نَزَلَ descend in Arabic
نَزَلَ is how you say “descend” in Arabic.
Root ن ز ل n-z-l. verb (form I). nazala.
Arabic
English
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Meaning of descend in Arabic
- to alight and settle in a place of a traveller dismounting and stopping, sojourning, or lodging somewhere
- to descend, come down e.g. of milk descending into an udder
- to take the place of, occupy the position of
Example sentence
باب مفتوح من السماء من أبواب الجنة ينزل من الجنات الرحمة على بيت المقدس كل صباح حتى تقوم الساعة
A gate from the gates of Paradise is open in the heavens, from which mercy descends upon Bayt al-Maqdis every morning until the Hour is established.
يَنْزِلُ it descends
Present-tense verb 'comes down, descends', 'he/it' form.
The English is machine-translated.
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How it is used
Classically used of a traveller getting down and settling at a place; the same root extends to figurative "descending" (milk into an udder) and to "occupying" a rank or position, which gives rise to مَنْزِلَة for social or grammatical standing.
Words from the same root
- مَنْزِلٌ a house, dwelling, or stopping-place
- مَنْزِلَةٌ rank, standing, station
- نَزِيلٌ a guest
- نَازِلَةٌ a severe calamity or affliction
- أَنْزَلَ to lodge someone, give him refuge
More example sentences
والظل الذي ينزل على بيت المقدس شفاء من كل داء من جنان الجنة
And the shade that descends upon Bayt al-Maqdis is a cure for every illness, from the gardens of Paradise.
يَنْزِلُ it descends
Present-tense verb 'comes down, descends', 'he/it' form.
كل ليلة ينزل سبعون ألف ملك من السماء إلى الأرض إلى مسجد بيت المقدس
Every night, seventy thousand angels descend from the sky to the earth, to the mosque of Bayt al-Maqdis.
يَنْزِلُ they descend
Present-tense verb 'descends', 'he/it' form (agreeing with the number-phrase as a unit).
إلَّا نَزَلَتْ عَلَيْهِمْ السَّكِينَةُ،
except that tranquility descends upon them,
نَزَلَتْ descends
The '-at' ending is the feminine subject 'it/she', agreeing with the feminine 'tranquility' that follows. Past in form, within the 'except that' it states a guaranteed result: 'tranquility descends upon them'.
وأن القرآن نزل من عنده
And the Quran descended from Him.
نَزَلَ it descended
Past-tense 'it descended/came down', subject 'it' built in, describing the Quran's revelation as a downward sending. The verb carries the doer internally.
فلما نزل سألوه من أين جئت بهذا؟
When he came down, they asked him: Where did you get this?
نَزَلَ he came down
Past-tense 'he came down, descended', the 'he' subject built in. It is the verb of the 'when' clause, the event that the main action waits on. The descent is reported as a completed act that sets the timing.
وأنزل ضرورَتك بالله ، ولا تستغن إلا بالله
And place your needs with God, and do not seek independence except through God,
وَأَنْزِلْ and place
This is the bound wa- 'and' plus a command verb, 'and set down, bring', addressed to a single male. The wa- coordinates the order with the surrounding advice, and the imperative carries no separate 'you'; the verb governs the object after it.
وَكَانَ أُمَيَّةُ إِذَا مَرَّ بِالْمَدِينَةِ نَزَلَ عَلَى سَعْدِ،
Whenever Umayya passed by the city, he would stay with Sa'd.
نَزَلَ he stayed
A past verb with 'he' inside that, paired with 'upon' next, means to lodge at someone's place. In this habitual frame it reads as 'he would stay', the customary result of each pass-through.
وَكَانَ سَعْدٌ إِذَا مَرَّ بِمَكَّةِ نَزَلَ عَلَى أُمَيَّةِ،
Whenever Sa'd passed through Mecca, he would stay with Umayya.
نَزَلَ he stayed
A past verb with 'he' inside that, paired with 'upon' next, means to lodge with a host; in this habitual frame it reads as 'he would stay', the regular result of each visit.
فَنَزَلَ عَلَى أُمَيَّةِ بِمَكَّةِ،
So he stayed with Umayya in Mecca.
فَنَزَلَ so he stayed
A fa- of result ('and so') on a past verb 'he stayed', with 'he' carried inside. The fa- frames the staying as the natural next step once he had set out.
ثُمَّ نَزَلَ
Then he came down.
نَزَلَ he came down
A past-tense verb of descending with its 'he' subject folded into the verb form itself, so no separate pronoun is written. The doer is understood from the surrounding story, which is why a one-word verb can stand as a complete sentence here.
فَنَزَلَ يَحْدُو بِالْقَوْمِ يَقُولُ
Then he came down among the people and began to chant, saying:
فَنَزَلَ so he came down
The opening fa- ties this coming-down to the previous moment as its sequel, the next step in the action. The rest is a finished-action verb, 'he descended', its doer built in, so connector and verb advance the scene together.
فَتَخَلَّفْتُ فَنَزَلَ يَحْجُنُهُ بِمِحْجَنِهِ،
So I lagged behind, and he dismounted and struck it with his staff.
فَنَزَلَ so he dismounted
Again fa- links this as the following action in the sequence, but now the doer shifts to 'he' (the Prophet), shown by the verb's third-person shape. So the connector advances the story to a new actor's move.
كَمْ رَأَيْتُ صَاحِبَ مَنْزِلٍ مَا نَزَلَ لَحْدَهُ حَتَّى نَزَلَ
How many a homeowner have I seen who never moved into his house before he died!
نَزَلَ move into
A past-tense verb carrying its 'he' subject inside, negated by the particle before it to mean 'he never moved in'. Inside the relative clause it describes the homeowner's frustrated life: the house stood ready but he never settled into it before death took him.
كَمْ رَأَيْتُ صَاحِبَ مَنْزِلٍ مَا نَزَلَ لَحْدَهُ حَتَّى نَزَلَ
How many a homeowner have I seen who never moved into his house before he died!
نَزَلَ he died
A past-tense verb carrying its 'he' subject inside, used idiomatically for 'he died', 'he went down' into the grave. As the event the previous 'before' points to, it marks the deadline that cut the homeowner's life short, closing the sentence's bitter contrast.
مُظْلِمَةٍ مَطِرَةٍ وَقَدْ نَزَلَ أَبُو سُفْيَانُ
It was a dark, rainy night, and Abu Sufyan had arrived.
نَزَلَ had arrived
This is a past-tense verb with the doer built in as 'he', so no separate subject pronoun is needed before it. Paired with the certainty-marker just ahead of it, it reads as a completed arrival that was already in place when the scene opens. Arabic regularly carries the subject inside the verb like this rather than spelling it out.
Common questions
- How do you say "descend" in Arabic?
- نَزَلَ (nazala).
- What is the connection between نَزَلَ and مَنْزِلَة?
- Both share the root ن-ز-ل; مَنْزِلَة (station, rank) comes from the sense of "taking the place of" something, an extension of "alighting" at a place.
Related words
Definitions summarised from Lane's Arabic-English Lexicon (E. W. Lane, 1863–1893).