Arabic 15 — Aḍ-ḍamāʾir al-munfaṣilah wa ʿalāmāt at-tarqīm — the separate pronouns in full, the three drills, and the punctuation marks الضَّمَائِرُ المُنْفَصِلَةُ وَعَلَامَاتُ التَّرْقِيمِ

A grammar (qawāʿid) lesson, not a reading passage: material you have already met unsystematically, now taken in order. It has two unrelated halves — الضَّمَائِر المُنْفَصِلَة, the separate pronouns (the definition, the three kinds, the three persons, the full paradigm and three drill sets), and عَلَامَات التَّرْقِيم, the punctuation marks, closing on the parenthetical clause illustrated from Sūrat al-Wāqiʿah.

1 · الضَّمِير — what a pronoun is #

الضَّمِير (aḍ-ḍamīr), plural الضَّمَائِر — the pronoun; Tamil பிரதிப்பெயர்.

Take a man whose name is Zayd. Instead of using the name, we put something in its place: هُوَ. That is all a ḍamīr is — a word standing where a name would stand.

And it is not restricted to human beings. Take شَجَرَة (shajarah), a tree: since shajarah is feminine, its pronoun is هِيَ.

You met ضَمِير in Lesson 13 as one of the four routes to مَعْرِفة; here the pronoun system itself is taught.

2 · The three kinds of ḍamīr #

Only the first is this lesson's subject. The other two are named so that the map is complete.

مُنْفَصِل — standing alone #

Munfaṣil = one that does not come joined to a noun, a verb or a particle.

Look at how each of them comes: attached to nothing.

مُتَّصِل — joined #

Muttaṣil = joined. Take قَلَم and the pronoun ـي:

The ـي, the ـكَ, the ـهُ — all ḍamīr muttaṣil, coming joined to a noun, a verb or a particle. It comes in the lessons ahead, not this one.

مُسْتَتِر — concealed #

مُسْتَتِر means concealed, hidden — it has hidden itself. This one we cannot see with the eye: we cannot tell whether it came joined or standing alone, because it is not written at all.

3 · The three persons #

Whichever of the three kinds a pronoun is, it also sorts into three persons:

Better to hold the term الضَّمَائِر المُنْفَصِلَة in Arabic than to translate it.

4 · المُتَكَلِّم — two forms, and that is all #

The noun after it changes for dual and plural; the pronoun does not.

5 · المُخَاطَب — five #

Here masculine and feminine do differ in the singular and in the plural:

Count them: five. The two duals being one and the same form, the dual counts once.

6 · الغَائِب — five, the same way #

That is the ضَمِير مُنْفَصِل, whole.

7 · From paradigm to sentence #

It is not enough to learn this as a table. The point is to use it in a sentence — so the exercises follow, and they are about application.

8 · Drill 1 — fill the blank with the fitting pronoun #

The drill sentences below follow the class's reading; read the exact wording from the textbook.

The first three sentences, with their blanks:

(The possessive suffix on بَلَد and شَرِكَة shifts with whichever pronoun is chosen.)

And note شَرِكَتِهِمَا: the ـهِمَا on the end is a ضَمِير مُتَّصِل — joined, and not the business of this lesson.

Sentence 1 — more than one answer fits #

أَنْتَ fits too. But أَنْتِ cannot, and هِيَ cannot — because مُسَافِرٌ is masculine.

Sentence 2 — أَنْتِ, and the force of the فَ #

The فَ is more than Tamil's "so, therefore": it carries at once, immediately — go, and go now. The urgency sits in the particle.

هِيَ would also stand — هِيَ مَرِيضَةٌ — with no grammatical error. Those two, and nothing else.

Sentence 3 — هُمَا, or نَحْنُ #

Both are sound; the suffix changes to match.

9 · Items 4 to 10 — where the rest of the sentence decides #

From here the drill stops having several answers: something else in the sentence settles it. This is the pattern to carry into the exam.

4 · أَنْتُمْ مُدَرِّسُونَ، تَذْهَبُونَ إِلَى المَدْرَسَةِ #

"You are teachers; you go to the school." هُمْ مُدَرِّسُونَ and نَحْنُ مُدَرِّسُونَ each fit on their own — but تَذْهَبُونَ is second person, and that settles it: أَنْتُمْ.

5 · هُمَا مُعَلِّمَتَانِ، أَعْرِفُهُمَا #

"Those two are teachers (f.); I know them both." أَعْرِفُ = "I know"; أَعْرِفُهُمَا = "I know the two of them."

6 · أَنْتُمَا تُسَاعِدَانِ زَوْجَيْكُمَا #

"You two help your two wives." The same reasoning in reverse: ـكُمَا is second-person dual, so أَنْتُمَا is what fits.

7 · أَنْتُنَّ تَدْرُسْنَ فِي هٰذِهِ المَدْرَسَةِ #

"You (f. pl.) study in this school." تَدْرُسْنَ addresses the mukhāṭab, so أَنْتُنَّ. Would هُنَّ do? No — with هُنَّ the verb would be يَدْرُسْنَ.

8 · أَنَا نَائِمٌ فِي غُرْفَتِي #

"I am asleep in my room." نَامَ = to sleep; نَائِم = one who is sleeping.

