Lesson 70 – الدَّرْسُ السَّبْعونَ

The concomitant object - الْمَفْعُول مَـعَـهُ

The conditions of the concomitant object -شُرُوط الْمَفْعُول معه

  • Let's Continue to learn Arabic through our free Arabic language course. This Arabic course contains Arabic grammar, Arabic syntax, Arabic morphology and more.
  • We learnt earlier that the Arabic concomitant object is an accusative dispensable noun that confirms its companionship, after the particle (و /wāw/) of concomitance (meaning with).
  • From the above mentioned definition we can understand the conditions of the Arabic concomitant object as follows

1-   It has to be a dispensable noun: this means that it is not one of the indispensable parts of the verbal sentence (the verb and the doer). Consider the following examples:

Picture

English meaning

Arabic example

Madinaharabic.com lesson image

Muhammad walked along the Nile

سَارَ مُحَمَدٌ وَالنَّيلَ

/sāra Muħammadun wan nīla/

Madinaharabic.com lesson image

Ali woke up at the dawn

اِسْتَيْقَظَ عَلِيٌّ والْفَجْرَ

/istayqađha ξaliyyun wal faĵra/

Madinaharabic.com lesson image

I studied in the light of the lamp

ذَاكَرْتُ وَالمِصْباحَ

/dhākartu wal miŝbāħa/

  • In the above mentioned examples the concomitant objects are as respectively as follows:

Concomitant object

النَّيلَ

الْفَجْرَ

المِصْباحَ

Meaning

The Nile

The dawn

The lamp

  • These above mentioned object are dispensable parts. None of them is a doer of the verb or participates in the action of the verb.
  • If we omit any of the concomitant objects the sentence remains complete verbal sentence, as in the following table:

English meaning

Example

Muhammad walked

سَارَ مُحَمَدٌ

/sāra muħammadun/

Ali woke up

اِسْتَيْقَظَ عَلِيٌّ

/istayqađha ξaliyyun/

I studied

ذَاكَرْتُ

/dhākartu/

  • You may notice that the sentence remains after omitting the concomitant object, because it is dispensable part, while we cannot omit the verb or the doer in the regular situation.

2-   The concomitant object has to be in a verbal sentence: consider the following examples:

Picture

English meaning

Arabic sentence

Madinaharabic.com lesson image

Ali went out at sunrise

خَرَجَ عَلِيٌّ وَشُرُوقَ الشَّمْسِ

/kharĵa ξaliyyun wa shurūqa ash shamsi/

Madinaharabic.com lesson image

Ibrahim played in the rain

لَعِبَ إبراهِيمُ وَالمَطَرَ

/laξiba ibrâhimu wal maŧara/

Madinaharabic.com lesson image

The child slept in the cold

نامَ الطِّفْلُ وَالبَرْدَ

/nāma aŧ ŧiflu wal bardu/

Madinaharabic.com lesson image

I woke up at the call of the dawn

اِسْتَيْقَظْتُ وَأَذَانَ الفَجْرِ

/istayqađhtu wa adhāna al faĵri/

  • We now clearly understand that the concomitant object has to be a part of a verbal sentence. If the noun falling after /wāw/ is not a part of a verbal sentence, it cannot be concomitant object; rather it is coordinated noun which has the same case of the preceding noun, as in the following examples:

Explanation

English meaning

Example

In these two sentence the noun after the /wāw/ is not a concomitant object, it is not accusative noun, rather it is a follower, i.e. it has the same case of the preceding noun

Ahmed and Muhammad are two friends

أحْمَدُ ومُحَمَّدٌ صَديقانِ

/aħmadu wa muħammadun ŝadīqâni/

Summer and winter are two different seasons

الصَّيْفُ والشِّتاءُ فَصْلانِ مُخْتَلِفَانِ

/aŝ ŝayfu wash shitā’u faŝlāni mukhtalifāni/

3-   The concomitant object has to fall after a /wāw/ of concomitance (meaning with).

  • In Arabic there are many types of /wāw/. These different types are to be studied in many lessons. The following table shows some of the types of /wāw/:    

The meaning of the /wāw/

Example

English

Arabic

The /wāw/ is a particle of oath, and the following noun is in the genitive case

(I swear) by Allah, I will not do it again

واللَّهِ لا أَفْعَلُ هَذَا ثَانِيَةً

/wa Allâhi lā afξalu hādhā thāniatan/

The /wāw/ of the status, it precedes a complete sentence. The noun after it is a subject (mubtada’) in the nominative case

The father returns while the children is asleep

يَرْجِعُ الأَبُ والأَوْلادُ نائِمُونَ

/yarĵiξu al abu wal awlādu nā’imuna/

The /wāw/ is a coordination particle, its following noun has the same case of its preceding noun

The teacher and the students went out

خَرَجَ الأُسْتاذُ وَالطُّلابُ

/kharaĵa al ustādhu waŧ ŧulābu/

/wāw/ of concomitance, the noun after it is in the accusative case

I will travel with the sunrise

سَأُسافِرُ وَشُرُوقَ الشَّمْسِ

/sa’usāfiru wa shurūqa ash shamsi/

4-   The concomitant object has to be placed after the verb of the sentence. Therefore we cannot say (والنِّيلَ سارَ مُحَمَّدٌ) because the /wāw/ of concomitance cannot be in the beginning of the sentence (only the /wāw/ of oath, and the /wāw/ of status can be in the beginning of a sentence).