?

For something past:  invariable  كان  is inserted between  ما  and the object of admiration.

ما كان أجملَ مدينتـَهم!                              How beautiful wais their town!

For the future يكون ما  )or  ما تكون if the object of admiration is f. or non-human p.) is inserted after the elative.

ما أقوى ما يكون ايمانـُهم بأنفسهم!               How powerful will their faith in themselves be!

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أسعد زوجين

مطعم طلال كباب هاوس
المرأة وسوق العمل

1.  الحال

A number of examples occur in this lesson as they frequently do in narratives of the construction referred to as الحال. We will examine first their structure, then their meaning, and then the order of the  حال  construction in the sentence.  Here are the examples:

سمع الزوج المِسْكين صوت امرأته من الراديو، وهي تذيع على المستمعين

The poor man heard his wife’s voice on the radio, telling the audience …

ودخلت الزوجة المطبخ أخيراً، وزوجها يباركها قائلاً:

The wife entered the kitchen as her husband was blessing her saying:

فخرجت الزوجة من المطبخ والعَرَقُ يَسيلُ من وجههاا…

She came out of the kitchen, with sweat flowing down her face.

ومرّت الأيام الأولى من أيام الزوجية… والعَريس   يطير شوقاً…

The first days of married life went by, with the bridegroom dying to …

                                He sat there, listening attentively        جلس يصغي بانتباه

            He up and went to his family and said (lit. … وقام الى اهله يقول لهم

  And found it burnt  فوجده قد احترق…

                       والعَريس يطير شوقاً منتظراً اليوم الذي تدخل فيه زوجته المطبخ،     

The bridegroom was anxiously awaiting the day his wife would enter the kitchen.

           The husband sat there, silent.             وجلس الزوج ساكتاً

as her husband blessed her saying       وزوجها يباركها قائلاً

We notice there are three types of   حال  .  The first, which we see in the first four examples, is introduced by the conjunction  و  , called  واو الحال   ; this type is called  جملة حالية بواو . The second, which we see in the next three examples, has no  و   , but is itself a sentence :it is called جملة حالية بدون واو. The third type consists of a participle; it is called )  حال مُفْرَد(ة ‘single or one word’  حال . These in fact are the major and most frequent types of  حال .

a. Let us now examine each of these types.

(1)  In  الجملة  الحالية  بواو , we can make the following observations:

(a) The  حال  may have a pronoun referring to a noun in the main clause as in the first three sentences (shown in bold, with the antecedent underscored). This is most often the case. For future purposes, it is important to single out the nature of the pronoun. It (a) may be the head noun of  الجملة الحالية بواو  , and thus, an independent pronoun, as in the first sentence,  or (b) may appear elsewhere, suffixed to the verb, to a preposition, or a  مضاف , as in the second  and third sentences.

(c) The  حال in these sentences consists of a  مبتدأ  with a verbal sentence. i.e. a sentence beginning with a verb as  خبر  . This is common, but is not always the case. All types of  خبر  can occur in  الجملة الحالية بواو  . You have run into man such examples, and we will have occasion to discuss these later.

(d) In the examples above, الخبر  is a verb in the imperfect  المضارع . Can the imperfect occur directly after  واو  . The answer is no. (A couple of examples are cited in some grammar books, but this emphatically not possible toy and has not for a long time).

(e) But what about the perfect? Can a perfect occur in  الجملة الحالية بواو ? Yes, indeed it does. And can it occur where the imperfect occurs, i.e. as  خبر  ?  Well, here the

evidence shows  that it is starting to creep  up in the writings of some writers, but this rare and we will disregard it. With the perfect the most common practice is to have:

و+  قد+ فعل ماضي  .

فخرجت الزوجة من المطبخ وقد سال العَرَقُ من وجهها…

(2)  Now let us look at  جملة حالية بدون واو  .

(a) An examination of sentences like  جلس يصغي بانتباه  and many others will show that in the context of (1) (i) above, i.e. when the head noun is identical to a noun in the main clause, الواو والمبتدأ   may be deleted. Thus,

    دخل  الى  الصفّ وهو  يضحك   

(b)  This  can only be done when the verb in الجملة الحالية بواو  is imperfect  المضارع;  when it is perfect  الماضي  ,  الواو  is maintained. It  is very commonly dropped when the verb in the main clause is one of the verbs of the senses

افعال  الحَسّ  such as وجد    ‘find’ ,  سمع ‘hear’ ,  رأى  ‘see’, and the resumptive pronoun in الجملة الحالية has the object of these verbs for antecedent.

   He found them (the fried eggs) burned.فوجده (البيض المقليّ)   قد احترق  (البيض المقليّ .

