السلام عليكم ورحمة الله وبركاته,

Today we’re going to start looking at التَابِعُ لِلْمَرْفُوْعِ (the grammatical follower of a word that’s in raf’).

There are four kinds of grammatical followers  (i.e. they come after a word and follow it in status).

This post is going to cover the نَعْت, and the rest will come in later sections إنْ شاء الله

 

باب النَعْتِ (The chapter on the adjective)

النَعْتُ: تَابِعٌ لِلْمَنْعُوْتِ فِيْ رَفْعِهِ وَنَصْبِهِ وَخَفْضِهِ, وَتَعْرَيْفِهِ وَتَنْكِيْرِهِ, قَامَ زَيْدٌ الْعَاقِلُ, وَرَأَيْتُ زَيْدًا الْعَاقِلَ وَمَرَرْتُ بِزَيْدٍ الْعاقِلِ

The adjective is a follower of the described word in its raf’, nasb and khafdh (jarr) and in its being a definite and indefinite noun. [You would say]:  قَامَ زَيْدٌ الْعَاقِلُ (“Zayd, the intelligent, stood”), رَأَيْتُ زَيْدًا الْعَاقِلَ (“I saw Zayd, the intelligent”), and مَرَرْتُ بِزَيْدٍ الْعاقِلِ (“I passed by Zayd, the intelligent”).

The word نَعْتُ (na’t) means “a description”, and the word it’s describing is called the مَنْعُوْت (the “described word”).  We can say it’s like an adjective in English except that in Arabic, it will come after the word it’s describing, and not necessarily right after it.  “A big house” would be “بَيْتٌ كَبِيْرٌ” (Which is بَيْتٌ – “house”, followed by كَبَيْرٌ – “big”).

Now, there are two kinds of na’t:

1. نَعْت حَقِيْقِيّ (“true description”) – Used for an attribute in the described entity
   • جاءَ مُحَمَّدٌ الْعاقِلُ (“Muhammad, the intelligent, came”) – العاقِلُ describes مُحَمَّدٌ
2. نَعْت سَبَبِيّ (“causal description”) – The attribute isn’t actually in who/what we’re describing, but is in something else related to it.  This “something else” is the real reason why we’re mentioning the trait (intelligence, beauty, size, etc.) and is called the sabab (cause).  This sabab will have a pronoun going back to the مَنْعُوْت
   • جَاءَ مُحَمَّدٌ الْفاضِلُ أبُوْهُ (“Muhammad, whose father is honorable, came”) – We are describing Muhammad, but his father (أبُوْهُ)  is the sabab for why we’re saying الْفَاضِلُ (“the honorable”).   The pronoun هُ (“his”) in أبُوْهُ refers back to مُحَمَّدٌ

The rule is that regardless of whether it’s “true” or “causal”, the description follows the described noun in:

1. the state it takes, and
2. whether it is a definite or indefinite – definite nouns refer to specific entities, while indefinite nouns don’t
   • Names of people (e.g. Muhammad or Fatimah) and nouns that have been made definite using ال are two kinds of definite nouns.  We will learn more about the other kinds of definite nouns later إن شاء الله.

Some examples, along with which state the described noun and the description are, and whether they are definite or indefinite are below.  See how the dhammah/fathah/kasrah on the end of the description in red matches the word that it is describing before it:

Example of description	State	Definite/ Indefinite
حَضَرَ مُحَمَّدٌ الفاضِلُ (“Muhammad, the honorable, arrived”)	Raf’	Definite
حَضَرَ مُحَمَّدٌ الفاضِلُ أَبُوْهُ (“Muhammad, whose father is honorable, arrived”)
رَأَيْتُ مُحَمَّدًا الْفَاضِلَ (“I saw Muhammad, the honorable”)	Nasb
رَأَيْتُ مُحَمَّدًا الْفَاضِلَ أبُوْهُ (“I saw Muhammad, whose father is honorable”)
نَظَرْتُ إلَى مُحَمَّدٍ الفاضِلِ (“I looked at Muhammad, the honorable”)	Jarr
نَظَرْتُ إلى مُحَمَّدٍ الفاضِلِ أَبُوْهُ (“I looked at Muhammad, whose father is honorable”)
رَأيْتُ رَجُلًا عَاقِلًا (“I saw an intelligent man”)	Nasb	Indefinite
رَأيْتُ رَجُلًا عَاقِلًا أبُوْهُ (“I saw a man whose father is honorable”)

 

“True” descriptions, also match what they are describing in gender (masculine/feminine) and number  (singular/dual/plural).  Some examples of matching in gender and number are below.  They are all describing something that is in nasb (shown using a ي for duals and a fathah for others) and is a definite noun (shown using ال at the beginning).

