أكل and أخذ | Arabic (Modern Standard) Grammar

Form I أَكَلَ / يَأْكُلُ “eat,” root ء-ك-ل, and أَخَذَ / يَأْخُذُ “take,” root ء-خ-ذ, preserve their initial root hamza in the perfect and imperfect. Their familiar commands, however, are exceptionally short: كُلْ “eat!” and خُذْ “take!” The hamza is deleted from the imperative stem, not merely hidden by an orthographic convention.

These verbs therefore need to be learned as principal-part sets: أَكَلَ — يَأْكُلُ — كُلْ — أَكْل, and أَخَذَ — يَأْخُذُ — خُذْ — أَخْذ. Their finite agreement endings and imperfect moods are otherwise ordinary. English supplies no warning that the Arabic commands will be shortened, so deriving them mechanically from “eat” and “take” is unsafe.

The general method for building commands from jussive stems appears in Imperative Formation; the exceptional deletion here has to be added to that method.

Principal parts and lexical behavior

Function	أكل	أخذ
root and Form	ء-ك-ل, Form I	ء-خ-ذ, Form I
3 m.sg. perfect	أَكَلَ	أَخَذَ
3 m.sg. imperfect	يَأْكُلُ	يَأْخُذُ
2 m.sg. imperative	كُلْ	خُذْ
common maṣdar	أَكْل	أَخْذ
active participle	آكِل	آخِذ
passive participle	مَأْكُول	مَأْخُوذ

Both verbs are normally transitive: what is eaten or taken is a direct object. أكل الطعامَ means “eat the food”; أخذ الكتابَ means “take the book.” أخذ has many lexical extensions—“adopt a decision,” “take a sample,” “begin to”—but its complement structure depends on the particular sense. This page uses the ordinary concrete and institutional senses and does not pretend that one English gloss predicts every construction.

أكلت سلمى تفاحة قبل التدريب.

ʾakalat salmā tuffāḥatan qabla t-tadrīb.

Salma ate an apple before training. (Neutral MSA.)

أخذ الباحثان عينتين من مياه النهر.

ʾakhadha l-bāḥithāni ʿaynatayni min miyāhi n-nahr.

The two researchers took two samples from the river water. (Formal VSO; singular verb before a dual subject.)

💡

Store each verb with its imperfect and command. The perfect alone tells you that hamza is initial, but only the complete set tells you the imperfect vowel and the exceptional imperative.

Hamza in the perfect and imperfect

In أَكَلَ and أَخَذَ, initial أ is hamzat al-qaṭʿ and the first root consonant. It is pronounced ʾ even after another word: وَأَكَلَ wa-ʾakala, فَأَخَذَ fa-ʾakhadha. It is not the removable hamzat al-waṣl found at the beginning of many derived Forms.

When an imperfect person prefix is added, root hamza becomes word-medial: يَأْكُلُ، تَأْكُلِينَ، نَأْخُذُ. The preceding prefix vowel is short a; there is no long vowel in يأكل or يأخذ. The written أ represents the root consonant on an alif seat.

يأكل الأطفال في المدرسة عند الظهر.

yaʾkulu l-ʾaṭfālu fī l-madrasati ʿinda ẓ-ẓuhr.

The children eat at school at noon. (Neutral VSO; singular verb before a human plural.)

الممرضات يأخذن استراحة قصيرة بعد الجولة الصباحية.

al-mumarriḍātu yaʾkhudhna stirāḥatan qaṣīratan baʿda l-jawlati ṣ-ṣabāḥiyya.

The nurses take a short break after the morning round. (All female; subject-first.)

The feminine-plural ending نَ produces يَأْكُلْنَ، يَأْخُذْنَ with sukūn before it. Hamza remains. With the five-verb endings, use ordinary forms such as تَأْكُلِينَ، يَأْخُذَانِ، يَأْكُلُونَ.

The active participles آكِل and آخِذ use madda آ because hamza is followed by the long ā of the participial pattern. Madda does not mean that the radical has disappeared.

هذا النص مأخوذ من تقرير رسمي، لا من مدونة.

hādhā n-naṣṣu maʾkhūdhun min taqrīrin rasmiyyin, lā min mudawwana.

This text is taken from an official report, not from a blog. (Formal.)

Mood changes the ending, not the root

The singular imperfect contrasts يَأْكُلُ / لَنْ يَأْكُلَ / لَمْ يَأْكُلْ and يَأْخُذُ / لَنْ يَأْخُذَ / لَمْ يَأْخُذْ. Hamza stays between the person prefix and the second radical. The particle determines mood: لن takes the subjunctive; لم takes the jussive and supplies past-negative meaning.

لن تأكل مريم قبل أن ينتهي الفحص.

lan taʾkula maryamu qabla ʾan yantahiya l-faḥṣ.

Maryam will not eat before the examination is over. (Formal; subjunctive after lan.)

