The circle
Start a circle
The weekly meeting, about 60 to 75 minutes
One passage of three to eight lines. Every level reads the same one.
1
Listen and recite · 5 min
Someone reads the passage aloud, or the recording plays. Everyone listens once with the text and once without, then says it together.
2
Narrate · 10 min
In twos or threes, each person says back what they understood, in any language. No corrections yet: just what was heard.
3
One root · 10 min
Choose one root from the passage. Open its page: the core sense in Ibn Fāris, its family in this text, where else it lives in the library.
4
One pattern · 10 min
Choose one word's mould (the doer, the place, the thing done, the seeking). Find two more words cast in it.
5
One grammar point, met in the text · 10 min
Name one construction the passage uses, then find the line of the classical primer that states it.
6
Discuss · 15–20 min
Meaning, resonance, disagreement. Say what the text says before saying what you think of it. Courtesy is the rule.
7
One line by heart · 5 min
Pick one line together. Say it three times aloud. Add its words to your deck and carry it through the week.
Between meetings, ten to fifteen minutes a day
Review
Ten minutes of the deck, on its spaced schedule.
Listen, then recite over it
Play the passage with word timing; then say it with the voice.
Reread an earlier passage
Reading plans keep your place; every return is a new pass.
Note what you noticed
A line in your notes to bring to the next meeting.
Roles
A guide, if there is one
مُعَلِّمSomeone who has read the text before, classically trained or simply further along. They name the grammar, correct the reading gently and give the commentary. A circle can have several, and a guide should sit in other circles too.
Companions
صاحِبEveryone in the circle. Pair up to recite the week's line to each other between meetings. Anyone a little further along is a companion to someone.
The host
مُضِيفRotates each week: opens the call or the room, keeps time, picks the passage from the plan, and posts the week's pieces in the chat.
Your own study
دَرْسTen or fifteen minutes a day with the reader: the deck, the recording, one earlier passage. The circle rests on it.
Four tracks, one passage
Nobody is placed in a track; people choose, and move. In the meeting everyone does every step, each at their own depth: the ear track may say the root's letters while the companions trace it through a commentary.
The ear
No Arabic yet
Letters and sounds; recognise the passage's roots; recite the line; read with the word panel and the English.
The bridge
Heritage speakers
Link the words of home to their classical roots; read vowelled text; the first case endings.
The grammar
Fluent native speakers
Name the analysis (iʿrāb) and the forms (ṣarf); the meanings the patterns carry; read a commentary.
The companions
Scholars and the classically trained
Read the commentaries and glosses; lead the grammar point; hear others read.
A first eight weeks: al-Fātiḥa
Seven verses, known by heart by many people in any room, and dense with core roots and the main patterns. One verse a week, then a week to put it together.
Tanzil text as in the reader
بِسْمِ ٱللَّهِ ٱلرَّحْمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ
- Pattern
- Two intensives from one root: raḥmān (faʿlān) and raḥīm (faʿīl).
- Grammar
- The preposition bi- and the genitive after it.
ٱلْحَمْدُ لِلَّهِ رَبِّ ٱلْعَـٰلَمِينَ
- Pattern
- The verbal noun: ḥamd, the act of praising.
- Grammar
- A nominal sentence: subject (mubtadaʾ) and predicate (khabar).
ٱلرَّحْمَـٰنِ ٱلرَّحِيمِ
- Pattern
- faʿlān and faʿīl again, side by side, now as epithets.
- Grammar
- Adjectives that follow their noun and agree in case.
مَـٰلِكِ يَوْمِ ٱلدِّينِ
- Pattern
- The active participle fāʿil: mālik, the one who owns.
- Grammar
- The construct (iḍāfa): two nouns bound into one phrase.
إِيَّاكَ نَعْبُدُ وَإِيَّاكَ نَسْتَعِينُ
- Pattern
- Form X, istafʿala, the form of seeking: nastaʿīn, we seek help.
- Grammar
- An object placed first for emphasis: iyyāka.
ٱهْدِنَا ٱلصِّرَٰطَ ٱلْمُسْتَقِيمَ
- Pattern
- The Form X participle: mustaqīm.
- Grammar
- The imperative, and a verb with two objects.
صِرَٰطَ ٱلَّذِينَ أَنْعَمْتَ عَلَيْهِمْ غَيْرِ ٱلْمَغْضُوبِ عَلَيْهِمْ وَلَا ٱلضَّآلِّينَ
- Pattern
- The passive participle mafʿūl: maghḍūb, the one on whom anger falls.
- Grammar
- The relative clause (alladhīna), and a noun standing in for another (badal).
Week 8 · the whole sūra
- Pattern
- Review every pattern met; find each once more elsewhere in the library.
- Grammar
- Read the whole sūra aloud to a companion, and narrate it in your own words.
Or begin with poetry: the Khamriyya
Ibn al-Fāriḍ's Wine Ode, a line or half a line a week, for its music. Ibn Khaldūn reports a scholar who thought poetry the better first step for the language (see the case); some circles will agree.
