Lesson 12: ‫كان‬, ‫قال‬, ‫ل ّما‬, ‫ك‬
‫كان‬
The verb
َ‫كان‬
tells us something about time- it doesn’t tell us anything by itself, as it
does not have any action indicated in itself alone, unlike other verbs which do give
you an action plus a time. (eg: he sat = the action of sitting done in the past) For this reason, it has
been labelled by the majority of linguists as a “defective verb” ‫) فعل ناقص‬
How it is used, is to transform the predicate of a nominal sentence into the past tense. It does not
have any effect on the meaning of the subject nor does it affect the subject’s case.
َ‫ كان‬must come before the subject and the predicate.
َ‫السارقَ مريضا‬
َ‫كان‬
ِ
َ‫ق مريض‬
َ ‫السار‬
ِ
The thief was sick
(the x was y)
When َ‫ كان‬is used, the subject of the nominal
sentence is known as the subject of َ‫ َكان‬or
َ‫ اسم كان‬and will be in the nominative case
‫مرفوع‬
The use of
The thief is sick
(the x is y)
When َ‫ كان‬is used,the predicate will be known
as the predicate of َ‫ كان‬or Khabr kaana, and
will be in the accusative case
‫منصوب‬
َ‫ كان‬with a prepositional phrase and indefinite subject
Occasionally,
َ‫ كان‬is not used with the nominal sentence (subject and predicate, as shown above)
but with a prepositional phrase and indefinite subject construction:
Subject
prepositional phrase
َ‫ّللاِ أسْوةَ حسنة‬
ََ ‫ل‬
َِ ‫لَق َْد كانَ لك ْمَ فِي رسو‬
There was for you, in the Messenger of Allah, an excellent example.
We learnt that when َ‫ كان‬is used in a nominal sentence construction, it causes the case of the
predicate to be
‫ منصوب‬however, when the predicate is a prepositional phrase, the use of َ‫كان‬
will not have any grammatical effect on the case of the predicate, however it does still render its
meaning into the past tense “was”.
[this is because of the previously learnt rule, that tells us, that which has strength to alter
grammatical case to a word, will take precedence if it’s the closest to that word – therefore here in
this example shown, we can see that ‫ فِي‬is closer than َ‫ كان‬to ‫ّللا‬
ََِ ‫ل‬
َِ ‫ رسو‬thus over-riding the
َ
‫ منصوب‬effect of َ‫ كان‬and keeping it ٌ‫( َم ْج ُرور‬prepositions render the noun which follows ٌ‫]) َم ْج ُرور‬
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Root letters
It is important to understand, that alif is never a root letter. Whenever alif appears in a “root” it was
originally in fact either a waw or a yaa.
To determine whether the alif was originally a waw or a yaa, you need to look at the verb in the
imperfect tense.
Taking the word َ‫ كان‬we can see it has an alif. We want to know if this alif was a waw or a yaa?
‫? و‬
‫ي‬
‫كا ن‬
To know the origin, we must look at it in the imperfect tense, and can see it was a waw!
َ‫يكون‬
Conjugation
Alif( along with all long vowels), has a sukoon. Therefore when conjugating such words that have
the presence of alif, waw or yaa, certain measures have to be taken to ensure that two sukoons
will not end up together (as we know that you can not have 2 sukoons in succession – this is
called
َ‫ – اِلتِقاءَ السا ِكني ِن‬the meeting of the 2 sukoons)
For example, if we want to say “you (2MS) were”, then we must put the verb
‫َكان‬into the pattern
َ‫( فع ْلت‬see verb conjugations lesson 8)
‫كان‬
I want to put into this pattern
َ‫فع ْلت‬
‫كاْ ْنت‬
When put into the conjugation pattern, we find 2 sukoons together! And we can
not have that!
To solve this problem we need to remove the weak letter alif-
‫ُك ْنت‬
As a tribute to the now ‘dead’ alif,
look at what it originally was
(whether waw or yaa’) and place a
corresponding vowel in its
Place
(if
‫ ي‬-kasra, ‫َو‬- dammah)
‫ك ْنت‬
Remove the alif
completely. Now you only
have one sukoon
‫كاْ ْنت‬
Take the word as it appears to be
once you have put the basic form
into the desired pattern
(put the sukoon on alif even
thought the pattern fa’alta has a
fathah – remember that alif can
only take sukoon!)
