Arabic Pronoun Suffixes in the Quran: The Endings on Every Page

Arabic pronoun suffixes are the short endings, such as -hu (his, him), -ka (your) and -na (our, us), that attach to the tail of nouns, verbs and prepositions instead of standing as separate words. They are the reason so many Quranic words seem to end the same way, and learning the small set of them is one of the quickest gains a reader can make. This article sets out the detached pronouns briefly, then the attached ones in detail, and uses Al-Fatihah, which almost every reader already knows, as the worked example.

The detached pronouns first

Arabic has a set of standalone pronouns, called damair munfasilah (detached pronouns), which appear as words on their own, usually as the subject of a sentence. The ones you will meet most are these:

• huwa (he, it) and hiya (she, it)
• hum (they, masculine or mixed) and hunna (they, feminine)
• anta (you, masculine singular) and anti (you, feminine singular)
• antum (you, plural)
• ana (I) and nahnu (we)

Huwa opens Surah Al-Ikhlas (112:1): "Say, He is Allah, the One". Standalone pronouns like this are easy to spot. The attached forms hide at the ends of other words and are far more frequent.

The attached pronouns

The damair muttasilah (attached pronouns) never stand alone. They fasten to a noun to show possession, to a verb as its object, and to a preposition as its object. Here is the set:

• -hu, which becomes -hi in some positions: his, him, its
• -ha: her, it, its (also used for many plurals of things)
• -hum: their, them (masculine or mixed); -hunna for a feminine group
• -ka: your, you (masculine singular)
• -ki: your, you (feminine singular)
• -kum: your, you (plural)
• -ee on nouns and -ni on verbs: my, me
• -na: our, us
• -huma and -kuma: the dual forms, "their" or "your" for exactly two

Notice how the attached forms echo the detached ones: hum and -hum, nahnu and -na. Know the standalone set and the endings are half learned.

Attached to nouns and verbs

On a noun, the suffix means "of his", "of yours", "of ours". Kitab (book) becomes kitabuhu (his book). Rabb (Lord) becomes rabbuka (your Lord) when the Quran addresses the Prophet, and rabbana (our Lord) in the supplications that begin with that word. Qawm (people) becomes qawmihi (his people), as in the ayat where a prophet addresses his people.

The short vowel between the noun and the suffix, the u in kitabuhu or the i in qawmihi, is the noun's case ending and changes with grammar; the suffix itself does not. If those small vowels are still unfamiliar, our article on the three short vowels will help you read them confidently.

On a verb, the suffix is the person the action is done to. Khalaqa (he created) becomes khalaqakum (He created you, plural). Hada (he guided) becomes hadana (He guided us). Razaqa (he provided) becomes razaqnahum (We provided them), with a subject ending and an object ending stacked together, which looks more daunting than it is. Read from the root outwards: the root gives the action, the middle gives who did it, the tail gives who received it. Our guide to how three-letter roots work makes the first of those steps easy.

Read a long Quranic word from the root outwards, and the last syllable will usually tell you who it is about.

Attached to prepositions

This is the group readers meet most and notice least. Li (for, belonging to) gives lahu (for him, His), laha (for her, for it), lahum (for them) and lakum (for you). 'Ala (upon) gives 'alayhi (upon him) and 'alayhim (upon them). Min (from) gives minhu (from him, of it), minhum (from them, some of them) and minkum (from you). Ila (to) gives ilayka (to you) and ilayhi (to him). Fi (in) gives fihi (in it) and fiha (in it, in her), the second appearing constantly in descriptions of Paradise: "they will abide in it". A short list of these in your notebook will pay for itself within a page.

Al-Fatihah as the worked example

The surah most commonly recited in prayer contains several attached pronouns in a few lines, which is why it makes such a good drill.

1. Iyyaka (You alone) appears twice in the fifth ayah: "You alone we worship, and You alone we ask for help". Iyya is a carrier word whose only job is to hold a pronoun that has been moved to the front for emphasis; the -ka is "You". The next word, na'budu (we worship), carries the "we" inside the verb's own form, not as a suffix.
2. Ihdina (guide us) in the sixth ayah is the command ihdi (guide) plus -na (us).
3. An'amta 'alayhim (You have favoured them) in the seventh ayah shows both kinds of ending at once: an'amta is the verb with the subject "You" built in, and 'alayhim is 'ala plus -him.
4. 'Alayhim appears again later in the same ayah, so you meet the preposition-plus-pronoun twice in one line.

Our word-by-word guide to Surah Al-Fatihah walks through the whole surah in this way.

Why -hu becomes -hi

You will have noticed 'alayhi and fihi above, where the expected -hu has become -hi. This happens whenever the suffix follows a kasrah (the short "i" vowel) or the letter ya (ي). It is a sound-harmony rule: the vowel adjusts to what came before, and the meaning is unchanged. Teachers explain the rule in different ways, some as a matter of sound, some through the grammar of case, so follow whichever explanation your own teacher gives. The same shift produces -him from -hum, as in 'alayhim. Hafs 'an 'Asim is assumed throughout this article; it has a few well-known places where the length of a pronoun vowel is treated specially, and other qira'at (transmitted modes of recitation) have their own practice, which your teacher will point out.

A practice routine

Take a single page of the mushaf, ideally one you can already read fluently. With a pencil on a photocopy or a finger on the page, mark every attached pronoun you can find. Then recite the page slowly and, at each mark, say the English pronoun aloud before moving on: "his", "them", "you", "us". The first attempt is slow; by the fifth you will notice pronouns on pages you never marked. Combine this with the core vocabulary from the most common words in the Quran and the outline of most ayat starts to appear. In the Arabic language course this is one of the first exercises a teacher sets, and it prepares the ground for the Tafseer course, where knowing who each pronoun refers to is often the whole point.

Frequently asked questions

How do I tell a pronoun suffix from a letter that belongs to the word?

Ask whether the word still makes sense without the ending. Rabbuka without -ka is rabb, a word you know, so -ka is a suffix. If removing the tail leaves something that is not a word, the letters were part of the root. Knowing the common roots makes this test quick.

Why does -hum sometimes appear as -himu or -humu?

When the next word begins with a connecting hamzah, a short vowel is added to the end of the pronoun so that the two words join smoothly. It is a matter of sound, not of meaning. Your teacher will model it, and after a few pages it becomes automatic.

Does -ha always mean her?

No. Arabic treats most plurals of non-human things as feminine singular, so -ha often means "them" or "its" when referring to things: the heavens, the gardens, the signs. Context tells you which. Reading the noun that the pronoun points back to usually settles it.

Is -ni the same as -na?

They are different. -ni means "me" and attaches to verbs, as in ihdini (guide me). -na means "us" or "our", as in ihdina (guide us) and rabbana (our Lord). The one-letter difference changes who is being spoken about, so it repays care.

Do I need grammar to use pronoun suffixes?

Not to recognise them. Spotting the ending and saying who it refers to is something a reader can do from the first week. Understanding why the vowel before the ending changes is grammar, and it can come later without slowing the recognition work down.

Mark up a page and read it back to us

If you have marked the pronouns on one page, that page is the perfect thing to bring to a first lesson. A teacher can check each one, explain the few you were unsure of and show you how the same endings behave on the next page. The Arabic language course is taught one-to-one on a private video call with a male or female teacher as you prefer, and your first class is free with no card needed.