Re: Learn Arabic Grammar !
Good try … Okay let’s start with question 1 that I asked earlier.
Firstly, something in abundance in Arabic is given by the maf’oolun mutlaq - katheeran (many)
Monk gave the correct answer … There are three types of words in Arabic.
They are the Asma, Af’aal and Haroof. (these are group names - which means they appear as plurals). One member of Asma is called Ism, likewise one member of Af’aal is called f’il and one member of Haroof is called harf. Translations of these six words is below:
Asma = Nouns (Names) ~ things
Ism = Noun (name) ~ a thing
Af’aal = Verbs ~ actions
F’il = Verb ~ an action
Haroof = Particles and Articles ~ word modifiers
harf = a particle or article ~ word modifer
Any given word can only be an ism, f’il or harf …
Now fa’il comes in when we consider sentence structure … nahuw in Arabic.
There are two types of sentence they are either:
- Jumlatu ismiyyah (nominal sentence)
or
- Jumlatu f’iliyyah (verbal sentence)
type 1 = This is a cat ~ example of nominal sentence in English
type 2 = I hit him ~ example of verbal sentence in English
type 1 in Arabic always start with an ism
type 2 in Arabic always start with a f’il
In the example type 2 - there are three words … I and hit and him … These three have difference functions based on their usage in the sentence. ‘I’ takes the role of ‘doer’ and ‘hit’ has the role of ‘verb’ and ‘him’ has the role of ‘object’.
In Arabic we call the verb f’il, the doer we call that faa’il and the object we call that the maf’ool. Notice how these three words all contain fa 'ain and laam.
So the translation of I hit him in Arabic is … Darabtuhu … but we are jumping again to be honest jumlatu ismiyyah should be the starting point in sentences and no progress should be made until the method of analysis of sentences is understood.