لم يأخذ المدير قرارا نهائيا بعد.

lam yaʾkhudhi l-mudīru qarāran nihāʾiyyan baʿd.

The director has not made a final decision yet. (Formal; jussive after lam.)

Underlying يأخذْ receives a helping i before the article in connected speech: يأخذِ المدير. That boundary vowel is phonological repair, not an indicative ending.

With masculine plural and feminine singular forms in the five verbs, mood deletes the final nūn in the normal way: يأكلونَ → لن يأكلوا / لم يأكلوا, تأخذينَ → لن تأخذي / لم تأخذي. The special behavior belongs to the command stem, not to every part of the paradigm.

The short imperative set

The commands are built on the short stems كُلْ and خُذْ. Add the normal imperative agreement endings directly:

Addressee	“eat”	“take”
one man	كُلْ	خُذْ
one woman	كُلِي	خُذِي
two people	كُلَا	خُذَا
men or mixed group	كُلُوا	خُذُوا
all-female group	كُلْنَ	خُذْنَ

There is no prefixed تـ in an imperative and no written alif before these short commands. Forms such as اؤكل or اأخذ are not contemporary MSA imperatives. The deletion is lexical and inherited; it does not authorize learners to remove hamza from arbitrary initial-hamza verbs.

كلي شيئا قبل أن تتناولي الدواء يا سلمى.

kulī shayʾan qabla ʾan tatanāwalī d-dawāʾa yā salmā.

Eat something before you take the medicine, Salma. (Direct advice to one woman.)

خذوا معكم ماء كافيا؛ فالطريق طويل.

khudhū maʿakum māʾan kāfiyan; faṭ-ṭarīqu ṭawīl.

Take enough water with you; the journey is long. (Addressing men or a mixed group.)

خذا مقعديكما في الصف الأمامي.

khudhā maqʿadaykumā fī ṣ-ṣaffi l-ʾamāmiyy.

Take your seats in the front row. (Addressing two people.)

كلن وجبتكن قبل بدء المناوبة.

kulna wajbatakunna qabla badʾi l-munāwaba.

Eat your meal before the shift begins. (Addressing an all-female group.)

💡

The short command still takes ordinary agreement endings: خُذْ is not a universal command for every audience. Match خُذِي، خُذَا، خُذُوا, or خُذْنَ to the addressee.

Negative commands use the full imperfect stem

A negative command is not the imperative plus لا. Prohibitive لا governs a second-person jussive imperfect, so root hamza returns: لا تَأْكُلْ، لا تَأْخُذْ. With a feminine singular addressee, the nūn is deleted: لا تأكلي، لا تأخذي.

لا تأخذ هذه النسخة؛ فهي قديمة.

lā taʾkhudh hādhihi n-nuskhata; fa-hiya qadīma.

Do not take this copy; it is old. (Addressing one man.)

The alternation خُذْ / لا تَأْخُذْ is morphological, not optional spelling. English uses “take” in both positive and negative commands; Arabic switches between an imperative stem and a governed imperfect.

Common Mistakes

Keeping hamza in the short imperative

❌ اأكل وجبتك قبل الاجتماع.

Incorrect — the ordinary 2 m.sg. imperative of أكل is the lexical short form كُلْ.

✅ كل وجبتك قبل الاجتماع.

kul wajbataka qabla l-ijtimāʿ.

Eat your meal before the meeting. (Addressing one man.)

Using one command form for every addressee

❌ خذ هذه البطاقة يا مريم.

Incorrect in fully inflected MSA — one woman requires خُذِي.

✅ خذي هذه البطاقة يا مريم.

khudhī hādhihi l-biṭāqata yā maryam.

Take this card, Maryam.

Dropping hamza from a negative command

❌ لا خذ الملف من المكتب.

Incorrect — prohibitive lā governs a second-person jussive imperfect: لا تَأْخُذْ.

✅ لا تأخذ الملف من المكتب قبل أن تسجله.

lā taʾkhudhi l-milaffa mina l-maktabi qabla ʾan tusajjilah.

Do not take the file from the office before logging it. (Addressing one man.)

Giving a plural verb to a following plural subject

❌ يأكلون الأطفال عند الظهر.

Incorrect in neutral VSO — a verb before an overt human plural is singular.

✅ يأكل الأطفال وجبتهم عند الظهر.

yaʾkulu l-ʾaṭfālu wajbatahum ʿinda ẓ-ẓuhr.

The children eat their meal at noon.

Key Takeaways

Learn أَكَلَ — يَأْكُلُ — كُلْ and أَخَذَ — يَأْخُذُ — خُذْ as complete sets.
Root hamza is pronounced in the perfect and imperfect; only the positive imperative uses the exceptional short stem.
Add ordinary command endings for gender and number, and use a jussive imperfect after prohibitive لا.
Mood and agreement remain regular: hamzation does not license English-style tense substitution or loss of person marking.

Now practice Arabic

Reading grammar gets you part of the way. The exercises are where it sticks — free, no signup needed.

Start learning Arabic →