السلام عليكم و رحمة الله

So, you’ve finally started understanding how nouns usually show their status:

1. In the state of raf’, you see a dhammah at the end (مُسْلِمٌ)
2. In nasb you see a fathah at the end (مُسْلِمًا)
3. In jarr you see a kasrah at the end (مُسْلِمٍ)

Then you encounter something that just doesn’t compute.  A word that you know for sure is in jarr, and looks like it should have a kasrah at the end, but somehow you see a fathah at the end!

For example, you might read, سافَرْتُ مِنْ مَكَّةَ إلى المَدِيْنَةِ (“I traveled from Makkah to Madinah”).  You see a kasrah at the end of المدينةِ, and that makes sense to you because the إلى before it is one of the particles of jarr.

Then you see the word مِنْ before مَكَّة, and you know مِنْ is another one of these special particles, so مكة should obviously have a kasrah at the end.  But it has a fathah on it.  It must be a misprint, right?

WRONG

You can tell I liked doing that, but forgive me because I can’t do that often :).  What happened here is that you’re looking at a word that is “partly flexible”.  That means that its ending can change somewhat (like from a dhammah to fathah), but it’s not flexible enough to go all the way down to a kasrah.  Just like how some people are not as good at limbo as others:

Why is that?

[Read more…] about Partly flexible nouns

السلام عليكم و رحمة الله,

We’ve covered كَسرَة (kasrah), which is the main indicator of خفض (khafdh), also known as جَرّ (jarr).  Today, we’re going on to the second sign of jarr, the letter ي.

No, not “yeah”! I said the letter ي!

Substitution of ي for كسرة

وَ أمّا اليَاءُ فَتَكُوْنُ علَامَةً لِلْخَفْضِ فِي ثَلاثَةِ مَواضِعَ: فِي الأسْماءِ الخَمْسَةِ, وَفِي التَثْنِيَةِ, وَالجَمْعِ

As for the ي, it is a sign of khafdh in three situations: the “five nouns”, the dual and the plural.

ي has three situations in which it is an indicator that a word is in jarr:

1. The “five nouns”
2. Dual nouns
3. Plural nouns

The “five nouns”

You know them and the conditions for giving them their endings from before.

For example:

• سَلِّمْ عَلى أبِيكَ صَباحَ كُلِّ يَومٍ (“Salute your father in the morning every day”)
• لا تَرْفَعْ صَوْتَكَ عَلى صَوْتِ أخِيْكَ الأكْبَرِ (“Don’t raise your voice over the voice of your elder brother”)
• لا تَكُنْ مُحِبّاً لِذي المالِ إلا أنْ يَكُوْنَ مُؤَدَّباً (“Don’t be a lover of one who has wealth except if he is refined”).

The word أخِيْك,is in jarr because it is mudhaaf ilayh, and أبِيْكَ and ذِي المالِ are in jarr because of a particle of jarr before them.  The sign of  jarr for all three is the ي.

Looking at the َك in the first two examples:

• it’s the pronoun of the 2nd person (“you”)
• it is مُضاف إلَيه (mudhaaf ilayh).  The mudhaaf here is أبِيْ or أخِيْ
• It is fixed upon فتحة (fathah) – pronouns are fixed, meaning the ending sound doesn’t change when their status does.
• It’s in the state of jarr (because it’s mudhaaf ilayh).

In the third example, المالِ is also mudhaaf ilayh and it is in jarr using the kasrah.

The dual

For example:

• انظُرْ إلى الْجُنْدِيَّيْنِ (“Look at the two soldiers”)
• سَلِّمْ عَلى الْصَدِيقَيْنِ (“Salute the two friends”).

الجُنْدِيَّيْنِ and الصَدِيْقَيْنِ are in jarr because of a particle of jarr before them, and the sign of jarr is the ي with a fathah before it and a kasrah after (which will give you the “ayni” sound). Each of them is dual because it indicates the meaning of two.  In the status of رفع (raf’), they were الجُنْدِيّانِ and الصَدِيْقانِ (with an “aani”) sound.

