Grammar term · Nahw · syntax
مُؤَخَّر
mu'akhkhar
Postponed (mu'akhkhar)
Nahw · syntaxOperationcore term1,023+ in the Qur'an
In one line
Delayed: a word pushed after its natural slot — the mubtada waiting behind its khabar: لِلَّهِ ٱلْمَشْرِقُ.
Classical definition
التَّأْخِيرُ جَعْلُ الكَلِمَةِ فِي آخِرِ الكَلَامِ وَهِيَ تَسْتَحِقُّ التَّقْدِيمَ، لِغَرَضٍ بَلَاغِيٍّ.
“Delaying is placing a word at the end of the speech when it deserves the earlier position, for a rhetorical purpose.”
(بتصرف من ابن هشام)
Key words in the Arabic
تَسْتَحِقُّ التَّقْدِيمَdeserves the earlier slot
مُؤَخَّرdelayed
Understand it
The mirror of fronting: when one part jumps forward, its partner is left standing after — and i'rab names them as a pair, خبر مقدم / مبتدأ مؤخر. The commonest case in the Qur'an: a jarr phrase or zarf opens the sentence and the true mubtada follows it (وَلِلَّهِ ٱلْمَشْرِقُ وَٱلْمَغْرِبُ). Some delays are compulsory — an indefinite mubtada must wait (فِي الدَّارِ رَجُلٌ) — others rhetorical.
How to spot it
Recognition test
Find the sentence's real topic standing after its news: label it mubtada mu'akhkhar (or fa'il, ism inna… mu'akhkhar) and its fronted partner muqaddam.
In the Qur'an
وَلِلَّهِ ٱلْمَشْرِقُ وَٱلْمَغْرِبُ
Al-Baqarah 2:115 — “To Allah belong the east and the west”
لِلَّهِ is the khabar fronted; ٱلْمَشْرِقُ is the mubtada mu'akhkhar — ownership stated before the owned.
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