Lesson 8. Rule of Hamas (حمس)

If there is سكون (Sukun/ Jazm) on the letters below, then they are pronounced with a whispering sound:

ف

س

ك

ت

ش

خ

ص

ح

ث

ه

How to Memorize them?

We can combine these letters to make them meaningful and then they will be easier to keep in mind:
فسكتشخصحثه

It will take a while practice them so start doing that from today. I would recommend Surah Takweer (Surah # 81) to look at and identify the words where you should have Hamas. 

Success!

Lesson 7. Huroof Mamdood (مدود حروف)

If three of the letters: 'ا'and ،'و'،'ى'  come at second last place in the word, their sounds should be extended equal to twice or four times of letter the letter ا (  aalif) (means they will get madda automatically.

Exercise: Notice these words in Surah Fateha and Surah Baqarah (Surah # 1 and 2) and try to practice by adding a madda. 

Rabbil Alamin is supposed to be said 'Rabbil Alamee-een'

Good luck,

Lesson 6. When is ا (Alif) said with a jerk?

Assalam-o-Alykum,

I have noticed that many among us don't know that the letter  ا (Alif) does not have its conventional pronunciation when there is a sukun (jazm) on it.

Please note that when there is  سكون over letter ( ا ) while it is in middle of a word, it is pronounced with jerk.

Example:  شَاٌنً in the Surah Abasa (Surah # 80), Ayah # 37.

If you were not doing it before, please practice and try to do it the right way. JazakAllah Khair!

Lesson 5. Arabic Diacritics ( تشكيل )

Assalam-o-Alykum,

Before we move further, it is important to briefly go through the nouns used for tashkeel as we will be using these nouns often so we should know what we are talking about.

I am pasting an image that I found from the source http://www.mediterraneosur.es/fondo/alfarabe.html

In urdu, we learnt the following words for tashkeel:

1) Fatha is 'Zabar'
2) Kasra is 'Zair'
3) Damma is 'Paish'
4) Sukun is 'Jazm'

Again, all those who learnt Quran know these tashkeel but this was just to be on the similar lines in calling them with a particular name. 

Lesson 4. Making a distinction between س, ص, and ث

Assalam-o-Alykum,

Our next lesson would be to pronounce letters that a technically not differently pronounced in few other languages but Arabic Does make a distinction. 

For those who have urdu as native language, it is very difficult to make a distinction between all three. We have in urdu all these letters but we pronounce them all in the similar way. 

It is important to say them in the way Allah SWT has revealed them in His book. 

س: Just like 's' in English, you say it with slightly opening your mouth like you do when you smile. 

ص: When you say 'sword' in English, the way your mouth looks, this letter has to be pronounced in that way. 

 ث: is from a different family then س and ص. I think it more belongs to the family of ذ, and English pronunciation would be close to 'th' sound with a little bit of air coming out. 

Lesson 3. Ghunna (غنة)

Assalam-o-Alykum,

Our next lesson is about Ghunna. The easy part is there are only two letters involved in it which are ن  and م .

Ghunna means to make a sound from the nasal passage without using your tongue.

This sounds very easy but a difficult part is going to come soon. There are 4 levels of ghunna but we will learn about them in our next level inshAllah.

Let's take it easy for today.

Lesson 2. Huroof-e-Qalqala (The letters with Qalqala)

Assalam-o-Alykum,

The letters with Qalqala, does it ring a bell in your mind. Yes it did for me but I had forgotten those words and also the meaning of "Qalqala".

Simply speaking "Qalqala" is like you throw a tennis ball on the floor and it bounces back to you. You say these letters and the sound should come back to you. 

Below are the letters where you have to do Qalqala but only when there is a 'sakoon' or what we call in Urdu 'jazm' on it. 

ق, ط, ب , ج, د

If you fear that you will forget these words after closing the blog, just memorize the word (Qutub Jadd) and this will cover the letters like قطب which means 'pole' in Arabic and جد which means 'with' in Arabic. 