The same thing happens, of course, when the verb in الجملة الحالية  isالمضارع  :

سمعت جاراً من جيراننا يُغنّي                       I heard a neighbor of ours singing.

(3) الحال المُنفْرد  , examples of which we can see in the last three examples,  is most commonly an active participle in the accusative. As we will point out later, other constructions can occur as  حال مُنْفْرَد  .

                    والعَريس يطير شوقاً منتظراً اليوم الذي تدخل فيه زوجته المطبخ

The bridegroom was elated, looking forward to the day his wife will enter the kitchen.

            The husband sat, silent وجلس الزوج ساكتاً

                      وزوجها يباركها قائلاً

                    Her husband was blessing her, saying.

Other words and constructions can occur as  حال مُفْرد  ,  but these will be considered as they arise.

b. The meaning of  حال          

As we can gather from the example above, a significant feature of حال  is simultaneity, a happening that occurs simultaneously at the time or during the main event of the main clause. Depending on the content of the حال  construction, the happening may be an event, an act, an action, a circumstance, or a state. With a perfect verb, the happening may have had its beginning in the recent past, but its effect is relevant to what is presented in the main clause as in:

وجده قد احترق

دخل المدينة وقد حلّ الظلام

With other verbs, like verbs of motion in the main clause, الحال  may, depending on the nature of the happening, refer to a circumstance during the actual journey or to one viewed at the end of the journey. Notice the difference in the following sentences:

جاء ماشيا/ يركب حصاناً                           He came on foot/riding a horse.

جاءوا يعزّونه                                       They came and consoled him.

جاء ابن الانسان يأكل ويشرب      The Son of Man came eating and drinking.

c.  As an be seen from these examples,  حال  most commonly follows the main cause. It will suffice here to say there are instances where this is not the case.

1.   وإذا إذا، إذا ب  وإذا الشرطية   The  إذا of Surprise  and Conditional  إذا

The particle   اذا  occurs in this lesson with two meanings:

1. اذا ب or اذا , with or without the preposition بِ , called  إذا الفُجائيّة or  حرف مفاجأة‘إذا of surprise’

Meanings of إذا الفُجائيّة

Its basic meaning is ‘and lo! …’, ‘and suddenly …’, ‘all of a sudden there was…’. It suggests the occurrence of an event or happening that is surprising or unanticipated. The example in the Basic Text is:

فاذا بصوتٍ ناعم يقول …      and lo and behold/‘all of a sudden there was a gentle voice saying …

Properties of إذا الفُجائيّة

a. It introduces a subject of a nominal or verbal clause, which can be indefinite as in the example above, or definite (or a pronoun), and is in the nominative  as in  إذا صوتٌ  unless preceded by ب , when it is in the genitive as in إذا بصوتٍ. The predicate of the nominal clause is in the nominative, where applicable.

نظرت اليها فاذا هي/بها تبكي                       I looked and there she was, crying.

بيته واذا أهلـُه/بأهلِه قد ناموا/نائمون        He entered the house, and to his amazement, his family was asleep.

كنت سائراً فاذا لصوصٌ/ بلصوصٍ يهاجمونني    I was walking when suddenly thieves attacked me.

b. It may be followed by an indefinite nominal clause, where an indefinite  subject follows a predicate which is a prepositional phrase. Here of course ب  cannot be used.  

فتح الصندوق فاذا فيه كنزٌ         He opened the box and behold a treasure!

c. It will be noticed that اذا  is most often linked to the main clause by means of  وَ  or فَ .

2. اذا  called إذا الشرطيّة  ‘conditional إذا’

Meanings of إذا الشرطيّة  

a. As you already know this particle expresses a condition that is generally viewed as likely and often implies some degree of probability and a note of expectancy, as in: 

فإذا ملكتها ملكت كلّ شيء         If she controls it, she controls everything.

b. It sometimes does carry a hypothetical meaning:

اذا تزوّج مريم فلن ينجب اولاداً    If he marries Mariam, he will have no children.

c. It can sometimes have the connotation and meaning of ‘when’, which is often the case in Classical Arabic, especially when a repeated process is involved or implied:

اذا ساله اين قلبك اشار الى معدته        When/If he asks him where his heart is, he points to his stomach.

اذا حلّ الليل لجأت الطيور الي أوْكارِها    When night falls, birds resort to their nests.

Properties of  إذا الشرطيّة  

a. It must be followed by a verb in the perfect  الماضي , as in the examples above.

When it is negated, the negative particle  لَمْ (and not  ما ) must be used.

اذا لم يُسألْ عن الموضوع نسيَه تماماً.              If he is not asked about the matter, he will forget it altogether.

b. As can be seen in the examples above, the verb in the result clause is often in

the perfect الماضي. But if it is not, it can be in the imperative, or  introduced by

the particles سوف or  س, the negative particles لن , لا , ليس , or the conjunction إنّ ,

and the like, in which case the result clause must be preceded by  فَ .

