Equational sentences and Adjective phrases

The sentence is made up of 2 parts which are known as the subject and the predicate. These strange terms may seem alarming so here is a short explanation of what they mean:

The subject مبتدأ here is basically what the sentence is about. We could say it is the topic of the sentence. When we say "The house is big.", the sentence is telling us something about the house, so the house is known as the subject.

The predicate خبر is simply a word which tells us something about the subject. "Big" in the above sentence is the predicate because it is telling us about the house.

The subject will be a noun (naming word) and if it is not a person's name it should have "Al" at the beginning,(ie names of things such as the table, the book, the man). The predicate should not have "al". Look at the examples below :

الرجلُ فقيرٌ
the man is poor

الكتابُ صغيرٌ
the book is small

المسجدُ جميلٌ
the mosque is beautiful

If the subject is a person's name, we do not have to put "Al" on front of their name as a person's name is already definite by it's nature (ie, if you say "Taariq", you know who you are talking about which makes it something definite in sense) See the following examples :

طارق طالبٌ
Taariq is a student

محمّد مجتهد
Mohammed is hard working

عليّ فقيرٌ
Ali is poor

If both the parts of the sentence were definite, or indefinite (ie when they match) then actually it is no longer a sentence, but it becomes an adjective phrase. An adjective phrase is when you have a noun and adjective together, ie something is being described. An example in English would be "the good book" (definite adjective phrase because it includes the word "the") or "a small tree". (Indefinite adjective phrase because it doesn't include the word "the")

Look at the examples below:

الولدُ الصغيرُ
the small boy
البيتُ الكبيرُ
the big house
الطالبُ المجتهدُ
the hardworking student
قلمٌ جميلٌ
a beautiful pen
رجلٌ فقيرٌ
a poor man
مطبخٌ صغيرٌ
a small kitchen

The definite adjective phrases could themselves be used as the subject in an equational sentence. See the following examples.

الطالبُ المجتهدُ فقيرٌ

the hardworking student is poor

البيتُ الكبيرُ جميلٌ

the big house is beautiful

The predicate could also be an indefinite adjective phrase

الكلبُ الصغيرُ كلبٌ شَقِيّ

the small dog is a bad (naughty) dog

الطالبُ الفقيرُ ولدٌ ذكيٌّ

the poor student is a clever boy

We could sum this up with the following formulae (if you like to think in a mathematical way this may help. If it confuses you, please ignore it - people's brains work in different ways!!)

_______________________________

definite noun + indefinite noun = equational sentence

الولدُ طالبٌ

The boy is a student

_______________________________

definite noun + indefinite adjective = equational sentence

الولدُ كبيرٌ

The boy is big

_________________________________

definite noun + definite adjective = definite adjective phrase

الولدُ الكبيرُ

The big boy

___________________________________

indefinite noun + indefinite adjective = indefinite adjective phrase

ولدٌ كبيرٌ

a big boy

____________________________________

definite adjective phrase + indefinite noun = equational sentence

الولدُ الكبيرُ طالبٌ

The big boy is a student

____________________________________

definite adjective phrase + indefinite adjective = equational sentence

الولدُ الكبيرُ ذكيٌّ

The big boy is clever

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