The sound masculine plural

For example:

• رَضِيتُ عَنِ الْبَكْرِيْنَ (“I was pleased with the Bakr’s”)
• نَظَرْتُ إلى المُسْلِمِينَ الْخاشَعِيْنَ (“I looked at the humble Muslims”).

البَكْرِِيْنَ and المُسْلِمِيْنَ are in jarr because of  a particle of jarr before them, and the sign of jarr is the ي with a kasrah before it and a fathah after (which gives an “eena” sound). Each of them is a sound masculine plural.

If you’ve been paying attention, you might have noticed that dual nouns and sound masculine plurals look exactly the same in نصب (nasb) and jarr!!!  How do you tell the difference? What works for me is that I know that there are only three ways a word can be in the state of jarr in the Arabic language:

1. It has one of the particles of خفض before it
2. It is mudhaaf ilayh (the second word in a “possessive phrase”)
3. It is a grammatical follower of another word that is in jarr (e.g. it’s coming as a description for that word or joined by  “and” or “or” to it).  There’s more on these grammatical followers in a later section, but these are the most common ones.

If I don’t see one of these three, then I know the word is not in jarr and I mark it up as nasb.

[Read more…] about Getting down with خفض, Part 2: ي

السلام عليكم و رحمة الله,

We’re down to the fifth and last indicator of نصب (nasb), which is when the final ن that was present when the word was in رفع (raf’) stops appearing when it switches to nasb.

When dropping of the final ن substitutes for فتحة as the sign of Nasb

In Arabic, it is stated as:

وَأمَا حَذْفُ النُوْنِ فَيَكُوْنُ عَلامَةً لِلنَصبِ في الأفعالِ الخَمسَةِ التِي رَفْعُها بِثَباتِ النُوْنِ

As for dropping of the ن, then it is a sign of nasb in the “five verbs” whose raf’ is by the establishment of ن.

You know from when we did the “five verbs” here what they are. If something happens that puts one of them in nasb, the final ن that is the sign of raf’ goes away. Some examples:

• يَسُرُّنِيْ أنْ تَحْفَظوا دُرُوسَكُمْ (“It delights me that you all memorize your lessons”) – the word was تَحْفَظُوْنَ before it change status.
• يُألِمُنِيْ مِن الكَسالى أن يُهمِلوا فِي واجِباتِهِمْ (“It hurts me from the lazy ones that they neglect their assignments”) – the word was يُهْمِلُوْنَ before it changed status.

Each of the words تَحْفَظُوْا and يُهْمِلُوْا is a present action that is put in nasb because of أن.  The sign of its nasb is that the ن dropped off. The doer of the action is the و of the plural, fixed upon سكون (sukoon) in the state of raf’.

The same thing happens for a verb that has the ا of the dual or the ي of the singular feminine second person connected to it, such as:

• يَسُرُّنِيْ أن تَنالا رَغَباتِكُماَ (“It delights me that you two attain your desires”) – the word was تَنالانِ  before it changed status
• ِيُألمنِي أن تُفَرِِّطِيْ فِي واجِبِك (“It hurts me that you [f.] be lax in your assignment.”) – the word was originally تُفَرِّطِيْنَ

You already know how to think about the ا and the ي in these examples (hint hint, they are doers of actions like how we saw for theو of the plural in the example above).

[Read more…] about Standing tall with نصب, Part 5: Dropping the final ن

السلام عليكم ورحمة الله,

Welcome to the fourth installment of our series on the indicators of when a word is in نَصب (nasb).  We’ve covered فتحة (fathah), the letter ا, and كسرة (kasrah) already.  Now we’re going to look at when ي will be used to show nasb.

When ي substitutes for فتحة  as the sign of نصب

ِوَأمّا الياءُ فَتَكُوْنُ عَلامَةً لِلنَصْبِ فِي التَثْنِيَةِ وَالجَمْع

As for the ي, it is a sign of nasb in the dual and the masculine plural

We already know what dual nouns (from Going high with رفع, Part 3: ا ) and the masculine plural (from Going high with رفع, Part 2: و) are, so there’s no need to go into that again.

To recap: in the status of raf’, the dual will use ا (so that you’d see it ending with انِ) and the masculine plural will use و (so that you’d see وْنَ at the end).

