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Grammar term · The harf · Non-Governing Particles

Attention particle (tanbih)

harf tanbih
حَرْف تَنْبِيه
The harfNon-Governing Particlesadvanced term
In one line
An attention particle — أَلَا, أَمَا, or the هَا of هَٰذَا: “Now listen!”.
Classical definition
حُرُوفُ التَّنْبِيهِ مَا يُنَبَّهُ بِهِ المُخَاطَبُ، كَهَا وَأَلَا وَأَمَا.
“The attention particles are those by which the addressed one is alerted — like ha, ala and ama.”
Key words in the Arabic
يُنَبَّهُ بِهِby which one is alerted
Understand it

أَلَا clears the air before something weighty: أَلَا إِنَّ أَوْلِيَاءَ اللَّهِ لَا خَوْفٌ عَلَيْهِمْ — “Listen: indeed the friends of Allah…”. And the هَا you see daily in هَٰذَا is this same particle fused onto the demonstrative: ha + dha, “look — this”. Small words that do nothing but raise the listener's head.

The three
#Meaning
1أَلَاalāLo! — and it opens a sentence
2أَمَاamāBehold!
3هَاhāTake heed! — and it is the هَا welded to هَٰذَا

They govern nothing. Their work is to make the listener look up before the sentence arrives. In هَٰذَا the demonstrative is really ذَا; the هَا in front of it is this particle.

How to spot it
Recognition test
أَلَا / أَمَا opening a sentence that then makes an announcement — attention machinery.
In the Qur'an
أَلَآ إِنَّ أَوْلِيَآءَ ٱللَّهِ لَا خَوْفٌ عَلَيْهِمْ وَلَا هُمْ يَحْزَنُونَ
Yunus 10:62 — “Behold! verily on the friends of Allah there is no fear, nor shall they grieve;”
أَلَآ opens the ayah with nothing but a call for attention — hear this — and إِنَّ follows it to give the statement weight. A harf tanbih changes no ending; it changes how you listen.
Common questions

Does an attention particle change any ending?

No, and that is what marks it out. It governs nothing at all. Its whole work is on the listener rather than on the sentence — it asks you to attend to what is coming, and the grammar carries on around it untouched.

Next in the guideحَرْف اسْتِئْنَافResumption particle (isti'naf) →

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