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    Three Meanings of Maa

    Wednesday, November 12th, 2008

    In Arabic, the word maa has over 15 meanings. In this post, we discuss three of those meanings–ismul istifhaam (the interrogative particle), nahiy (the particle of negation), and the third meaning which is similar to alladhiy (the one who/which/that).

    Mamnoo’ Min As-Sarf

    Wednesday, October 29th, 2008

    Most nouns show they’re majruwr with kasra. But there’s a special class of nouns that shows this with fatha! They are called Mamnoo’ Min As-Sarf in Arabic, which literally means something like “not on the pattern.” We illustrate a few examples of these, and give you a starter list of words like this.

    Verbs with More Than One Maf’ool

    Tuesday, October 28th, 2008

    All verbs in Arabic are transitive or intransitive. They take no maf’ool (recipient) of the verb, such as thahaba and kharaja, or they take one recipient, such as shariba and akala. But can a verb take TWO or more maf’ool bihi? The answer is … yes. We give an example from the Qur’an.

    Lam-ut-Ta’leel

    Tuesday, October 21st, 2008

    Mudaari’ verbs are generally marfoo’. But, they can become mansoob! How? In this post, we discover one of the ways–through the use of lam-ut-ta’leel, the lam of explaining. Lam-ut-ta’leel, when applied, causes the mudaari’ verb to become mansoob.

    The Faa’il in Verb Duals

    Wednesday, October 15th, 2008

    The faa’il in dual forms of verbs is the alif–alif-ul-uthayn. It’s clearly evident in both the maadi and the mudaari’ verbs. We explain with the example of kharaja/yakhruju.

    Kam: How Many

    Friday, October 3rd, 2008

    In Arabic, when you want to inquire how much or how many of something, you use the word “kam.” The word immediately after it–the thing you want to know about–is singular and mansoob (even though the translation into English makes it plural).

    Fi’l Mudaari’: Present and Future Tense

    Tuesday, September 2nd, 2008

    In Arabic, Al-Mudaari’ can be the present-tense or future-tense verb. How do you know which? By context! But, you can explicitly specify either tense, by the addition of al-aana (now) to indicate present-tense, or the particle seen or sawfa (not translated) to indicate future tense.

    Amr and ‘Umar

    Saturday, July 12th, 2008

    The name ‘Umar, in Arabic, contains a waw at the end when written. But this waw is not pronounced; why does it exist? To find out, we need to travel back to the beginning of the Arabic language, back when no dots or tashkeel existed in the written language.

    Fi’l Amr: The Imperative

    Saturday, May 10th, 2008

    Fi’l amri–the command form (or imperative form) of the verb–is derived from the second-person present-tense. You make three changes to the second-person present-tense verb to make the amr. We also discuss how to conjugate for anta, antum, anti, and antunna for the imperative.

    Badal: Something that Stands in for Something Else

    Saturday, May 3rd, 2008

    Badal–something that stands in for something else. The badal passes on the grammar to the next word. The rules for badal are three: the badl must be an ismul-ishaara, and the word following it (which it displaces the grammar onto) must be a common noun that’s definite (usually with alif-lam).

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