Elementary Arabic Morphology 3

The Active and Passive Nouns

  1. What is an active participle noun?

  2. How is an active participle noun formed?

  3. What is a passive participle noun?

  4. How is a passive participle noun formed?

  5. An active participle noun is a form that indicates that which performs an action or indicates a state, for example: کاتِب.

  6. An active participle noun is formed from triliteral verbs on the form فاعِل, for example: شاکِر. It is formed from verbs with more than three letters from their active aorist form by replacing the aorist letter with a mīm that has a dummah and giving the next to last letter a kasrah. So, the verb یُکرِم becomes مُکرِم.

  7. A passive participle noun is a form that indicates that which the action was performed on, for example: مَکسُور.

  8. The passive participle is formed from triliteral verbs on the form مَفعُول, for example; مَنصُور. It is formed from verbs with more than three letters from their passive aorist form by replacing the aorist letter with a mīm that has a dummah, for example: مُکرَّم.

The two forms فَعُول and فَعیل are common for both the active and passive participle nouns. Sometimes they are used to mean an active participle noun, for example: صَبُور and sometimes a passive participle noun, for example: رَسُول.

The passive participle noun is formed from passive transitive verbs whether they accept an objective compliment by themselves or by a intermediary, for example: مکانٌ مَجلوسٌ فیه.