Arabic vocabulary
How to say “must” in Arabic, with pronunciation and real example sentences from OpenArabic texts.
ومن عاش فيه بالحيل والمكر والدهاء فلا بد له من خزي في الدنيا ومقت في الأخرى وإن تسود هذا،
Whoever lives by deceit, trickery, and cunning will inevitably face disgrace in this world and contempt in the next, even if they gain prominence.
بُدَّ — must. This noun ('escape / avoidance') sits in the bare accusative of the category-denying 'no' before it, forming the idiom 'there is no escaping' = 'inevitably'. The stripped ending is the signature of total negation. It pairs with 'for him' and 'from' to say what he cannot avoid.
From: Intention in Islam →وعقيب الخمس ، في أن يصلحك ويوفقك والزم ولا بد آية الكرسي في دبر الصلوات المفروضة ،
And after the five prayers, to guide and aid you, and always adhere to Ayat al-Kursi at the end of the obligatory prayers,
وَلَا بُدَّ — and necessarily. This is the bound wa- 'and' plus the la of absolute denial plus a noun, an idiom meaning 'and there is no escaping it, it is a must'. The la wipes out the category of 'escape' to assert necessity; Arabic uses this fixed 'no-escape' phrase to mean 'inevitably'.
From: True Devotion →والزم الصدق المفرط عن كل بد في كل شيء ،
And adhere to absolute honesty in everything without exception,
بُدٍّ — necessity. This indefinite noun, 'escape, exception', sits in the possessed, 'of'-type ending because kull 'every' before it owns it: 'any escape'. After kull the singular indefinite noun in this ending gives the blanket 'without any way out' meaning.
From: True Devotion →OpenArabic teaches words like بُد through real bilingual reading with native audio and spaced-repetition practice.
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