Grammar term · Nahw · syntax
أَدَاة شَرْط
adat shart
Conditional operator
Nahw · syntaxParticle typecore term
In one line
The conditional operators — the words (particles and nouns) that tie an “if” to its “then”.
Classical definition
أَدَوَاتُ الشَّرْطِ مَا يَرْبِطُ جَوَابًا بِشَرْطٍ، مِنْهَا الجَازِمُ كَإِنْ وَمَنْ وَمَا، وَغَيْرُ الجَازِمِ كَإِذَا وَلَوْ وَلَوْلَا.
“The conditional operators bind a response to a condition: the jazm-causing ones like إِنْ, مَنْ and مَا, and the non-jazm ones like إِذَا, لَوْ and لَوْلَا.”
(بتصرف من ابن هشام)
Key words in the Arabic
الجَازِمjazm-causing
غَيْر الجَازِمnot jazm-causing
Understand it
One family, two branches. إِنْ and its fellows put both verbs into jazm — condition and answer alike. إِذَا (when), لَوْ (if only — contrary to fact) and لَوْلَا (were it not) carry the same logic without touching the endings. Meeting a shart word, first ask which branch it belongs to; that decides what you expect of the two verbs.
How to spot it
Recognition test
An “if/when(ever)” word opening a two-part sentence; with the jazm branch, both verbs show jazm.
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