Daily Archives: October 21, 2021

How do you understand the Qur’an if you do not know Arabic?

In the beginning, you must know that understanding the Qur’an in Arabic is much better than understanding it without Arabic, because the Qur’an was revealed in Arabic, and there are some Arabic vocabulary that are difficult to translate, and the Arabic language is a very rich language, and Arabic words have many synonyms, and God Almighty may mention a word to express For the intended meaning, and this word sometimes cannot be replaced with its synonym, because it will not express the full meaning intended.

But if you do not have enough time to study Arabic, it is possible to read translated books of the explanation of the Qur’an (Tafseer books), that will be very useful for you.

But learning Arabic is not difficult.

At first, you will need to learn (Alqaidaa annooraniaa), which is a set of important lessons to learn how to correctly pronounce Arabic and Quranic letters and words, then you can start studying Arabic and Tajweed rules, and there are many books dedicated to teaching Arabic to non-native speakers.

You will need a good teacher to teach Arabic Tajweed rules, and to practice the language with him, because learning the language without practicing will not be useful, if you do not practice the language you will forget it very quickly, so it is better to have some friends who speak Arabic, and do not depend on the teacher only, so you can improves Your level quickly.

The teacher who will teach you must take care of all the skills you need to learn Arabic, which are listening skill, speaking skill, reading skill and writing skill.

You must also make sure that the teacher has studied at a university or college specialized in teaching Arabic, it is not enough to be an Arab, because many Arabs speak dialect and cannot speak Standard Arabic as they cannot teach it.

It is best to prepare at the beginning of all your lessons by talking to the teacher and using the words that you learned before, because the practicing and using the words in dialogue will get you better in no time.

You must do all your homeworks, and the teacher must give the student a variety of assignments, covering all language skills.

And if you are serious about learning the language, keep going and don’t stop, because the interruption makes you late and start again, but the continuation will make you learn quickly as soon as possible.

Why do many non-Arab students want to learn Arabic?

Many Muslim and non-Muslim students want to learn and specialize in the Arabic language.

For Muslim students, they love it because it is the language of the Quran (the words of the God), who revealed it to His Messenger through the angel Jibril peace be upon him, and we should use the Arabic language to read the Quran and to pray.

Furthermore the understanding of the Arabic language well makes me a master of understanding the Quran and Sunnah and the understanding of Arabic and Islamic studies, and that will make me able to explain Islam and preaching people to it.

As for non-Muslims, it is also useful for them, because the Arabic language is one of the most widely formal languages ​​in the world. It is spoken by over 467 million people, and therefore it has the fourth place in terms of being the most prevalent languages ​​in the world, and is an formal language of the twenty-seven States, which is the fourth language in terms of the number of users on the Internet, one of the formal languages ​​of the six in the United Nations, and it celebrated in the global day on the eighteenth of December each year, it is also very rich language, It contains more than 12 million words, so the non-Muslims are keen to learn it also so that they can communicate them with many peoples, and to read the Islamic studies that written in Arabic.

But what helped the spread of the Arabic language in such a big way?

The Qur’an helped it. Because those who converted to Islam wanted to learn Arabic so that they can read the Qur’an, in addition to the expansibility of the Islamic conquests led to the Arab spread across the Countries, many of the peoples of those countries learned Arabic language and Islamic studies.

What dialect of Arabic should you learn? Arabic (Eastern), Arabic (Egyptian) or Arabic (Modern Standard)?

Unless you have a specific reason to learn a dialect (ie you have family you want to talk to, you’re going to be living there the rest of your life, etc.) Modern Standard Arabic is the way to go. Almost anything translated for Arabic users is translated into Modern Standard Arabic, and there are more language courses for Modern Standard Arabic than there are for the dialects. Further, Modern Standard Arabic is understood by any educated person in the Middle East, as opposed to dialects which are only really understood locally. Finally, it’s easier to go from Modern Standard Arabic to a dialect as opposed to one dialect to another since most dialects (except maybe Moroccan) end up just being ‘Modern Standard Arabic but this is different.’

In short, Modern Standard Arabic sits in the linguistic center of the Arabic dialects, making it the most flexible option for new learners of Arabic.

Will a non-Muslim have a harder time learning Arabic compared to a Muslim?

No brother, There are many non Muslims who mastered Arabic. So, finding a language hard or easy depends on each individual/motivation.

The only reason that may make it easier for Muslims to learn Arabic is using it in their prayers and also with communicating to a lot of Arab Muslims(reading Quran etc). This is the only advantage I may think of. However, if someone is learning Arabic for becoming a translator or studying politics majoring in the Middle East studies, they won’t really find Arabic that hard.

Note, There are thousands of Arabic words in the Quran that more than 80% of Arabs cannot understand including those who have graduated from universities. To understand Quran, you must have BA in the Islamic studies.

So, it’s all about what motivates you to learn something.