The pronouns that join the end of a word

The last lesson's words join the front of a word. This lesson's join its end. They are pronouns, the words for "they", "you", "he", "we", "I" and "she", and the Qur’ān writes them as part of the word before them.

Two of them, "they" and "you" for more than one, are among the five commonest parts of the Qur’ān's words, and "he" is among the ten commonest. With the last lesson's words, they are much of what holds a sentence together.

The new words

The corpus names each pronoun by three things: its person (the speaker, the one spoken to, or someone else), its gender and its number, in that order. "3MP" is third person, masculine, plural: "they", "them", "their". The table shows the ways the Qur’ān writes each one: a pronoun can take one shape when it is the one who does a verb's action, and another when the action is done to it or when it follows a noun.

Joined to a verb

A pronoun joined to a verb can be the one who does the action, or the one it is done to.

This one word has three parts: a verb, aʿṭā, then nā, "we", the ones who give, and then ka, "you", the one given to. In Arabic a whole sentence can be one written word.

Here nā is joined to a verb in the imperative, the form that tells or asks someone to do something, and it is the one the action is done to: "us".

Joined to a small word

A pronoun can also join the small words of the next lesson, the words for "in", "on" and "to".

Fīhi is fī, "in", and hi, "it": "in it". The corpus calls this pronoun third person, masculine, singular, the same pronoun as "his" and "him".

ʿAlayhim is ʿalā, "on", and him, "them". This pronoun is written hum or him by the sound before it; both are the same pronoun.

Joined to a noun

Joined to a noun, a pronoun says whose it is: "his", "our", "my".

This sentence was written for practice. Baytunā is bayt, "house", and nā, "our".

Reading

الكلمات التي تعرفها كاملةً بعد هذا الدرس مُعلَّمة.

Recall

• In the word aʿṭaynāka, which part is "we" and which is "you"?
• What does "3MP" stand for?
• In fīhi, what is hi?

Answers: nā is "we" and ka is "you"; third person, masculine, plural; the pronoun "it" (third person, masculine, singular), joined to fī.

Next

The next lesson teaches the small words of place and direction: "from", "in", "on", "to" and "about".