when thought as completed, i.e., in the perfect, causes the stem to precede the person; but when thought in the imperfect as still engaging the subject, the idea of it is limited by its inherence in the personality of the subject, which it reduces by taking the place of the subject's life (53), and follows the person in expression; while number and gender, when separable from the personality, follow the verbal stem as not determining the idea of it (Def. 23). The simple demonstrative pronoun in Arabic is ā, this, that, masculine; gay, tay, or tā, feminine. In the plural of both genders the stem is hul; the pronoun is hulya, or ḥulāḥi, common gender. Closely connected in its origin with a is another monosyllable which is commonly used in the sense of possessor, owner, viz., Ou masculine, gātu feminine nominative, Or, Oāti genitive. Stronger demonstratives are formed from the simple demonstrative by subjoining to it the suffix of the second person in the gender and number corresponding to the person addressed, and with or without the demonstrative element li intervening. The demonstratives, simple and compound, may be strengthened also by prefixing ha, which has the same force as Latin -ce, and which is called by the Arabs the particle which excites attention. The definite article is hal.1 The relative pronouns are: hallaţi masculine, hallatī feminine, who, which; man, he who, she who; ma, that which; hayyun he who; hayyuman, whoever; hayyuma, whatever. The pronoun man, ma is mā indeclinable, and is never used adjectively; hallafi forms a plural, halla@ina masculine, hallātī feminine, and a nominative and genitive dual, hallagani, halla@aini masculine, hallatāni, hallataini, feminine; hayyun masculine, hayyatun feminine, is regularly declined in the singular (59), but has commonly neither dual nor plural. The relative pronouns, with the exception of hallabi, are also interrogative, and to them may be added kam, how much? The interrogative man, who? has the distinctions of gender, number, and case only when it stands alone; hayyun when constructed with a gen. following noun drops the final n; as hayyu kitab in, which book (quid libri).2 52. The varieties of the verbal stem, or derived forms of the Arabic verb, indicate a tendency to reflexive formations which express occupation about self; they also show an attention to the whole subjective process, including repetition or intensification, or direction to an end, and they reveal a habit of connecting action immediately with the object rather than by transition to the object, transitional or relative thought not being favoured by the genius of the language.3 The simple and derived forms may be seen in the following example: (1.) Fagala. "The vowel of the second radical is a in most of the transitive, and not a few of the intransitive verbs. The vowel i in the same position has generally an intransitive signification, u invariably so. The distinction between them is, that i indicates a temporary state or condition, or a merely accidental quality in persons 1 Wright, p. 215-218. 2 Ibid. p. 219-223. 3 Ibid. p. 28-43. or things; whilst u indicates a permanent state or a naturally inherent quality "1 (see 79). (2.) Faggala; intensive, temporally extensive, numerically extensive, iterative, causative, or factive. (3.) Fağala; effort or attempt, act or state reaching to indirect object, reciprocal. (4.) Hafjala; causative; sometimes expresses an intransitive state thought too objectively to take up the subjective process in all its strength, so that the realisation becomes causation. (5.) Tafajjala; reflexive; experience by subject, of an action or effect on self, whether this proceeds from subject or from another. (6.) Tafajala; reflexive of third. (7.) Hinfajala; reflexive, never reciprocal, the subject being the direct object of an action which he does or allows. (8.) Hiftagala; reflexive, the subject being the direct or indirect object, reciprocal. (9.) Hifi alla (rare); colours and defects thought as clinging firmly. (10.) Histafÿala; reflexive of fourth, the subject being either direct or indirect object. (11.) Hifi alla (very rare); same as ninth in a higher degree. The following forms are not explained : (12.) Hifiaujala. (13.) Hifgauwala. (14.) Hifganlala. (15.) Hifganlai. The causative and reflexive elements are in the beginning, because they determine the whole idea of the verb as causative or reflexive. In the fourth form the causation is incorporated in the process of the verb, taking up its first vowel. In the seventh, eighth, and tenth forms, the reflex object is incorporated in the verb; n, which is probably less objective than t, blends into the verb more closely than t, just as in the meaning of the seventh form the reflex object is more nearly related to the action than in the others; and t takes always a to express the movement to it as object; this a, however, being in the eighth and tenth forms the initial part of the process. In the fifth and sixth forms the verb is stronger, and the reflex object more distinct. In the ninth and eleventh forms there is no initial vowel of process, because it neither goes to the subject nor from it, but only clings to it. The initial s of the causative element, which has been dropped in the fourth form, appears in the tenth. The initial i in the forms after the sixth is euphonic, because two consonants cannot begin a syllable. 53. The derived forms, as well as others of the characteristics of the Arabic verb, spring from the high degree of subjectivity with which it is thought. For the verb being thought mainly in the subjective process is VOL. IL 1 Wright, p. 28. B varied so as to assume a different form, if it involve a larger expenditure of subjective energy, or a greater reaching of the subject to an object, or a causation thought subjectively in the cause rather than in the effect, or a reflex action on the subject, this last being different according as the subject is more or less distinct in thought from the subject as object, or the latter from the process. For the same reason, the thought of the process as engaging the subject is strongly distinguished from the thought of it as no longer doing so; the latter tending to part with the sense of the subject more than if the verb, instead of being thought as no longer engaging the subject, were thought as an engagement of it in past time, and the former determining the verb by the subject so as to limit the thought of it to what it is in the subject. The abstract person, therefore, or third singular masculine, disappears from the perfect; and in the imperfect the person element of all the persons is prefixed. Moreover, this high subjectivity of the verb causes the thought of the subjective process to take up a sense of the force of the subject as masculine or feminine (Def. 16), which it retains even when thought in the perfect as no longer engaging the subject. And the verb with its subjective contents is thought in one act which simultaneously embraces them all. 54. There are two voices, active and passive; and two tenses, perfect and imperfect, which refer not to position in time, but to completion or incompletion; the completion or incompletion being