Amr And Nahy

In this lesson, we will study the أمر (Command Verb) and نَهْي (Prohibition Verb). And we will also introduce the concept of grammatical states for verbs.

Verbs and Grammatical States

We have already seen the concept of grammatical states, and at this point, we should be intimately familiar with the concept and have much experience in this area. We have discussed the need for grammatical states when dealing with أسماء in order to remove any confusion about how an اسم is being used (recall our Subject vs Object discussion).

You have also seen how حروف have very limited usage, and there is generally no confusion regarding them and the role they are playing in the sentence, and therefore, they don't require any grammatical states.

This leaves the last part of speech, the أَفْعَال (verbs). Verbs, like Isms, can be used in multiple different ways and as a result, we need grammatical states. For example, the Harf can come before a مضارع in order to negate it: ((you do not do)). But, as you will learn in this lesson, can also come before a مضارع for the purpose of prohibition. "You do not do" would become "Do not do". If there is no change at all to the verb, how would we know which meaning is intended?

There is much more to this discussion which will come in a subsequent lesson, where we deal with the مُعْرَب (declinable words) and مَبْنِيّ (indeclinable words) concept in great detail.

The Grammatical States of the Verb

An اسم experiences 3 states, رفع نصب جر. A فعل also experiences 3 states. The first two are the same, رفع, which is the default and is what you have learned, نصب, which you have not yet seen, and جَزْم, which is what we will be focusing on today. Both the Command Verb and the Prohibitive Verb make the verb مَجْزُوْم (in the state of Jazm).

The Command Verb

The أمر is the 3rd major type of verb. The command verb is a declaration by the speaker of their wishes for a particular action to occur. If you say, "Stand", you are expressing your desire for the person spoken to to carry out the action of standing. Since the action has not yet occurred, the tense of this verb is future (recall that a verb is action + tense).

Next, the أمر can be split into two categories: literal or direct command, and figurative or indirect command. Literal command is what you would expect; you are speaking to someone or a group of people in front of you, and you are expressing your wish for them to perform a particular action. Therefore, the Literal Command is when you are dealing with the Second Person, numbers 7-12 from the conjugation table. The Figurative or Indirect Command is for the remaining conjugations, the 3rd person 1-6, and the first person 13-14. These cases are you expressing your wish for the people not present to carry out the action, or you yourself or your group to carry out the action: "He/she/they must help, I/we must help..."

In the case of the passive, there is no direct command, only indirect, since all 14 conjugations are you expressing your wish for some vague person to carry out the action. "He/she/they/you/I/we must be helped"

In terms of construction, we will deal with the أمر in a similar manner as we did the مضارع, that is by considering the beginning and ending separately.

Constructing the أمر

Step 1 - Make the verb مجزوم

The first step to constructing the أمر is to take the مضارع verb and make it مجزوم. Let's deal with the 5 singulars first. To make the 5 singulars مجزوم, all you need to do is replace the vowel on the Laam letter with a sukoon. So we get:

Next, we deal with the feminine plurals, #6 and #12. The feminine plurals in fact do not change. They are like هٰذَا and will remain as they are in all 3 states.

All remaining conjugations, the 4 duals, the masculine plurals, and the 2nd person singular feminine, end in a Noon. To make these verbs مجزوم, all we do is strip off that Noon. This Noon's sole purpose in fact is to be the sign of رفع for these verbs. Whenever it's missing, it is to signal that the verb is no longer مرفوع. Now, before we give you the full مجزوم table, it is worth talking about the منصوب verbs. They are actually almost exactly the same as the مجزوم verbs, with one exception. And that is that the 5 singulars will receive a Fathah on the Laam letter instead of a sukoon. Therefore, even though the منصوب verb has no relevance to our discussion of أمر and نهي, for the following table, we will include it anyway and cover how to make verbs منصوب with almost no extra effort! The full table is then as follows, with the منصوب verbs listed first followed by the مجزوم:

With this, we have completed Step 1 - Make the verb مجزوم.

Step 2 - Add the لَامُ الْأَمْرِ (The Laam of Command) for the Indirect Command

This step is very straightforward and will give us 8 of the 14 command conjugations straight away. Recall that the indirect command covers the 3rd and 1st person, conjugations 1-6 and 13-14. To construct the indirect command, we take the مجزوم verb and prefix the لَامُ الْأَمْرِ (The Laam of Command) which is لِ.

Step 3 - Construct the Direct Command Verbs (2nd Person Verbs)

Step 3.1 - Remove the sign of مضارع

The construction of the direct command follows two stages. The first thing we must do is get rid of the sign of the مضارع, which for the 2nd person will be the ت prefix.

Step 3.2 - Add هَمْزَةُ الْوَصْل if required

Notice that in all of the direct commands created in step 3.1, all of them begin with a فْ, which is impossible to pronounce; you can't pronounce a word where the first letter is vowelless in Arabic. This is where the هَمْزَةُ الْوَصْل (Hamza of Assimilation/Connection, sometimes also called The Eliding Hamza), comes in. The sole purpose of هَمْزَةُ الْوَصْل is to allow the pronunciation of words that begin with a sukoon, such as the direct command.

The هَمْزَةُ الْوَصْل will receive a Fathah if the first vowel coming after it (so the vowel on the second letter after the one with the sukoon) is either a Fathah or a Kasrah. If the first vowel is a Dammah, then the Hamzah will receive a Dammah.

• اُنْصُرْ → نْصُرْ → تَنْصُرْ → تَنْصُرُ
• اِفْعَلْ → فْعَلْ → تَفْعَلْ → تَفْعَلُ
• اِضْرِبْ → ضْرِبْ → تَضْرِبْ → تَضْرِبُ

The Full أمر Table

We can now display the full table for the أمر, both Indirect and Direct. We will also list the passive along with the active. There is no need for a separate section on the passive as the derivation is exactly the same, except you start off with the passive form يُفْعَلُ instead of يَفْعَلُ.

Finally, to wrap up the أمر, we list a verb whose passive command is a little easier to understand for all 14. (For لِيُفْعَلْ, we would translate it as "it must be done".)

The نهي (Verb of Prohibition)

The نهي verb is the opposite of the أمر. It is the speaker's wish for the action not to occur instead of wishing for it to occur, as in the case of the أمر.

The نهي is even simpler than the أمر to construct. There is no direct/indirect categorisation. All we do is take the مجزوم grammatical state of the verb and add a لَا before it.

And last of all, another example of the passive نهي with translation.