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Singular
Plural
3M
َ‫كان‬
ْ ‫كان‬
َ‫وا‬
3F
ْ ‫كان‬
َ‫ت‬
َ‫ك َن‬
2M
َ‫ك ْنت‬
َ‫ك ْنت ْم‬
2F
َ‫ت‬
ِ ‫ك ْن‬
َ ‫ك ْن‬
َ‫تن‬
1
َ‫ك ْنت‬
‫كنَا‬
*note: When conjugating, if we have 2 letters that are the same, the first of which has sukoon, then
you will assimilate the 2 letters together, therefore remove the first with sukoon, and replace with a
shaddah.
The Pluperfect: “had” / used to
Sometimes the verb ‫ كان‬can be used to convey the meaning of the pluperfect; the past of the
past. It is used in this way when followed by another verb, and can manifest in one of three ways:
+‫َكان‬
Followed by an
imperfect verb
Followed by a
Perfect verb
Translate as “used to”
Translate as “had”
Commonly appears in the
Qur’an
Appears infrequently in the
Qur’an
‫ارعونَ فِي‬
ِ ‫كانَوا يس‬
ْ
َِ ‫الخيْرا‬
‫ت‬
Followed by a
perfect verb +
َ‫ق ْد‬
Doesn’t appear in the
Qur’an
(is used to emphasise the
verb: ie, surely, verily,
indeed etc.- do not need to
translate in homework)
They used to race in good
deeds
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Note:
Although the basic meaning of ‫ كان‬is “he was”, it is frequently used in the Qur’an to mean the
present “he is”. This is when referring to Allah.
Ie:
َ‫كانَ ّللاَ غفوراَ رحيما‬
Allah is the forgiving and compassionate
However, this only applies to ‫ كان‬in the perfect, not ُ‫ يكون‬in the imperfect, which means ‘he will be’
in the future.
‫قال‬
َ‫ قال‬means “to say” or “to speak” and is used to introduce direct speech.
Its perfect tense can be conjugated in the same way as
َ‫كان‬
Singular
Plural
3M
َ‫قال‬
ْ ‫ق‬
َ‫الوا‬
3F
ْ ‫قال‬
َ‫ت‬
َ ‫ق ْل‬
‫ن‬
2M
َ‫ق ْلت‬
َ‫ق ْلت ْم‬
2F
َ‫ت‬
ِ ‫ق ْل‬
َ‫ق ْلت َن‬
1
َ‫ق ْلت‬
‫ق ْلنا‬
*note: 3M singular and plural do not loose the weak letter alif – this is because when 3M is conjugated, it does not
produce the problem of 2 sukoons together.
‫ل ّما‬
‫ ل ّما‬means “when” or “after”. It is a conjunction (a word that joins two clauses in a
sentence). It is used in a sentence with two perfect verbs
‫الفعل الماضي‬
The verb which comes right after the ّ‫لما‬
َ will have happened earlier in time to the second verb
mentioned. It does not effect case, and must be placed at the beginning of the sentence or clause.
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Verb 2 (action B)
Verb 1 (action A)
َ‫ل َما س ِمعْنا الهدى ءامنّا ِب ِه‬
Verb 1 occurs before verb 2
When we heard the guidance, we believed in it
‫ ل ّما‬must come before action A, and action A must come before action B
‫ك‬
َ‫ ك‬is a preposition which is prefixed to the front of a noun. It means “like” as in
“this is like that” (not as ink “I like apples”.)
As with all prepositions, the word which follows it will become majroor.
َ‫جال‬
ِ َ‫ما ال ِنساءَ كالر‬
Women are not like men
(note: although the Arabic may be written with the definite article, in English it is not always
nesserssary to translate the “deffitness” if it makes sense to translate without, because in English
we do not always use “the……..” – read in English, and think does the translation make sense to
give the meaning intended)
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