Madinah Book 1 Lesson 3: the article ال, sun and moon letters
What Madinah Book 1 lesson 3 teaches
Madinah Book 1 lesson 3 opens with the heading النَّكِرَةُ وَالْمَعْرِفَةُ: the indefinite noun (“a house”) and the definite noun (“the house”). It teaches the article ال, what it does to the tanwin, and how to pronounce it depending on the letter that follows: this is where the sun and moon letters come in. It also introduces 24 adjectives, and with them a new kind of sentence: “the house is new.”
Lessons 1 and 2 pointed at things with هَذَا and ذَلِكَ. Here you describe them. Each section below follows one page of the book, in order.
ال: “the,” joined to the noun
ال is a small word joined to the front of a noun. It makes the noun definite, like “the” in English: بَيْتٌ means “a house,” الْبَيْتُ means “the house.”
When ال is added, the tanwin drops. The noun keeps a single vowel, here the damma, instead of the doubled one. A noun never has ال and the tanwin together: it is one or the other.
بَيْتٌ ← الْبَيْتُ
a house → the house
قَلَمٌ ← الْقَلَمُ
a pen → the pen
كِتَابٌ ← الْكِتَابُ
a book → the book
جَمَلٌ ← الْجَمَلُ
a camel → the camel
These are the four examples the book starts with. In each pair, the first word ends in the doubled vowel (the tanwin) and the second in a single vowel.
Moon letters: the lam is pronounced
The book calls this case اللَّامُ الْقَمَرِيَّةُ, the moon lam. Before these letters, the lam of ال is pronounced and carries a sukun (the mark for “no vowel”): الْ.
أ ب ج ح خ ع غ ف ق ك م و ه ي
the 14 moon letters
الْكِتَابُ
the book: the lam is pronounced
الْقَمَرُ
the moon
They are called moon letters: الْقَمَرُ (the moon), a word from this lesson, is one of them. Most lesson 1 nouns fall in this group: الْبَابُ, الْمَسْجِدُ, الْقَمِيصُ, الْحِمَارُ.
Sun letters: the lam goes silent, the letter doubles
The second case, اللَّامُ الشَّمْسِيَّةُ, is the sun lam. Before these letters, the lam is silent and carries no sukun. Instead, the next letter is doubled: it takes a shadda (the doubling mark).
ت ث د ذ ر ز س ش ص ض ط ظ ل ن
the 14 sun letters
نَجْمٌ ← النَّجْمُ
a star → the star
رَجُلٌ ← الرَّجُلُ
a man → the man
دِيكٌ ← الدِّيكُ
a rooster → the rooster
طَالِبٌ ← الطَّالِبُ
a student → the student
Look closely at the four forms with ال: no sukun on the lam, a shadda on the next letter. ل itself is a sun letter, which is why اللَّبَنُ (the milk) has a shadda.
To know which group a noun belongs to, look only at its first letter, the one right after ال.
“The house is new”: the noun with ال, then the adjective
Adjectives bring a new kind of sentence, which we sum up as “the house is new.” You put the noun with ال, then the word that describes it, with the tanwin. As in lessons 1 and 2, there is no verb “to be”: الْبَيْتُ جَدِيدٌ means “the house is new.” The book’s sentences follow this pattern:
الْقَلَمُ مَكْسُورٌ
The pen is broken.
الْبَابُ مَفْتُوحٌ
The door is open.
الْكِتَابُ جَدِيدٌ وَالْقَلَمُ قَدِيمٌ
The book is new and the pen is old.
الْبَيْتُ قَرِيبٌ وَالْمَسْجِدُ بَعِيدٌ
The house is near and the mosque is far.
السُّكَّرُ حُلْوٌ
The sugar is sweet.
التَّاجِرُ غَنِيٌّ
The merchant is rich.
The rule of thumb: the first word takes ال, and the second keeps its tanwin.
الْمَرِيضُ: when the adjective becomes a person
With ال, an adjective can name a person. مَرِيضٌ means “sick,” and الْمَرِيضُ means “the sick man.” The book uses it in the last sentence of the sun-lam list: الْمَرِيضُ قَصِيرٌ, “the sick man is short.” Do not mix it up with الطَّالِبُ مَرِيضٌ, “the student is sick,” where مَرِيضٌ describes the student.
Lesson 3 vocabulary
Most of the 24 adjectives come in pairs of opposites, which makes them easier to remember:
- جَدِيدٌ (new) / قَدِيمٌ (old)
- صَغِيرٌ (small) / كَبِيرٌ (big)
- طَوِيلٌ (tall, long) / قَصِيرٌ (short)
- نَظِيفٌ (clean) / وَسِخٌ (dirty)
- بَارِدٌ (cold) / حَارٌّ (hot)
- ثَقِيلٌ (heavy) / خَفِيفٌ (light)
- قَرِيبٌ (near) / بَعِيدٌ (far)
- جَالِسٌ (sitting) / وَاقِفٌ (standing)
- غَنِيٌّ (rich) / فَقِيرٌ (poor)
- On their own: مَكْسُورٌ (broken), مَفْتُوحٌ (open), جَمِيلٌ (beautiful), حُلْوٌ (sweet), مَرِيضٌ (sick), لَذِيذٌ (delicious).
كَبِيرٌ is big in size (الْحِمَارُ صَغِيرٌ وَالْحِصَانُ كَبِيرٌ), while طَوِيلٌ is tall or long (الطَّبِيبُ طَوِيلٌ).
The lesson also introduces new nouns, which the book shows directly with ال: الْمَاءُ (the water), الْقَمَرُ (the moon) and الْوَرَقُ (the paper) with a moon letter, and الدَّفْتَرُ (the notebook), التَّاجِرُ (the merchant), الدُّكَّانُ (the shop) and التُّفَّاحُ (the apple) with a sun letter.
Common mistakes in lesson 3
- Keeping the tanwin after ال: ال makes the tanwin drop, and a single vowel remains.
- Pronouncing the lam before a sun letter, or writing a sukun on it: skip the lam and go straight to the doubled letter.
- Forgetting the shadda: in النَّجْمُ, the ن is doubled.
- Putting ال on the adjective in “the house is new”: only the noun takes it, and the adjective keeps the tanwin, as in الْبَيْتُ جَدِيدٌ.
Reviewing lesson 3
To review, take the nouns from lessons 1 and 2 one by one and give each its form with ال, saying out loud whether the lam is pronounced. Then describe them with an adjective: الْقَمِيصُ نَظِيفٌ, الْحَجَرُ ثَقِيلٌ وَالْوَرَقُ خَفِيفٌ, اللَّبَنُ بَارِدٌ وَالْمَاءُ حَارٌّ.
If you need to go back, Madinah Book 1 lesson 1 explains هَذَا, مَا and مَنْ, and lesson 2 explains ذَلِكَ.
In Medina Way, an app to learn Arabic based on the Madinah method, lesson 3 is practiced in short exercises: you put the vowels back on الْ and the shadda, fix wrong sentences, fill in the right adjective, and the new nouns come back in spaced reviews.