9 replies to this topic

[AbuMuslimKhorasani]

بسم الله الرحمن الرحیم
اسلام علیکم


GATEWAY TO ARABIC - BOOK 1  | Audio CD

GATEWAY TO ARABIC - BOOK 2  | Audio CD

GATEWAY TO ARABIC BOOK 3

See more list of useful books for learning Arabic here.

[lotfilms]

JazakaLlahu Khayran brother AbuMuslim.  This is a great series.

Out of curiosity, how did the people in non-Arab areas like Khorasan increase their Arabic vocabulary to be able to understand the Quran and Sunnah back in the day?

That has always fascinated me and figuring out how that did that would probably help a lot of our brothers and sisters now-a-days increase their vocabularly

Any idea?

Edited by lotfilms, 01 September 2011 - 10:20 PM.

[AbuMuslimKhorasani]

wa iyyak.

Well brother, the Persians and other non-arab Muslims would travel to far lands (i.e. Iraq, Syria, Egypt, Hejaz) in pursuit of knowledge. There are many examples i.e. Imam Muslim, Imam Bukhari, Imam Abu Daud, Imam Tirmizi (may Allah have mercy on them) etc. Moreover, Arabic was also an official language in the Muslim lands.

See this interesting article: The Story of Sibawayh the Persian: The Imam of Arabic grammar!

[lotfilms]

subhanAllahh, reminds me of this hadith:
Abu Huraira reported: We were sitting in the company of Allah's Apostle (may peace be upon him) that Sura al-Jumu'a was revealed to him and when he recited (these words):" Others from amongst them who have not yet joined them," a person amongst them (those who were sitting there) said: Allah's Messenger! But Allah's Apostle (may peace be upon him) made no reply, until he questioned him once, twice or thrice. And there was amongst us Salman the Persian. The Apostle of Allah (may peace be upon him) placed his hand on salman and then said: Even if faith were near the Pleiades, a man from amongst these would surely find it.  (Sahih Muslim Book #031, Hadith #6178)


and mamnoon baradar barakaLlahu feek that was such an inspiring article masha'Allah

Imagine, Imam al-Sibaweh was at a level where he could say:
لأطلبنّ علما لا يُنازعني فيه أحد

in a normal conversation like that yet he he made such an acceptable mistake (acceptable as in you can completely understand why he said أبو and not أبا) yet that gave him such a push so that he would never make such a mistake again.

That's the difference between the real scholars of Islam and laypeople


(side note: it's rather sad how much the standard of Arabic has plummeted over the last couple of centuries in spoken conversation.  It's up to us 'Ajam to revive it)

Edited by lotfilms, 02 September 2011 - 12:21 AM.

[Ebn Hussein]

are u persian lotfilms?

Something to add: People in Khorasan (like in Nishabour, city of Imam Muslim, still located in Iran), Rai (old name for Teh ran), Isfahan, Shiraz etc. knew Arabic better than some arabs back then .Almost all major Persian scientists wrote their masterpieces in arabic first, among them poets, scientists, and scholars of Islam. It is reported that Imam Al Bukhari (Persian speaker who lived in the part of Khorasan/Persia what is known today as "uzbekistan") mostly used to held conversations in arabic. So in Sunni Persia Arabic was to Persians (educated ones) what french is today for north africans and English is today for Indians.

[lotfilms]

Faylaq Omar, on 02 September 2011 - 07:50 PM, said:

are u persian lotfilms?

Something to add: People in Khorasan (like in Nishabour, city of Imam Muslim, still located in Iran), Rai (old name for Teh ran), Isfahan, Shiraz etc. knew Arabic better than some arabs back then .Almost all major Persian scientists wrote their masterpieces in arabic first, among them poets, scientists, and scholars of Islam. It is reported that Imam Al Bukhari (Persian speaker who lived in the part of Khorasan/Persia what is known today as "uzbekistan") mostly used to held conversations in arabic. So in Sunni Persia Arabic was to Persians (educated ones) what french is today for north africans and English is today for Indians.

i am Kurdish/Iraqi.  i think we have some Persian in our bloodline going a little back though.  

And i believe that.  In my area, among the people i know, two of the most knowledgeable people in Arabic language that i know of personally are non-Arabs.  One is Kurdish and another is from somewhere in Africa.

In some ways, the non-Arabs have a slight advantage (especially now-a-days) because:
1) They have to learn the language from scratch, and this gives them a unique perspective into the language.
2) They're not forced to speak colloquial Arabic all day, every day like Arabs who are living in Arabic countries have to do

#2 especially makes a huge difference.  i know a Lebanese brother who lives here who is trying to improve his Arabic, but is so frustrated because whenever he tries to practice his Fusha with his fellow Lebanese, they give him strange looks so he has to dumb down his Fusha a little so it's not so awkward when he wants to speak in Arabic with them.

On the other hand, there's some Black brothers around here who are learning Arabic so when we want to practice our Arabic, we basically speak amongst each other in Fusha to the best of our ability.  

But either way, alhamdulillah we have such a long history of non-Arabs who have learned the Arabic language and have learned it well, so there's no excuse for any of us not to learn it.  Especially now-a-days with all of these resources available for free at our fingertips.

And thanks again to AbuMuslimKhorasani for these links

Edited by lotfilms, 02 September 2011 - 09:29 PM.

[vigilare]

AbuMuslimKhorasani, on 01 September 2011 - 09:52 PM, said:

بسم الله الرحمن الرحیم
اسلام علیکم


GATEWAY TO ARABIC - BOOK 1  | Audio CD

GATEWAY TO ARABIC - BOOK 2  | Audio CD

GATEWAY TO ARABIC BOOK 3

See more list of useful books for learning Arabic here.

Not sure how I missed this but I came back on the forum just to say   for this.  I've made a lot of progress recently with Arabic, but even still, I think these are a very good resource.  

lotfilms, on 01 September 2011 - 10:19 PM, said:

JazakaLlahu Khayran brother AbuMuslim.  This is a great series.

Out of curiosity, how did the people in non-Arab areas like Khorasan increase their Arabic vocabulary to be able to understand the Quran and Sunnah back in the day?

That has always fascinated me and figuring out how that did that would probably help a lot of our brothers and sisters now-a-days increase their vocabularly

Any idea?

In Albert Hourani's book, the Arab Peoples, he mentions that as Islam spread, the language spread with it.  Muslims spent a lot of time learning and teaching Arabic and it became the language of the Islamic land. The beauty of it is that for a period of time, the entire Muslim world spoke Arabic and people were motivated and passionate about learning it - and there were so many students of knowledge precisely because they could access and understand Islamic knowledge.

In our day, I think (my opinion only) is that many people have become lazy in learning Arabic because many things are translated and we have it all at our fingertips so there's no point to seriously consider it. The biggest misfortune of that is people don't - or aren't - able to read and understand the Quran.

[Servant-of-Sahaba]

Brother

nowadays I need this

[AbuMuslimKhorasani]

vigilare, on 15 June 2012 - 09:48 AM, said:

Not sure how I missed this but I came back on the forum just to say   for this.  I've made a lot of progress recently with Arabic, but even still, I think these are a very good resource.  

Walaikum Salam,

wa iyyak

Indeed, these books are very helpful.

Check this link - I am sure you will find it useful: Understand Quran Academy.

Edited by AbuMuslimKhorasani, 15 June 2012 - 01:57 PM.

[Hani]

Awww it's so cute this book, with animal names and all  = D