Arabic vocabulary
How to say “word” in Arabic, with pronunciation and real example sentences from OpenArabic texts.
فَجَمِيع مَا شَرعه الله من الذّكر إِنَّمَا هُوَ كَلَام تَامّ لَا اسْم مُفْرد وَلَا مظهر وَلَا مُضمر
Therefore, all that Allah has prescribed of remembrance is indeed complete speech, not a single noun, whether explicit or implicit.
اسْمٌ — a single word. 'a noun, name', nominative indefinite — the first thing it is denied to be; agreeing with 'speech' it is contrasted against.
From: Small Deeds, Great Reward →كَمَا كَانُوا يستعملون الْحَرْف فِي الِاسْم فَيَقُولُونَ هَذَا حرف غَرِيب أَي لفظ الِاسْم غَرِيب
Just as they used the term 'letter' in place of 'word', saying: 'This is a strange letter,' meaning the word is unusual.
الاسْمِ — the name. Genitive after 'fi' — 'the noun, word'. They used 'letter' to mean a whole word.
From: Small Deeds, Great Reward →كَمَا كَانُوا يستعملون الْحَرْف فِي الِاسْم فَيَقُولُونَ هَذَا حرف غَرِيب أَي لفظ الِاسْم غَرِيب
Just as they used the term 'letter' in place of 'word', saying: 'This is a strange letter,' meaning the word is unusual.
الاسْمِ — the name. Genitive owner of 'wording' — 'the noun, word'. The thing whose wording is called strange.
From: Small Deeds, Great Reward →وطرس الطلبة على اسمه ورسمه صورة ومعنى
And the students erased his name and form, both in image and meaning.
اسْمِهِ — his name. This noun, 'his name', carries the attached -hi 'his' and sits in the possessed ending forced by 'ala before it: 'upon his name'. The -hi points back to the disgraced narrator, and one word holds 'name' plus 'his'.
From: True Devotion →وَهِي اسْم يجمع كَمَال الذل ونهايته وَكَمَال الْحبّ لله ونهايته
And it is a term that encompasses complete humility at its highest degree, and complete love for Allah at its highest degree.
اسْمٌ — a term. This noun is indefinite, 'a term', with no 'the', and its ending marks it as the description completing 'it is a name'. The indefinite ending signals a general category rather than one specific named thing.
From: Worship and Repentance →OpenArabic teaches words like اسْم through real bilingual reading with native audio and spaced-repetition practice.
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