Lesson 62 – الدَّرْسُ الثّانِي والسِّتُّونَ

/kāda/ and its sisters - كَادَ وَأخَوَاتُها

/kāda/ and its sisters – كَادَ وأخَوَاتُها

  • We are still in lesson sixty two of our free Arabic language course. This Arabic course with images and audios will help you learn Arabic.
  • We learnt earlier that /kāda/ and its sisters are divided into three types or groups of verbs. In this part we will study the general characteristics of the three groups.
    1-/kāda/ and its sisters intervene only in nominal sentence, as shown in following examples:

Picture

English

Arabic

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The fire is just about to go out

كَادَتِ النَّارُ أنْ تَنْطَفِئَ

/kādat annāru an tanŧafi’a/

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It is hoped (I hope) that the student succeeds

عَسَى الطَّالِبُ أَنْ يَنْجَحَ

/ξasā aŧ ŧâlibu an yanĵaħa/

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The workers stated to dig

بَدَأَ العُمَّالُ يَحْفُرُونَ

/bada’a al ξummālu yaħfurūna/

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The house is just about to fall down

أَوْشَكَ البَيْتُ أَنْ يَسْقُطَ

/awshaka al baytu an yasquŧa/

  • All these verbs as you may notice start the nominal sentence. If you see any of them falling before a verb, be sure that it is a verbal predicate of nominal sentence which has the subject latent as follows:

English meaning

Supposed latent pronoun

Arabic example

He started talking

بَدَأَ (هُو) يَتَكَلَّمُ

بَدَأَ يتَكَلَّمُ

/bada’a yatakallamu/

2-The verbs in the above mentioned table are annuller verbs (أفْعَال نَاسِخَة). These verbs come only with nominal sentence. We studied the nominal sentence in lesson (58), and here we remind you with a summary of the nominal sentence (for revision purpose).

The nominal sentence consists of two important parts, the subject (المُبْتَدَأ /al mubtada’/) and the predicate (الْخَبَر /al khabar/).

The predicate can be one of three types as shown in the following table (please read from right to left):

Picture

Its type

The predicate

English meaning

Arabic example

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isolated

بَارِدٌ

/bāridun/

The weather is cold

الجَوُّ بَارِدٌ

/al ĵawwu bāridun/

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Quasi-sentence (phrase)

عَلَى المَكْتَبَ

/ξala al maktabi/

The book is on the desk

الكِتَابُ عَلَى المَكْتَبِ

/al kitābu ξala al maktabi/

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Verbal sentence

حَضَرَ

/ħađara/

Ahmed has come

أَحْمَدُ حَضَرَ

/aħmadu ħađara/

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Nominal sentence

بَيْتُهُ جَمِيلٌ

/baytuhu ĵamīlun/

 

Ahmed his house is beautiful

أَحْمَدُ بَيْتُهُ جَمِيلٌ

/aħmadu baytuhu ĵamīlun/

  • We also learnt in the previous lesson that the predicate of the annuller verbs (/kāna/ and its sisters) can be one of the above mentioned types.
    But here with /kāda/ and its sisters the matter is different, i.e. the predicate always with /kāda/ and its sisters is a verbal sentence. This is evident in the examples shown below (these examples are also mentioned above):

English

Arabic

The fire is just about to go out

كَادَتِ النَّارُ أنْ تَنْطَفِئَ

/kādat annāru an tanŧafi’a/

It is hoped (I hope) that the student succeeds

عَسَى الطَّالِبُ أَنْ يَنْجَحَ

/ξasā aŧ ŧâlibu an yanĵaħa/

The workers stated to dig

بَدَأَ العُمَّالُ يَحْفُرُونَ

/bada’a al ξummālu yaħfurūna/

The house is just about to fall down

أَوْشَكَ البَيْتُ أَنْ يَسْقُطَ

/awshaka al baytu an yasquŧa/

  • You may notice that the predicate in these examples is always a verbal sentence which is, respectively, as follows: (please read from right to left)

أَنْ يَسْقُطَ

يَحْفُرُونَ

أَنْ يَنْجَحَ

أنْ تَنْطَفِئَ

Predicate

To fall down

Dig

To succeed

To go out

meaning

  • We now clearly understand that /kāda/ and its sisters are annuller verbs, so they change the nominal sentence as follows:
    1-They add their meaning to the subject and the predicate.
    2-They change the name of the subject into the noun of /kāda/ or its sisters. And the predicate (the verbal predicate sentence) is changed to be the predicate of /kāda/ or its sisters.
    3-They have a non- evident effect on the declension, as we will study later in this lesson In-Shā’-Allâh (God willing).
  • Here is a list of the annuller verbs /kāda/ and its sisters (كادَ وَأخَوَاتُها /kāda wa akhawātuha/):

Meaning

Verb

Meaning

Verb

To set to do, or to set about to do something

جَعَلَ

/ĵaξala/

To be (just) about to

كَادَ

/kāda/

أَخَذَ

/akhadha/

كَرُبَ

/karuba/

طَفِقَ

/ŧafiqa/

أَوْشَكَ

/awshaka/

شَرَعَ

Sharaξa

It is hoped that (I hope that)

عَسَى

/ξasā/

أَنْشَأَ

/ansha’a/

حَرَى

/ħarâ/

بَدَأ

/bada’a/

اِخْلَوْلَقَ

/ikhlawlaqa/