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Arabic Indeclinable Nouns

1. What is an indeclinable noun?
2. Types of the declinable noun (مُعْرَبٌ)
3. Which nouns are غير منصرف ?
4. Exercise

What is an indeclinable noun?

In the lesson, Arabic grammar cases, we discussed three cases of the Arabic language. A noun can be in the nominative case ( حَالَةُ الرَّفْعِ ) , accusative case ( حَالَةُ النَّصْب ) , or genitive case ( حَالَةُ الجَّرِ ) . We have also seen how singular, dual, and plural nouns decline in three cases. The Arabic term for a declinable noun is مُعْرَبٌ .

There are about 2% of Arabic nouns that don't decline. These nouns preserve their original shape in all three cases. In Arabic, these indeclinable nouns are called مَبْنِىٌّ . From the lesson, introduction to Arabic nouns, we know that all types of pronouns (personal, demonstrative, relative, interrogative, possessive) are subdivisions of the Arabic noun.

1. All types of pronouns are indeclinable, e.g. the demonstrative pronoun هٰذَا (this), the relative pronoun اَلَّذِيْ (which), and the personal pronoun هُوَ (he).
2. Nouns with short alif ( ـٰ ), which in Arabic is called اَلفٌ مَقْصُوْرَةٌ , e.g. names of two Prophets, Moses مُوْسٰى (عليه السلام) and Jesus عَيْسٰى (عليه السلام) .
3. Since we are discussing indeclinable nouns, at this point you can easily keep in mind that cardinal numbers from eleven to nineteen remain indeclinable. However, we will discuss numbers in their own lesson.

In the above table, three new words are used. These are in fact plurals of words that we already know.
اَسْمَاءُ is the plural of اِسْم, which means noun or name.
اَلْمَبْنِيِّةُ is the plural of اَلْمَبْنِىُ
ضَمَائِر is the plural form of ضَمِيْر, which means pronoun.

Types of the declinable noun (مُعْرَبٌ)

The declinable noun (مُعْرَبٌ) also has further two types.

1. مُنْصَرِف
2. غَيْرُ مُنْصَرِف

The difference between منصرف and غير منصرف only occurs in singular and broken plural nouns, because the difference lies only in tanween (double vowel).

1. منصرف nouns contain tanween (double vowel). These nouns are triptote, i.e. have three cases.
2. غير منصرف nouns have a single vowel. These nouns are diptote.

منصرف nouns are in majority and we have already discussed in the lesson Arabic grammatical cases.

In the lesson Arabic gender, we came across the name حُزَيْفَةُ .
We don't see tanween dammah ( ـٌ ) on this noun. (Please don't confuse this single vowels with single vowel of definite article ال ).

The noun حُزَيْفَةُ declines as:

We don't see an extra alif ( ا ) in the accusative case because extra alif only comes with tanween dammah ( ـً ). We also see that accusative and genitive declensions are identical, and there is no kasra ( ـِ ) in the genitive case.
Broken plurals that fall under the category of غير منصرف also decline in the same manner.

Which nouns are غير منصرف ?

غير منصرف is the minority group under مُعْرَبٌ. They are easily recognizable and consist of the following categories.

1. Names of women are غير منصرف , e.g.
   عَائِشَةُ ، نَبِيْلَةُ
2. Male names that end in rounded taa or taa marbootah ( ة )
   حُزَيْفَةُ ، عَكْرَمَةُ ، اُسَامَةُ
3. Male names that end in ــ ان
   عِمْرَانُ ، عُثْمَانُ ، سَلْمَانُ
4. Adjectives that end in ــ ان
   عَطْشَانُ thirsty
   تَعْبَانُ tired
   We know that adjective is the sub-category of the Arabic noun. So, any noun that ends in ــ ان is غير منصرف.
5. All non-Arabic human names, whether they are English names or names from any other language
   هَامِلْتَنُ Hamilton
   يُوْرِيُ Yuri
   اِبْلِيْسُ ، فِرْعَوْنُ
6. Names of places, cities, countries
   مَكَّةُ ، لَنْدَنُ
7. Names of all angels
   جِبْرِيْلُ ، مِيْكَالُ ، هَارُوْتُ
8. Names of Prophets, except for six, i.e.
   مُحَمَّدٌ ( صلی الله علیه وسلم ) ، نُوْحٌ ، لُوْطٌ ، هُوْدٌ ، شُعَيْبٌ ، صَالِحٌ ( عليهم السلام )
9. Nouns ending in long alif ( ــَ اءُ )
   The Arabic term for long alif is الف مَمْدُوْدَةٌ
   بَيْضَاءُ white
   سَوْدَاءُ black
   خَضْرَاءُ green
   Some broken plural nouns also end in ــَ اءُ
   فُقَرَاءُ poor (plural)
   عُلَمَاءُ scholars
   جُهَلَاءُ ignorant people
   
10. Nouns that on the pattern of اَفْعَلُ
    These Arabic nouns are equivalent to comparative and superlative degrees of adjectives. Some of these also used as personal names.
    اَكْرَمُ most generous
    اَكْبَرُ biggest
    اَسْوَدُ black
    اَبْيَضُ white
    اَحْمَرُ red
11. Broken plurals on the following three patterns
    مَفَاعِلُ ، فَعَالِيْلُ ، فَوَاعِلُ
    On the pattern مَفَاعِلُ
    مَسَاجِدُ mosques
    مَدَارِسُ schools
    مَذَاهِبُ schools of thought in a religion
    On the pattern فَعَالِيْلُ
    مَفَاتِيْحُ keys
    اَسَاطِيْرُ stories
    On the pattern فَوَاعِل
    حَوَاجُّ needs
    دَوَابُّ living things

Exercise

On a separate paper, write the accusative and genitive cases of the following nouns.

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