Lesson 69 – الدَّرْسُ التَّاسِعُ والسِّتُّونَ

The Circumstantial object (Adverbs of Time and Place) - الْمَفْعُولُ فِيهِ

Introduction - مُقَدِّمَةٌ

  • This is lesson sixty nine of our free Arabic language course. This Arabic course with images and audios will help you learn Arabic.
  • We learnt earlier that the Arabic objects (الْمَفاعِيل /al mafāξīl) are accusative dispensable parts of the verbal sentence. The objects that we have covered so far are as follows:

1-    The direct object (المَفْعُولُ بِهِ / al mafξūl bihi/) lesson 66.

2-    The absolute object (الْمَفْعُول الْمُطْلَق /al mafξūl al muŧlaq/) lesson 67.

3-    The causal object (الْمَفْعول لأجْلِه /al mafξūl li’aĵlihi/) lesson 68.

  • In this lesson we will study the fourth type of the objects, which is the circumstantial object (المَفْعُول فيهِ) In-Shā’-Allâh (God willing).
  • The circumstantial object (the adverb) is called in Arabic (الظَّرْف /ađħ đharf/) which literally means vessel or container, because it indicates the containing time or place in which the action of the verb occurs. Therefore the most important condition under which the noun is an accusative circumstantial object is that the action must occur in it (as a place or a time). 
  • In this lesson we will learn the following topics:

1-    What the circumstantial object (the adverb) is and what its two types are.

2-    We will also learn the adverb of time as:

Adverb of time

بَعْدَ

قَبْلَ

غَدًا

الْيَوْمَ

English meaning

after

Before

Tomorrow

Today

  • And the adverb of place as:

Adverb of place

خَلْفَ

شَمالَ

تَحْتَ

فَوْقَ

English meaning

Behind

Northerly

Under

Over

  • We will also learn the difference between the limited and the vague noun of place as follows:

Limited noun of place

Vague noun of place

English

Arabic

English

Arabic

The house

البيت

To the right

يمِينا

The university

الجامِعَة

After

بعدَ

  • We will study that some circumstantial objects are declinable, i.e. it can be in the accusative or the genitive case as follows:

Genitive

Accusative

English

Arabic

English

Arabic

I prayed in the mosque

صَلَّيْتُ فِي المَسْجِدِ

Tomorrow

غَدًا

I went to the university

ذَهّبْتُ إلَى الْجامِعَةِ

In the early morning

بُكْرَةً

  • There are other circumstantial objects which are indeclinable, i.e. that do not change according to the position in the sentence as follows:

Indeclinable circumstantial object

Indeclension sign

English

Arabic

Yesterday

أَمْسِ

/kasrah/

Whenever

أَيَّانَ

/fatħah/

Wherever

حَيْثُ

/đammah/