اذا درست نجحت                                   If you study, you will succeed.

اذا جاع عدوّك فأطعمه                              If your enemy hungers, feed him.

اذا كانوا بحاجة الى مساعدة فسأ ُساعدهم   If they need help, I will help them.

اذا أردت أن تُطاع فاطلب المُستطاع      If you want to be obeyed, request what if possible.

اذا آخَيْتَه فإنّك ستجد فيه عوناً ورفيقاً               If you take him as a brother, you will find in him a helper and a companion.

c. Finally, the conditional clause with اذا  as with other conditional particles can be postponed:

اذهب لمقابلته اذا شئتَ                              Go to meet him, if you wish.

The postposition can be obtained by simply reversing the order of

condition and result clauses. In this case, the rules given above do not

apply: the result clause with a perfect verb cannot be reversed, i.e. placed in first position, the فَ  must be omitted, and the form of the verb will vary with the meaning.

سنشاهد الأهرام  اذا ذهبنا  الى مصر               We will visit the pyramids if we go to Egypt.

فتِّش عن الجار اوّلا اذا اردت راحة البال          Look out for good neighbors if you want peace and quiet.

3. Other Uses of  إذا

The construction with اذا is a way to introduce an indirect question in Arabic with the meaning ‘whether’. Thus,

Direct questions:

سألتها: هل عندك وقت للراحة والاستجمام؟        I asked her: “Do you have time for rest and relaxation”?

أجابت: لا اعرف. هل هذا ممكن لإمرأة مثلي؟     She answered: “I do not know: Is such a thing possible for a woman like me”?

Indirect questions:

سألتها اذا كان عندها وقت للراحة والاستجمام؟    I asked her whether she had time for …

أجابت انّها لا تعرف اذا كان هذا ممكناً لإمرأة مثلها؟ She responded that she did not know whether that was possible for a woman like her.

Note the use of  كان to fulfill the requirement that اذا be followed by a verb in the perfect.

Another widely used conditional particle is the particle  لو , with which you are quite familiar. Should there be need, review its properties and uses  in Elementary Modern Standard Arabic (EMSA) or other books you learned Arabic in.

For other uses of these particles, go to Lesson 3, Lexical Note 3.

2. (من) … لا بـُدَّ( ل)  The لا  of Categorical Denial ‘it is inevitable, incumbent’

1. As we see in the vocabulary item in the New Vocabulary section, لا بدّ may be followed by clauses with (مِن) انْ / أنّ  . These clauses often are preceded by the conjunction و , in which case مِن must be dropped:

لا بُدَّ وأنّنا سنواجه مصاعبَ جَمّة.      It is unavoidable that we will face great difficulties.

لا بدّ وأنْ يفوز في الانتخابات.     He will inevitably win in the elections.

Lexical 2 (لِ) … من …  . لا بدّ  ‘it is inevitable, incumbent’

2. This expression can be put in the past by placing an invariable form of  كان  before it.:

لا بدّ (له) من الزواج بتلك المرأة.                  It was unavoidable to/ He cannot but/ marry that woman.

كان لا بدّ له من الزواج بتلك المرأة.                It was unavoidable that he/he could not but marry that woman.

But how do we negate this latter sentence? Here’s how:

لم يكن بدّ  ٌ من الزواج بتلك المرأة.                 It was unavoidable that he marry that woman.

3. Here are other idioms with the same meaning as لا بدّ :

لم يجدْ بُدّاً من أن يتزوّج تلك المرأة.                He could not but (lit. he found no way but to) marry that woman.

لا يَسَعُني/ما وَسِعَني إلا ّ العودة الى أرض الوطن  I cannot/could not but return to my country.

لا مَفَرَّ من ايجاد حلّ عادل.                         We cannot but (lit. there is no way out, no escape but to) find a just solution.

ما كان منهم إلاّ انْ تركوا بلادهم وهربوا.          They could not but leave their country and run away.

3.

1. لا…إلّا ‘only’

These two words, لا ‘not’ before a verb and .إّلا ‘except, but’ after it, together mean “only”.  If the word following إّلا is the subject of that verb it is put in the nominative case, whereas if it is an object or predicate of a linking verb it is in the accusative case, just as if إّلا were not there.  Thus:

لا يحترمُ الا المؤمِنين ‘He honors only the faithful.’ (المؤمِنين ‘the faithful’ is object: accusative)

لا يحترمُهُ الا المؤمِنونُ ‘Only the faithful honor him’ (المؤمِنونُ ‘the faithful’ is subject: nominative)