9 · نَحْنُ …، نَفْحَصُ المَرْضَى #

"We are doctors; we examine the patients." فَحَصَ = to examine, to check over; مَرِيض = a patient, plural here مَرْضَى. The verb نَفْحَصُ is first-person plural, so نَحْنُ must come.

10 · أَنْتِ مَسْؤُولَةٌ عَنْ بَيْتِكِ #

"You are responsible for your house." مَسْؤُولَة = responsible, answerable for something.

10 · Drill 2 — choose one of three offered #

A different shape: three pronouns are offered for each sentence and you pick the one that fits.

سَهِرَ = to stay awake at night — the word from the line already met in this course:

Offered: أَنَا · أَنْتَ · أَنْتُمْ. Only أَنَا fits the verb أُحِبُّ.

تَكَلَّمَ = he spoke; the ـتِ ending gives the feminine addressee.

فَكَّرَ needs a particle before what is thought about — بِـ, as here, or فِي (the classical form, as in يَتَفَكَّرُونَ فِي خَلْقِ السَّمَاوَاتِ). And فَكَّرُوا is masculine plural, so the pronoun is هُمْ.

Feminine plural, so أَنْتُنَّ.

Go over all of these exercises again and again — then the way the pronouns are used stays in the mind properly.

11 · Drill 3 — supply any pronoun that fits #

Same shape again, but now count how many are possible:

عُمَّال is the plural of عَامِل — labourers, workers.

12 · Practice #

• Exercise 4: supply the pronoun proper to the مُتَكَلِّم. There are only two to choose between — أَنَا and نَحْنُ.
• Exercise 5: take what is in the مُخَاطَب and rewrite it in the غَائِب.

Then repeat the drills above.

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13 · A second, separate topic: the Arabic comma #

The second half of the lesson is unrelated to the pronouns.

When we write we use marks — the same ones, used the same way, in Tamil. But look at the comma: in Tamil and English it is written one way; in Arabic it is turned the other way about — ،.

Lesson 1 listed punctuation among the unit's material still to come; it is taught here.

14 · عَلَامَاتُ التَّرْقِيم — the marks, named #

The dots and signs are called عَلَامَاتُ التَّرْقِيم (ʿalāmāt at-tarqīm). Everyone already uses them; the work here is knowing their names and applying them.

15 · The marks applied, sentence by sentence #

Two marks are needed here: the فَاصِلَة inside, and the نُقْطَة to close.

Complete in itself, so it closes with a نُقْطَة.

One of the wonder-constructions already studied — so عَلَامَةُ التَّعَجُّب.

الفَاصِلَة المَنْقُوطَة — the clause that explains #

Where a later clause explains or clarifies what went before it — why did he travel? — the mark is the فَاصِلَة مَنْقُوطَة. The sentence still ends in a نُقْطَة.

النُّقْطَتَانِ, and عَلَامَةُ التَّنْصِيص #

After قَالَ تَعَالَى come two dots — النُّقْطَتَانِ.

نَصّ (naṣṣ) means a text, the wording itself — the same word used of a ḥadīth's naṣṣ. So when we reproduce someone's own words exactly, we put them inside عَلَامَةُ التَّنْصِيص.

Because قَالَ comes, the نُقْطَتَانِ follow it; and the quoted words take عَلَامَةُ التَّنْصِيص.

16 · الجُمْلَة الاعْتِرَاضِيَّة — the parenthetical clause #

Rather than memorising the names, remember that every one of these marks is used in Tamil too.

Now the two dashes — what goes between them is a جُمْلَة اعْتِرَاضِيَّة (jumlah iʿtirāḍiyyah), a parenthetical clause. Say we are speaking about Muhammad; between the dashes we drop in a clause saying who he is — something the listener needs in order to follow, but which is not part of the main sentence.

17 · The construction in the Qurʾān — Sūrat al-Wāqiʿah #

The oath is فَلَا أُقْسِمُ بِمَوَاقِعِ النُّجُومِ; its answer is إِنَّهُ لَقُرْآنٌ كَرِيمٌ. In between comes وَإِنَّهُ لَقَسَمٌ لَوْ تَعْلَمُونَ عَظِيمٌ — a clause that tells the listener how great the oath is, but is not part of the main sentence: take it out and the oath runs straight on to its answer. That is a جُمْلَة اعْتِرَاضِيَّة. Written in our own sentences, it would stand between two dashes.

18 · Sūrat az-Zalzalah — the scene of the Resurrection #

What is being described? The scene of the hereafter — set out so that it comes before the eyes as a picture.

A digression: there is a whole book devoted to just this — مَشَاهِدُ القِيَامَة (Mashāhid al-Qiyāmah), on how the Qurʾān composes its scenes of the Resurrection.

The earth is shaken; وَأَخْرَجَتِ الأَرْضُ أَثْقَالَهَا — it throws out all its burdens; and man says مَا لَهَا, "what is the matter with it?" Then:

بِأَنَّ رَبَّكَ أَوْحَى لَهَا is joined to تُحَدِّثُ — it gives the reason the earth speaks, and answers the question rising in the listener's mind: how can the earth speak?

The scene then goes on:

They come out in separate crowds; whoever did good sees it, and whoever did evil — that too will be made known.

19 · Summary #

Run back over the paradigm — how the مُتَكَلِّم comes, then the غَائِب; the mukhāṭab set of five, the mutakallim set of two. "If you have understood how to use them, that is enough."