that of the engagement of the subject rather than of the accomplishment of external fact. The following are the perfect and imperfect, third singular, active and passive of all the forms of the verb qatala :1 If the vowels be taken as having the significance assigned respectively to each in connection with the first form in 52, the vocalisation of these perfects and imperfects may perhaps be understood as follows. The vowel of the first radical, which in the active is a, in the passive is u, the former expressing motion outward, the latter motion inward. In thinking the process of doing or being the mind starts from the subject, and in the natural order of thought what comes first is a 1 Wright, pp. 240, 241. sense of the realisation as outward in reference to the world, or inward as affecting the subject, and of these the former naturally suggests a and the latter u, for the vowel of the first radical. Still thinking the process with a strong sense of the subject, the mind will have a sense of it as in its nature passing from the subject or dwelling in the subject, and in the latter case as on the one hand temporary or accidental or on the other hand permanent or natural; and these aspects of it are suggestive respectively of a, i, and u, as the vowel of the second radical (see 52). The passive thought as a temporary or accidental state takes i In finishing this subjective thought of the process, whether active or passive, when there is no suffix the mind has a sense of it, when perfect as having passed from the subject, and when imperfect as still engaging the subject, so that the last vowel is in the perfect a and in the imperfect u. The y which is given above as initial of the imperfect is the prefix of the third person singular masculine. In the simple form it takes up the vowel of the first radical, because in the imperfect the realisation is thought so intimately in the subject. But in the derived forms the idea of the stem being less simple tends to be more distinct from the subject, and this takes a vowel of its own, which in the non-reflexive forms of the active and all the passive is u to express the continuing engagement of the subject; but in the reflexive forms it is a on account of the transition to the reflex object. In the ninth and eleventh forms also it is a, for in these the verbal stem is thought as clinging to the subject, and the person has consequently the vowel which expresses reference to it. The simple form, if it have a with the second radical in the perfect, has u or i in the imperfect, the former probably when a transitive action is thought in the imperfect within the subject as still springing from its native energy, the latter when the verb in the imperfect is thought as a temporary state of the subject. If the second radical have i in the perfect, the verb is thought in the perfect as being in its nature a temporary state, and this state is thought in the imperfect as passing, and the i becomes a. But if it be u the verb is thought in the perfect as a permanent state, and this abides also in the imperfect and u remains. Verbs whose second or third radical is a guttural retain in the imperfect the a which their second radical has in the perfect, the gutturals having an affinity for a, which is uttered more entirely in the throat than the other vowels.1 The derived forms being less capable, as has been said, of being thought immersed in the subject, are more superficially involved in it in the imperfect, and their second radical has i for its vowel. But in the reflexive forms in which the reflex object is not blended with the root the transition to it causes the second radical to take a. The passive is a temporary state, and in the imperfect it is thought as passing from the subject, and consequently the i of the perfect is changed to a in the imperfect. It is only in the third singular masculine of the perfect, which has no person element, that there is a third stem vowel expressive of the 1 Wright, pp. 56, 57. being or doing, as having passed from the subject. In the other persons the suffix of the person is subjoined to the third radical without an intervening vowel, the thought of the person itself as no longer engaged being such as to render this vowel unnecessary. So also in the imperfect; it is only in those persons which have no suffix of the person that there is a third stem vowel expressive of the being or doing as still in the subject, this element in the other persons being replaced by the fragment of the person which is subjoined, the person being thought as still engaged. The personal prefixes of the imperfect all take the same vowel as that of the third singular masculine. 55. There is a subjunctive mood in Arabic to express a fact as an aim, or object, or result, or concomitant condition of another fact1 (74, Ex. 10, 15). It must in reference to the latter be future or contemporaneous, and cannot therefore be perfect, but is expressed as a modification of the imperfect. Its difference from the latter is twofold; the final u of the imperfect, which expresses the act or state as still engaging the subject, is in the subjunctive changed to a, which expresses it abstracted from such present engagement; and the subjunctive having less vivid realisation in the subject, the suffixes of person are reduced by dropping their second syllable when they have one, for their first syllable sufficiently expresses their meaning. Negation so reduces the realisation of the future that the negative future is expressed by the subjunctive after the negative.2 3 4 There is also a jussive mood used also for what is a supposition or what depends on a supposition (74, Ex. 13) and for a fact thought as not in course of realisation yet, or not at a past time 3 (64). It drops the final a of the subjunctive, being thought with still less realisation in the subject than the latter (see 64). In the suffixed persons it is the same as the subjunctive. With the preposition li, to, prefixed, it is used for the imperative, generally in the third person. A prohibition must be expressed by the jussive, as the imperative is always positive.5 The imperative, which is only in the active voice, the jussive being used for it in the passive, drops the personal prefix of the jussive with its vowel, and when this leaves two consonants at the beginning, a vowel must be prefixed, as two consonants cannot begin a syllable. This prefixed vowel is in the simple form hu-, when the second radical has u there being then a strong sense of subjectivity. In the third or causative form it is ha-, on account of the transitiveness of causation; but in all other cases it is hi, which is the vowel that is prefixed merely for euphony. Both in the jussive and imperative of the ninth and eleventh forms, is inserted for euphony between the third radical and the repetition of it. From the jussive are formed two energetic forms, one with -anna suffixed to it, and the other with -an; and when the person ends in - or u, the a is elided, and the ī or u is shortened as being in a shut syllable. In the dual, which ends in a, and in the second and third 3 Ibid. p. 25-27. 1 Wright, Syntax, r. 18-24. • Ibid. p. 24. 2 Ibid. p. 16. |