In the status of nasb however, the dual and the masculine will both use ي.  When we go over how ي can be an indicator of جرّ/خفض, we will see that this is also true when they are in that state as well.

• The dual would switch from ا to ي and end with يْنِ (with a fathah on the letter before the ي and a kasrah on the ن).  You’d be going from an “aani” sound at the end to “ayni”.
• The plural would switch from a و to ي and end with يْنَ (with a kasrah on the letter before the ي and a fathah on the ن).  Here you’d be going from an “oona” sound at the end to “eena”.

The dual noun

Some examples:

• نَطَرْتُ عُصْْفُوْرَينِ فَوْقَ الشَجَرَةِ (“I saw two sparrows over the tree”) – the word was originally عُصْفُرانِ
• اشتَرى أبِيْ كِتابَينِ أحَدُهما لي وَالآخَرُ لِأخِيْ (“My father bought two books, one of them for me and the other for my brother”) – the word was originally كِتابانِ

Each of the words ِعُصْفُوْرَيْن and ِكِتابَيْن is in nasb because it’s the object of an action, and the sign is the ي that has a fathah before it and a kasrah after it. The ن in these dual nouns substitutes for the tanwin that we normally see at the end of a singular noun.

The sound masculine plural

Some examples:

• إنَّ المُتَّقِينَ لَيَكْسِبُونَ رِضا ربِّهِمْ (“Indeed the God-conscious will earn the pleasure of their Lord”) – the word was originally المُتَّقُونَ
• نَصَحْتُ المُجْتَهِدينَ بالانْكِبابِ عَلى المُذاكَرةِ (“I advised the ones who strive to apply themselves to memorization”) – the word was originally المُجْتَهِدُوْنَ

Each of the words َالمُتَّقِيْن and َالمُجْتَهِدِيْن is in nasb because it is the object of an action (first example) or influence by إنَّ (second example). The sign of nasb is the ي that has a kasrah before and a fathah after, as it is a sound masculine plural.  Just like with the dual nouns, the ن is a substitute for the tanwin that we would normally see in the singular noun.

[Read more…] about Standing tall with نصب, Part 4: ي

السلام عليكم و رحمة الله,

We’ve covered فتحة (fathah) and the letter ا as signs of نصب (nasb).  Today we take a short look at the third sign, كَسرة (kasrah):

When كسرة substitutes for فتحة as a sign of نصب

وَأمّا الكَسْرَةُ فَتَكُوْنُ عَلامَةً  لِلنَصْبِ فِي جَمْعِ المُؤَنَّثِ السالِمِ

As for the kasrah, then it is a sign of nasb in the sound feminine plural.

You already know what the “sound feminine plural” is from Going high with رفع, Part 1: ضمة and now we tell you that you can figure out that a sound feminine plural is in nasb if it has a kasrah at the end.

For example, إنَّ الفَتياتِ المُهَذَّباتِ يُدْرِكْنَ المَجدَ (“Indeed, the refined girls will attain glory”). Each of the words الفتياتِ and المُهذباتِ is a sound feminine plural, and they are both in nasb, the first because of the word إنَّ (which is one of the nasb-izers of nouns) and the second is a description of an اسم that is in nasb state. The indication of their nasb state is the kasrah, substituting for the fathah.

Two things to note here:

1. إنّ and its siblings will force a noun to be in nasb.  We will learn more about إنَّ and its siblings in a separate section إن شاء الله
2. If a word is meant to be used as a description for another word, then both words will have the same status.  This will become clearer in a later section on “grammatical followers”.  For now just know that the noun that is being described and the description will have the same status (as well as the same gender, number and definite/indefiniteness).  In our example, الفتياتِ (“the girls”)  is being described and is in nasb because of إنَّ.  The word المُهَذَّباتِ (“the refined”) is the description.  الفَتَيات and its description المُهَذَّباتِ are both:
   1. definite (you can tell by the ال before them)
   2. feminine plural (you can tell by the ات ending)
   3. in nasb (you can tell by the kasrah at the end)

[Read more…] about Standing tall with نَصْب, Part 3: كَسْرَة