Classical Arabic

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Classical Arabic
OP - November 23, 2009, 12:54 AM

I can read and write Arabic, but can't understand it. How long do you think it would take me to learn classical arabic, and how difficult would it be?

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Re: Classical Arabic
Reply #1 - November 23, 2009, 01:21 AM

Modern Arabic is difficult to master. Once you manage it, it doesn't take long to understand Classical Arabic.

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Re: Classical Arabic
Reply #2 - November 23, 2009, 01:28 AM

I wish Hassan would start making tutorial videos where he would teach Arabic. That'd be cool. I'd love to learn from him.

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Re: Classical Arabic
Reply #3 - November 23, 2009, 02:03 AM

Modern Arabic and Classical Arabic are not that much different, it would be easier to learn the Modern one and build on it to learn the Classical. The problem however is that you'll be learning a pretty much 'textual' language even the Modern one. Apart from most of the official speeches, news reports, and a small portion of entertainment, you'll only get to write and read the language. Every single Arab country has a different dialect(in many cases more than one) and they are most of the time distinctly different from the Modern Standardized Arabic, specially in grammar.

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Re: Classical Arabic
Reply #4 - November 23, 2009, 02:28 AM

Quote from: Tommy on November 23, 2009, 01:28 AM
I wish Hassan would start making tutorial videos where he would teach Arabic. That'd be cool. I'd love to learn from him.

that would be very cool. I really want to go back to learning Arabic.

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Re: Classical Arabic
Reply #5 - November 23, 2009, 09:47 AM

I have not spoken Arabic in more than a year except for some slang words that are part of my everyday speech. I don't want to see it, hear it, speak it, write it. I am still recovering from the trauma of being there. Also the trauma of my in laws. Also, I would not have bothered with it if I wasn't trying to become a 'better Muslim', and no matter how much you learn it or speak it you're never 'good enough in Arabic' to 'really know' the quran or the sunnah or the books of fiqh and so on and so forth - it is endless game of catch up and 'no, you are not at the level to read these things!'

So since I don't believe in Islam I have no reason to speak it or read it or learn more especially since my children despise speaking Arabic. They associate it with the 'ya ihmaaar ya haiwaaaaan' method of pedagogy that defined their schooling and really endeared the blessed tongue of quranul kareem to their hearts. They haven't touched an Arabic comic book or book or video in more than a year. When I pass by someone speaking Arabic in the mall or something I pretend like I don't understand them.

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Re: Classical Arabic
Reply #6 - November 23, 2009, 09:50 AM

Quote from: Manat on November 23, 2009, 09:47 AM
I have not spoken Arabic in more than a year except for some slang words that are part of my everyday speech. I don't want to see it, hear it, speak it, write it. I am still recovering from the trauma of being there. Also the trauma of my in laws. Also, I would not have bothered with it if I wasn't trying to become a 'better Muslim', and no matter how much you learn it or speak it you're never 'good enough in Arabic' to 'really know' the quran or the sunnah or the books of fiqh and so on and so forth - it is endless game of catch up and 'no, you are not at the level to read these things!'

So since I don't believe in Islam I have no reason to speak it or read it or learn more especially since my children despise speaking Arabic. They associate it with the 'ya ihmaaar ya haiwaaaaan' method of pedagogy that defined their schooling and really endeared the blessed tongue of quranul kareem to their hearts. They haven't touched an Arabic comic book or book or video in more than a year. When I pass by someone speaking Arabic in the mall or something I pretend like I don't understand them.

Personally I see the requirement to learn Arabic as part of Islam is nothing less than confirming what I've always believed; Islam is a form of colonialism that conducts cultural genocide by stealth. No one questions this genocide because it is part of a religion thus making it immune from criticism.

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Re: Classical Arabic
Reply #7 - November 23, 2009, 09:51 AM

Quote from: aliadiere on November 23, 2009, 12:54 AM
I can read and write Arabic, but can't understand it. How long do you think it would take me to learn classical arabic, and how difficult would it be?

There are some good vocabulary building books and courses out there that you might be able to work on on your own to build up your foundations a bit. U of Damascus is one. Madinah has another one. The last I knew of this, you could buy the U of Madinah books from most Muslim book suppliers and U of Damascus' curriculum had been packaged and sold for westerners to buy and learn from. By packaged I mean it is usually xerox copied and spiral bound or something, but the content is really good even if the appearance is cheap.

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Re: Classical Arabic
Reply #8 - November 23, 2009, 09:56 AM

Quote from: kaiwai on November 23, 2009, 09:50 AM
Personally I see the requirement to learn Arabic as part of Islam is nothing less than confirming what I've always believed; Islam is a form of colonialism that conducts cultural genocide by stealth. No one questions this genocide because it is part of a religion thus making it immune from criticism.

Yes. On the one level, it made sense to me that you should learn some Arabic or learn to read it to read the quran, the way a Jewish kid learns Hebrew, but then I realized, you know, most of my Jewish school chums learned enough Hebrew for their Bar/Bat Mitzvah or to say some prayers, and then they go on being Jewish and learning Judaism without people saying 'You don't know enough Hebrew and you don't really know what you're talking about' or something. Well, this is probably also because Judaism allows for Reform, Conservative, etc. - the different schools, but Islam claims not to have any of that.

Whereas for us, there was always this thing where you never know enough, no matter how many hours you sat there with your legs folded underneath you, studying and studying. When I found out that there are people, especially in the Subcontinent, that study for years to read the quran in Arabic and they don't understand that and yet they were praised and held up as examples of 'scholars in trainiing,' it really bothered me. You would have a 16 year old haafiz - mashallah - come in to the masjid and he didn't understand a word of what he was repeating. But he had perfect tajweed of course.

You were never proficient enough in Arabic to say or question anything about the deen, that is always the excuse. Islam is universal for all peoples and times except that it isn't. You can't have quran in English or hadiths in English or fiqh in English, and ditto for Urdu or Punjabi or whatever. I have friends that spent several years learning only Arabic non-stop, all day everyday for two or three years, and at the end of it they can conjugate verbs or diagram sentences like nobody's business, but they can't talk to a regular Arab person or understand a news cast -- and of course, they're not good enough to interpret quran or a hadith or question some fiqh ruling.

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Re: Classical Arabic
Reply #9 - November 23, 2009, 09:57 AM

Quote from: Infidel on November 23, 2009, 02:03 AM
Modern Arabic and Classical Arabic are not that much different, it would be easier to learn the Modern one and build on it to learn the Classical. The problem however is that you'll be learning a pretty much 'textual' language even the Modern one. Apart from most of the official speeches, news reports, and a small portion of entertainment, you'll only get to write and read the language. Every single Arab country has a different dialect(in many cases more than one) and they are most of the time distinctly different from the Modern Standardized Arabic, specially in grammar.

I think grammar is more the same and vocabulary and pronounciation are a bit different. Learn a modern dialect since it is easier to interact with those who speak it, then moving to classical will be easy. You will always use a dictionary for classical which is the same thing native arabs have to do anyways.

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Re: Classical Arabic
Reply #10 - November 23, 2009, 06:32 PM

Just watch Al-Jazeera TV or arabic movies with english subtitles. A lot of the words are similar to urdu words.

I'd like to understand arabic too. I'll soon go on a crash course when I'm not so lazy.

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Re: Classical Arabic
Reply #11 - December 18, 2009, 06:59 PM

A good site to begin learning Arabic from;

http://www.madinaharabic.com/

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