Surah Fatiha (lesson 5)

بسم الله الراحمن الراحيم

 

Last part of Surah Fatiha is a dua which starts with the word "ihdena" meaning "hidayat day humain". The "Na" means "We/Us" as previously discussed in نعبر  (Na'budu) and نستعين (Nasta'een).

The first part of the word اهر (ihde) belongs to the root ه ر ى (ha da ya) which is simple Urdu meaning hidayat هرايت. Notice the same root in هرايت. Strictly speaking Arabic root HaDaYa means نمایاں. Jo keh door say nazar aye and gives you direction from far away.

Example 1: هاربة Hadiya - meaning pani main ubhri howee chattaan jo door say nazar aye. Sailors used to find their way by the help of Hadiyas.

Example 2: هرية Hadya - meaning a return gift which is given in advance of the original gift.

Example 3: هادي Haadi - the front part of anything which can be seen from far away. Urdu main we call this حد the border...  the front part of a country.

Haadi hence is also used in the sense of راه نما Rah Numa or Raah ko numayan karnay wala. The same function which Hadiya is doing for Sailors / Travellers trying to reach their destination. So when we say اهرنا before the start of the Qur'an, we mean to get hidayat / Rah Numaee from it. The Qur'an calls itself
هرى للمتقين
Huda-lil-muttaqeen immediately after Surah Fatiha.

رب ذدنى علما
Rabbe Zidnee ilma

Surah Fatiha (lesson 4)

بسم الله الراحمن الراحيم

In the second part of Surah Fatiha we make two promises to Allah.
إياك (Iyyaka)
When a KA (kaaf zabar) is attached at the end of a word it means "You". So إياك (Iyyaka) holistically means "Only You". When KUM كم is attached after a word it means "You All"
Example:
إسلام عليك (alaika)
إسلام عليكم alaikum) a)
Peace be upon you (singular)
Peace be upon you all (plural)

Next word is نعبر  (na'budu). It belongs to the Arabic root عبر  (aa' baa daa) which means "Worship". The rule is whenever theres a ن (noon) before a word it means "We do". So   نعبر  (na'budu) means
"We worship". The root  عبر  (aa' baa daa) is also simple urdu when used as عبارت. Both are also Arabic words meaning: Worship
عبر verb
عبارت noun
عبار (Ibaad) Ibadat karnay Walla.
As we saw on the third day
حمر حمار
Jaisay Hamd say Hamid banaya thaa waisay Abd say Aabid bana saktay hain. Jaisay hamd say Hameed banaya thaa waisay Abd say Abeed bana saktay hain.
حمير jiss ki Hamd ki jaye
عبير jiss ki ibadat ki jaye
نحمر (nahmado)
Humne Hamd ki
نعبر (na'budu)
Humne ibadat ki
Ya hum ibadat karta hon

Next word is نستعين (nasta'een) which means  "We ask for help". The Noon ن in the beginning of the word means "We". Ta'een تعين belongs to the Arabic root ع و ن (aa wa na) which means "help". We use this root in Urdu in many ways and forms. For example: تعاون Ta'wwun meaning "help". (Try identifying the root in each word)
Mu'awanat معاونت "Help" (noun)
Mu'awin معاون Helper
Moeen معين Helper
Wow و is a weaker part of root and dissappears in some words. Whenever there's a و wow in a root expect it to disappear in some word forms which is exactly why it is called Weak root.

Lets revise the 3 words. We have made two promises to Allah.
إياك نعبر
إياك نستعين
You-only (do) we-worship
You-only (do) we-seek-help (from)

This ends the second part of سورة فاتح

رب ذدنى علما
Rabbe Zidnee ilma

Surah Fatiha (lesson 3)

Today's word is Malik-e-Youm-id-Din. Three words. All of them are simple Urdu.
Malik is owner
Youm is Day
Din is Religion.
Literally it means
"Owner(of the) Day (of) Religion"
Figuratively it means
"Owner of the Day Of Judgement" (Qiyamat).

Surah Fatiha has three parts. In the first part Allah is described.
1. Alhamdolillah
2. Rab-al-Aalamin
3. Malik-e-Youm-idDeen
Today we have finished the  first part.
In the second part we make promises to Allah.
In the third part we make dua.
Rabbe Zidnee Ilma.

Surah Fatiha (lesson 2)

Today's word is Rabul Alamin. Both words are simple Urdu again. Rab and Aalamin. Rab means sustainer (Paalnay wala). Aalameen is plural of Aalam meaning World and AL in Rab-AL-Aalamin means THE, which we have already seen previously. Hence Rab-AL-Aalamin means "Sustainer (of all) The Worlds"

Question: Where did 'of all' come from ?
Answer: I mentioned before that there's no OF in Arabic. There are no conjunctions in Arabic. It's a very efficient language in that way. AL (alif laam) means THE. In the sense of "All Of The". For example Al-Hamd would mean "Sab Tareefain". It is used in exhaustive sense. It means "jitnee bhi tareefain hain woh siraf aur siraf Allah kay leeyay hain. Kissi aur ki tareef nahin kee jaa saktee". Which is why hum jab bhi kissi ki tareef kartay hain we should say Mashallah. Otherwise Allah naraz ho jatay hain aur uss say who cheez cheen laitay hain. Similarly Al-Alamin means all of the worlds exhaustively.