Example of true description	Gender	Number
رَأَيْتُ مُحَمَّدًا الْعاقِلَ (“I saw Muhammad, the intelligent”)	Masculine	Sing.
رَأَيْتُ فَاطِمَةَ الْعَاقِلَةَ (“I saw Fatimah, the intelligent”)	Feminine (using ة at the end)	Sing.
رَأَيْتُ الْمُحَمَّدَيْنِ الْعاقِلَيْنِ (“I saw the two intelligent Muhammads”)	Masculine	Dual
رَأَيْتُ الرِجالَ الْعُقَلاءَ (“I saw the intelligent men”)	Masculine	Plural (Using broken plural)

 

As for “causal” descriptions, they are always  singular, and the gender will agree with what comes after it (i.e. the sabab).  Only the last of these examples has a female sabab (أُمّ -mom).  Notice how the pronoun at the end (هُما [“both of them”]- هُمْ [“all of them”] – هُنَّ [“all of them (f.)”]) refers back to the children or girls.

Example of causal description	Gender	Number
رَأَيْتُ الوَلَدَيْنِ العَاقِلَ أَبُوْهُما (“I saw the two children whose father is intelligent”)	Masculine	Singular
رَأَيْتُ الأوْلَادَ العَاقِلَ أَبُوْهُمْ (“I saw the children whose father is intelligent”)	Masculine
رَأَيْتُ الْبَناَتِ العَاقِلَ أَبُوْهُنَّ (“I saw the girls whose father is intelligent”)	Masculine
رَأَيْتُ الأوْلَادَ العَاقِلَةَ أَمُّهُمْ (“I saw the children whose mother is intelligent”)	Feminine (w/ ة at the end)

 

To summarize, a نَعْتَ (description) has to have four “dimensions”.  The “true” and “causal” descriptions will match in these dimensions with the مَنْعُوت (described word) and sabab as follows:

Dimension	True description	Causal description
State (raf’/nasb/jarr)	the described word before it (for all 4)	the described word before it
Definite/Indefinite
Gender (Masculine/Feminine)		the sabab after it
Number (1/2/Plural)		always singular

 

Advanced tip:  You might be wondering why the sabab in all these examples is always in raf’, no matter what the state the described word and description are.  That is a great question, and I want to address that.  The most direct answer is that sometimes a noun will have the same grammatical effect as a verb (i.e. a noun after it works as its doer and will be in raf’).  If you don’t remember what I mean, go back to the The فاعل (Doer) and refresh your memory.

Exactly which kinds of nouns can act like a verb are beyond this discussion, but I’m just going to leave it at saying that nouns built in the style of the doer (commonly rhymes with فاعِل) are one of them.  The words عاقِل/عاقِلَة and الفاضِل have this style, so they can work like a verb and raf’-ize a doer after it, so that’s why we see أبُوْ (with a و) and أُمُّ in raf’ after them.

From the Quran

Below, I’ve highlighted the descriptions that I could find on this page (38:62-83).  They are all “true” descriptions, so it should be easy how they match what they are describing in the four dimensions (status, definiteness, gender and number).

• You can tell the description is definite if it has ال at the beginning
• الوَاحِدُ (“The One”) and القَهّارُ (“The Prevailing”) both describe اللهُ –> raf’ (dhammah), definite, masculine, singular
• العَزِيْزُ (“The Almighty”) and الْغَفّارُ (“The Oft-forgiving”) both describe رَبُّ السَماوَاتِ (“Lord of the heavens”) –> again, raf’ (dhammah), definite, masculine, singular.
  • If a word is mudhaaf, we know its definiteness from the mudhaaf ilayhi (what it’s been added to)
  • السَماواتِ  is definite (with the ال), so we know رَبُّ is also, which means that any word we use to describe this رَبّ, also has to be definite.
• عَظِيْمٌ (“great”) describes نَبَؤٌا (“news”) –> raf’ (dhammah), indefinite , masculine, singular
• أنْتُمْ عَنْهُ مُعْرِضُوْنَ (“You all turn away from it”) also describes نَبَؤٌا –> sometimes a whole sentence or a semi-sentence can come as a نَعْت.
• الأعْلَى (“the highest”) describes المَلَإِ (“the assembly”) –> jarr, definite, masculine, singular
  • Because an ى (alif maqsurah) cannot take a vowel, we assume there is a kasrah there to put it in jarr
• مُبِيْنٌ (“clear”) describes نَذِيْرٌ (“warner”) –> raf’, indefinite, masculine, singular
• الْمَعْلُوْمِ (“the known”) describes الْوَقْتِ (“the time”) –> jarr (kasrah), definite, masculine, singular
• الْمُخْلَصِيْنَ (“the chosen”) describes عِبادَكَ (“your slaves”) –> nasb (using fathah for عِبادَ and ي for الْمُخْلَصِيْنَ), definite, masculine, plural
  • عِبادَ is attached to the pronoun كَ (“your”).  All pronouns are definite, so any noun that is mudhaaf to a pronoun (like this عِبادَ) is also definite.  That’s why we know to make the description المُخْلَصِيْنَ definite by putting ال at the beginning

Questions

1. What is a نَعْت?
2. How many kinds of نَعْت are there?
3. What is the نَعْت حَقِيْقِيّ (true description)?
4. What is the نَعْت سَبَبِيّ (causal description)?
5. What are the things that a true description has to match the described word in?
6. What does a causal description’s gender match?

 

Until next time, السلام عليكم و رحمة الله و بركاته

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