Now coming back how you have to perform the Qalqala task, look at the Surah Falaq:

Look at the last letter which is ق, and since the ayah is ending here, so you may like to stop here. When you stop, it becomes a qalqala letter. You will say  ق with a sound that comes back to you. Falaqa. So you notice that I added an 'A' after ق, but you don't have to say complete a but rather half 'A' sound. 

Practice it with other Ayahs of Surah Falaq as it provides one of the best examples for Huroof-ul-Qalqala. 

Wish you best of all practicing these words and hope you will enjoy. 

Lesson 1. Making the difference between ز, ذ, ظ, ض

Assalam-o-Alykum,

Many of the non-Arabs find it very difficult to make a difference between the letters mentioned in the title. Not making the a clear distinction between these letters can alter the meaning as we mentioned in the blog preview. 

I was one of those saying all these letters in a very similar fashion and found it very hard to correct myself. It needed a lot of hardwork to make a distinction. It might not be hard for everyone but the simple rule is: the more the efforts, the more hasanaat. 

Lets see each one of them separately. 

ز: (pronounced as 'zal' in English), very simple one. No such effort required for most of us. An example is 'zebra'. 

ذ: (pronounced as a mix between zha and dha), a difficult one at least for me. Many of us cannot make a distinction between ذ and ز but they are different. In  ذ, your tongue's tip is little bit visible to the one sitting in front of you while this is not the case with letter ز. English does not provide an example of the letter  ذ. 

ظ: (pronounced as 'zua' in English), Just like saying ز but your mouth will be round while saying this. English doesn't have this as a letter. 

ض: (pronounced as 'duad in English but you will not make a 'd' sound, but the sound that you make while saying 'the'), again no English example of this letter. 

ض can be sometimes mixed up with letter د but the different is with ض, your mouth will be round and you say  د with an open mouth 'daal'. 

Practicing the difference between ذ, ض, and  د took me lots of efforts so I would request you all to start practicing from today. The more the Quran reading, the faster it would come. 

Blog Preview

This blog is primarily meant for the non-Arabic speaking Muslims who want to recite the Quran with tajweed. I have noticed that a lot of us (including me), when we finish learning the Quran, we memorize some rules and pronunciation that we forget very fast over time and a time comes when reciting Quran becomes so casual that it can barely be distinguished from our native language. 

Reciting Quran with tajweed and correct pronunciation has several benefits compared to not doing so:

1) Not saying words with clear distinction can completely alter the meaning for example:

كل means "Each" and قل means "Say" Now there are several others you can think of.

2) Reciting the words correct can improve your skin tone and reduce wrinkles. The facial skin muscles are stretched by saying different arabic alphates correct the way which is beneficial for your skin for example look at the difference between س  and ص and the way in which your mouth moves when you say each one of these.

3) Reciting correct can increase your lung capacity and improves breathing quality

3) The difference of hasanaat you get from merely reciting Quran as a formality and putting efforts to make it look best as Allah SWT says in the Quran:

Or add to it, and recite the Qur'an with measured recitation (73-4)

4) When we recite Quran with tajweed, it increases our for love and respect for it and most importantly, we don't look at the verses informally anymore and try to conceive the meanings which enhances our understanding of Quran.

5) Our relationship with Allah SWT is strengthen with correct recitation. 

What is Tafweed: 

Simply speaking,

i. How a letter is to be pronounced 

ii. What rules change in the letter due to order of the letter

So I wish myself and all of you lots of success in improving our Quran recitation and taking full benefits out of it. I thank the sister who is helping me in learning these Ahkamaat. I pray for all those who are part of this blog in terms of teaching, contributing and reading that may Allah SWT lead us to Jannah without any difficult in between. Amen. 

P.S. Don't try to learn all the Ahkamaat in one go. Rather, take one hukm and practice it for week(s) and then take another one. I am following the same at the moment.