The Imperfect Tense in Arabic - الْفِعْلُ الْمُضَارِعُ | Arabic Free Course

23 décembre 2020 – Institut Al-Dirassa

Introduction

The imperfect tense in Arabic expresses both the present and the future, referring to an action that is incomplete. The conjugation of the imperfect tense is done by adding prefixes and suffixes to the past form.

Example:

يَفْعَلُ	He does / will do

1. The Regular Imperfect

The conjugation of the imperfect form of فَعَلَ: يَفْعَلُ is as follows:

3rd person masculine

Singular	Dual	Plural
يَفْعَلُ	يَفْعَلانِ	يَفْعَلُونَ

He does / will do	They both do / will do	They do / will do

3rd person feminine

Singular	Dual	Plural
تَفْعَلُ	تَفْعَلانِ	يَفْعَلْنَ

She does / will do	They both do / will do	They do / will do (fem.)

2nd person masculine

Singular	Dual	Plural
تَفْعَلُ	تَفْعَلانِ	تَفْعَلُونَ

You do / will do	You both do / will do	You do / will do (masc. pl.)

2nd person feminine

Singular	Dual	Plural
تَفْعَلِينَ	تَفْعَلانِ	تَفْعَلْنَ

You (fem.) do / will do	You both do / will do (fem.)	You do / will do (fem. pl.)

1st person (masculine/feminine)

Singular	Dual	Plural
أَفْعَلُ	–	نَفْعَلُ

I do / will do	–	We do / will do

The prefixes are ن – أ – ت – ي. They are also called the signs of the present tense اَلْمُضَارِعُ. The suffixes are انِ (dual), ونَ (masculine plural), نَ (feminine plural), and ينَ (feminine singular second person). There is no suffix for the first person.

Past tense verb مَاضٍ	Imperfect verb مُضَارِع
بَعُدَ	يَبْعُدُ
He moved away	He moves / will move away

حَسُنَ	يَحْسُنُ
He became good	He becomes / will become good

قَرُبَ	يَقْرُبُ
He approached	He approaches / will approach

Examples of imperfect verbs used in the Noble Qur’an

وَيَفْعَلُ اللّٰهُ مَا يَشَاءُ

And Allah does whatever He wills. (14:27)

الَّذِينَ يُوفُونَ بِعَهْدِ اللّٰهِ وَلَا يَنقُضُونَ الْمِيثَاقَ

Those who fulfill their covenant with Allah and do not break the pact. (13:20)

ذَٰلِكَ بِأَنَّهُمْ كَانُوا يَكْفُرُونَ بِآيَاتِ اللّٰهِ وَيَقْتُلُونَ الْأَنْبِيَاءَ بِغَيْرِ حَقٍّ

That is because they disbelieved in Allah’s signs and killed the prophets unjustly. (3:112)

The Future Tense

When the imperfect tense is preceded by سَ or سَوْفَ (meaning “soon” or “in the near future”), it expresses a future meaning. These particles are called future markers.

سَيَقُولُ السُّفَهَاءُ مِنَ النَّاسِ

The foolish among the people will say: (2:142)

كَلَّا سَوْفَ تَعْلَمُونَ

No! You will soon know! (102:3)

2. The Verb with Hamza in the Imperfect

Introduction

A “Hamzated verb” is a verb whose first radical is the letter أ (hamza), as in أَكَلَ : يَأْكُلُ. It follows the same conjugation pattern as فَعَلَ : يَفْعَلُ.