Tajweed & Arabic Basic Skills
.
What follows is a brief introduction to some Tajweed rules.
[73:4] ...and recite the Qur'aan clearly with Tartil (in a distinct and measured tone).
The Sukoon is a small circle which is plced on top of the letter to indicate "absence" of movement on the letter i.e. that letter doesn't make a vowelled sound. The letter before it and after it will make a full sound but not the letter upon which a Sukoon is placed e.g جْ
One of the best Quranic reciters of old Muhammad Sideeq Minshawi reciting Surah Maryam
There are no capital and lower case letters in Arabic, all the writing is connected. Most of the letters in Arabic have four forms: stand alone, word initial, medial and word ending.Six letters of the alphabet only join from one side. There are three types of words in Arabic, Particles (letters, prepositions, compounds etc), nouns and verbs. In Arabic we also have three tenses . But we have only two words for them. One word is fi`l madi /فعل ماضی(called Past or Perfect tense), and the second word is called fi`l mudari`/ فعل مضارع(called the Imperfect tense to give the meaning of Present Tense and the Future Tense). Ths fi`l mudari` is translated into English as Verb Aorist . Thus when we say: fa`ala/فَعَلَ it means He did. But when we say: yaf`alu/ یَفۡعَلُit means : He does or He will do. There are also several types of nouns e.g. Pronouns and Relative nouns.
Qamariya and Shamsiya (Sun and Moon letters). The Arabic alphabet is split into 14 Sun and 14 Moon letters, for reasons of correct pronunciation in linking letters and words.
.
What follows is a brief introduction to some Tajweed rules.
[73:4] ...and recite the Qur'aan clearly with Tartil (in a distinct and measured tone).
Tajweed
The word Tajweed linguistically means 'proficiency' or 'doing something well'. When applied to the Qur'an, it means giving every letter of the Qur'an its rights and dues of characteristics when we recite the Qur'an and observing the rules that apply to those letters in different situations. We give the letters their rights by observing the essential characteristics of each letter that never leave it. And we give them their dues by observing the characteristics of each letter that are present in them some of the time and not present at other times.Alphabets
Arabic language has 28 basic alphabets which take different shapes depending on the positioning within the word itself i.e. it may have a different form if used as a first, middle or last letter. Some letters can be combined with the next letter while other can't be combined and have to be written by themselves. All basic Arabic letters are consonants.Hamaza
Hamza (Arabic: الهَمْزة, (al-)hamzah) (ء) is a letter in the Arabic alphabet, representing the glottal stop. Alif doesn't have a sound of its own but when you say "Aa" its acutally Hamza (with a Fatha on top) which is making the sound. Hamza can also be on top of Yaa and Waw (they are called Hamza's chairs).Three (3) Short Vowels
The short vowel-marks enable the letter to make a sound in a similar way to the English language. In the same way a word cannot be made in the English language without one of the 5 vowels (a, e, i, o or u), in Arabic one cannot make a word without a vowel being used. The sound is a single beat and no further elongation is required. The names of these three short vowels are Fatha, Kasra and Dhamma.Sukoon
The Sukoon is a small circle which is plced on top of the letter to indicate "absence" of movement on the letter i.e. that letter doesn't make a vowelled sound. The letter before it and after it will make a full sound but not the letter upon which a Sukoon is placed e.g جْ
Shadda (emphasis) or Tashdeed (sign of emphasis)
This is a small w which is placed on top of the letter to indicate that the letter is to be pronounced twice e.g جّQalqalah
The following letters are pronounced with a slight (echo) vibrating sound at the end when the letter has a Sukoon or letter is assigned a Sukoon because of stopping.| Letter Sound | Transliteration | End | Middle | Beginning | Isolated (Original) Form |
| bā’ | b | ـب | ـبـ | بـ | ب |
| jīm | j | ـج | ـجـ | جـ | ج |
| dāl | d | ـد | ـد | د | د |
| ṭā’ | ṭ | ـط | ـطـ | ط | ط |
| qāf | q | ـق | ـقـ | قـ | ق |
The Varieties of Arabic
The Arabic language takes many forms and can be divided into three main categories:- Quranic or Classical Arabic: This is the Arabic of Islam's holy book, the Quran. It is an ancient text, dating from the late 600's when the Quran was revealed and written down. It is the most read and memorised book in the world. Classical Arabic is not just used for the Quran, it is used for poetry, religious debates and hadeeth literature. Classical Arabic also overlaps with Modern Arabic.
- Modern Arabic: This is a version of Classical Arabic which is taught in the schools of Arab countries. It is the language of the news, modern literature and education. It is understood by all regions of the Arab world and is the form of Arabic taught in colleges around the world.
- Regional or Colloquial Arabic: There are many local varieties of Arabic, many languages in their own right. The most widely spoken and understood of these is Egyptian, Iraqi, Levantine (Lebanese/Syrian/Jordanian/Palestinian) and Moroccan Arabic. Most of these regional dialects have limited use in educated circles.
At the end of nouns and adjectives, when they are ism nakirah (indefinite nouns), the vowel signs (dammah, fathah, kasrah) are written double. This means that they are to be pronounced with a final “n”, un, an, in. This is called tanwin or nunation. It is to be noted that with the fathah, the letter alif is added. But if the word ends in ta’ marbutah the alif is not added. For example: Rasulan, Jannatan.