Sharḥ Dīwān Ibn al-Fāriḍ (Cairo 1872) vowelled as in the reader
شَرِبْنا عَلَى ذِكْرِ الْحَبِيبِ مُدامَةً سَكِرْنا بِها مِنْ قَبْلِ أَنْ يُخْلَقَ الْكَرْمُ
- Pattern
- faʿīl: ḥabīb, the beloved.
- Grammar
- The past tense with its subject suffix: sharibnā, we drank.
شَرِبْنا عَلَى ذِكْرِ الْحَبِيبِ مُدامَةً سَكِرْنا بِها مِنْ قَبْلِ أَنْ يُخْلَقَ الْكَرْمُ
- Pattern
- The passive verb: yukhlaqa, it was created.
- Grammar
- min qabli an: before, with the subjunctive after an.
لَهَا الْبَدْرُ كَأْسٌ وَهْيَ شَمْسٌ يُدِيرُهَا هِلَالٌ وَكَمْ يَبْدُو إِذَا مُزِجَتْ نَجْمُ
- Pattern
- Form IV, afʿala: yudīru, he passes it round.
- Grammar
- A nominal sentence: al-badru kaʾsun, the full moon is a cup.
وَلَوْلَا شَذَاهَا مَا اهْتَدَيْتُ لِحَانِهَا وَلَوْلَا سَنَاهَا مَا تَصَوَّرَهَا الْوَهْمُ
- Pattern
- Form VIII (iftaʿala) and Form V (tafaʿʿala): ihtadaytu, taṣawwara.
- Grammar
- lawlā … mā: were it not for …, then not.
Week 5 · line 4
وَلَمْ يُبْقِ مِنْهَا الدَّهْرُ غَيْرَ حُشَاشَةٍ كَأَنَّ خَفَاهَا فِي صُدُورِ النُّهَى كَتْمُ
- Pattern
- Hear the metre, al-ṭawīl (the long), and the rhyme on -mu that closes every line.
- Grammar
- Scan one line together, syllable by syllable.
Week 6 · line 5
فَإِنْ ذُكِرَتْ فِي الْحَيِّ أَصْبَحَ أَهْلُهُ نَشَاوَى وَلا عارٌ عَلَيْهِمْ وَلا إِثْمُ
- Pattern
- Collect the passage's participles and verbal nouns in the deck.
- Grammar
- Meet one point the commentary itself raises.
Week 7 · line 6
وَمِنْ بَيْنِ أَحْشاءِ الدِّنانِ تَصاعَدَتْ وَلَمْ يَبْقَ مِنْها فِي الْحَقِيقَةِ إِلَّا اسْمُ
- Pattern
- One pattern chosen by the circle.
- Grammar
- One point chosen by the circle.
Week 8 · the lines learned
- Pattern
- Review; recite the opening lines from memory.
- Grammar
- Read the lines learned aloud to a companion, and narrate them.
Online
- A video call for the meeting; a chat server (Discord, Matrix, or whatever the circle already uses) for the week between.
- One channel per circle, with a thread for each week's passage.
- The host posts the week's session link so everyone opens the same passage.
- Bring words into the chat with the reader's Share: the word, its root, its source and a link back to its place.
- Recite the week's line to your companion in a short voice call or a voice note.
In person
- Sit in a circle, not in rows. A library room, a kitchen table, a café, a courtyard.
- Print the passage large, with the study sheet of the text, and the kit.
- One phone or speaker for the recording; phones otherwise face down.
- Bring food if you can. Ibn ʿArabī tied adab, the manners of learning, to maʾduba, a banquet: people brought together round a meal (as Denis Gril reads him).
A reading licence
One person heard you read the text, in full, and says so.
The classical ijāza was a personal licence: this student read this text with me. The part worth keeping is simple and true. When you have learned a text, read it aloud, whole, with its roots and grammar, to a companion or guide. They write a few lines and sign them.
- It is not a religious licence, not a licence to teach, and not an academic credential. It says so on its face.
- It claims no historical chain. The only chain is the real one: who heard whom.
- It can stay between the two of you. Nobody has to see it.
The wording, to copy
[Name] read [text, e.g. al-Fātiḥa] aloud in full to me, with its roots and grammar, on [date].
Strong: [what was strong]. To return to: [what to come back to].
Heard by [name].
What to avoid
- Severity, shaming or public ranking. No leaderboards for memorising.
- Streak pressure. Spaced review works without guilt.
- Memorising what has not been understood, when understanding is within reach. Keep the word panel open.
- A pile of handbooks. One primer ladder is enough: the Ājurrūmiyya, then Qaṭr al-nadā, then the Alfiyya.
- The root fallacy. A root shows a family of meanings; the sentence decides the meaning.
- Grammar for its own sake. It serves the reading.
- A single guru. Many guides; companions matter as much.
- Asking anyone what they believe, or making them justify it. The circle teaches reading.
- Promising brain benefits. The evidence does not support them.
- Fake credentials or implied chains of transmission.
The tools, step by step
Word panel
Tap any word: root, pattern, grammar, lexicons, sound.
Roots
Every root in the library, with its core sense and its family.
Grammar
The topics, the verb forms and the classical primers.
Decks
Keep words and lines; review them on a spaced schedule.
Reading plans
A passage a sitting, with your place kept.
Audio
Every text read aloud, word by word, in the reader.
Session link
One link that opens the week's passage for everyone.