Today we'll look at two most powerful Arabic words: Ar-Rahman & Ar-Raheem. Both are Allah's names. The Qur'an refers to Allah with 99 different names, each name refers to one of His attribute / quality. Since Allah has used them to describe himself nobody is sure exactly what they mean. But many scholars give different opinions about their meaning. 
Both these names belong to the root "Ra Ha Ma" (Ray Hay Meem) which directly translates into Urdu as Reham meaning "Mercy".
So although both Rehman and Raheem mean "Merciful"..  we're not sure about the fine difference between them. 
One scholar which appealed to me most thinks that one means "limitlessly merciful (in amount of mercy) " and the other means "continuously Merciful (unlimited in time and frequency)".
While requesting for forgiveness in dua call Him by the name of Ya-Rahman Ya- Raheem. 

Don't forget to say dua for yourself after every session. Rabbe Zidnee Ilma

Surah Fatiha (Lesson 1)

I'll start with Surah Fatiha because that is the opening of the Qur'an and also because we recite this in every rakaat. As we learn, try to feel the meaning of each word in Namaz.Iss say revision bhi hotee rahay gee aur namaz main jaan bhi aye gee. Today we'll see the meaning of Alhamdolillah.

AL-hamd-le-Allah

It constitutes of two words Hamd and Allah. Both are Urdu words. Hamd belongs to the root Ha Ma Da (hay meem daal). Other words belonging to the same root are Hamid Hammad Hameed. Notice all three have the same root Ha Ma Da. Hence the meaning would also be similar. With practice you should learn to extract the root from every Arabic word. Once you can identify the root, you will be able to know the meaning. Every Arabic word belongs to a root. A root is a three letter combination with a generic meaning. Many words are derived from a single root. Generic meaning of all of them would be same. Specific meaning would be a little different from each other. This is the secret of knowing the Arabic language. For example the root HaMaDa (hay meem daal) means "praise". Hamid means "Hamd karnay wala". Hammad means "bohat Hamd karnay wala". Hameed means "jiss ki Hamd ki gayee ho". Same grammar rule would apply on all words and roots. Like we made Hamid from HaMaDa. We can similarly make Rashid from RaShaDa (Ray Sheen Daal). Root RaShaDa means  "hidayat"..  hence Rashid means "hidayat paanay wala". We'll talk more about the rules governing roots and how to make words from them. InshaAllah.

There are two grammar rules in AL-hamd-Le-Allah. Whenever there's AL (Alif Laam) attached before a word it litetally means "The". Figuratively here it is meaning "(All of) The". Second grammar rule in AL-hamd-Le-Allah is the use of letter Le (Laam) when attached before a word simply means "For" (sense of belonging).

Rabbe Zidnee Ilma.

Ae Rab mujhe zyada ilm dei.

Amin.

Bismillah (lesson 2)

So lets begin the lesson 2 with a question that was posed to Humbal.

Question:

Normally when we read Bismillah in english its "In the name of Allah ....". You said Bay means "With". So does this mean that "in" and "with" have the sames meaning/use in Arabic?

Answer:
Every language has its own way of saying things.In English we start a task IN the name of Allah. In Urdu hum Allah Kay naam SAY (from) shuru kartay hain. Naam Kay ander (in) say nahin hai. Similarly in Arabic hum Allah kay naam kay saath (with) shuru kartay hain. I will be focusing on literal meaning of words. Leaving everybody to deduce the figurative meaning themselves. And that is when the Qur'an starts speaking with every individual.

Lesson 2:

In lesson 1 of Bismillah we learned one Arabic word and one grammatical rule.  The Arabic word we learned was ISM meaning "name". The Grammatical rule we learned was the use of Arabic letter BAY when attached before another word would mean "With".

Today we'll look at two most powerful Arabic words: Ar-Rahman & Ar-Raheem. Both are Allah's names. The Qur'an refers to Allah with 99 different names, each name refers to one of His attribute / quality. Since Allah has used them to describe himself nobody is sure exactly what they mean. But many scholars give different opinions about their meaning.
Both these names belong to the root "Ra Ha Ma" (Ray Hay Meem) which directly translates into Urdu as Reham meaning "Mercy".
So although both Rehman and Raheem mean "Merciful"..  we're not sure about the fine difference between them.
One scholar which appealed to me most thinks that one means "limitlessly merciful (in amount of mercy) " and the other means "continuously Merciful (unlimited in time and frequency)".
While requesting for forgiveness in dua call Him by the name of Ya-Rahman Ya- Raheem. 

Rabbe zidni ilma
My Lord! Increase me in knowledge.
 Amin.

Bismillah (lesson 1)

Today's word is Bismillah. This is all simple Urdu. It consists of three words:

Ba-Ism-Allah

In Arabic grammar whenever you put the letter BAY before a word it means "With".

As in Urdu we say:
"ba maa' Ahl O Ayyaal" meaning "With Family"

ISM is also an Urdu word meaning Noun. Bachpan main Ism ki iqsaam parhtay thay Urdu mai. In Arabic it means "name". Arabic people used to have long names. We only have first name and family name but the Arabs have Ism, Laqab, Nasab, Nisbah and Dynasty. Out of these ISM is the personal name. The name most closest to you.

So Be-ISM-Allah literally means "with Name (of) Allah"

Notice there's no arabic word for "OF". Arabic being a very efficient language, unlike Urdu and English, conveys meaning beautifully without redundant use of words. Even letters have meaning. Like the use of letter BAY we saw today.

Rabbe zidni ilma
My Lord! Increase me in knowledge.


Amin.