Breakdown of كنا نتبرع بالطعام لليتيم حبا له.
الal
the
طعامta'âm
food
هhu
his / him (object) / it (dummy pronoun after لأن)
نحنnahnu
we
لli
for, to (attached)
كانkâna
to be
حبhubb
love
تبرع بtabarra'a bi
to donate
يتيمyatîm
orphan
Questions & Answers about كنا نتبرع بالطعام لليتيم حبا له.
Why is the word for love written as حبا instead of just حب?
حبا is an Adverbial Accusative of Purpose (المفعول لأجله). In Arabic, you can explain why an action was done by using a verbal noun in the accusative case, which gives it the -an ending. Instead of using a full phrase like 'because we love him', Arabic expresses 'out of love' simply by making the word for love accusative: حبا.
Why do we use two verbs, كنا and نتبرع, right next to each other?
This combination creates the past continuous tense, meaning 'we were donating'. كنا is the past tense of the verb 'to be' for 'we' (we were), and نتبرع is the present tense verb for 'we donate'. Putting the past tense of 'to be' right before a present tense verb is the standard way to show an ongoing action in the past.
Why is there a ب attached to the word for food in بالطعام?
The verb نتبرع (we donate) requires the preposition ب to introduce the item being donated. In Arabic, you cannot just say you 'donate food'; you must literally say you 'donate with the food', which is why we use بالطعام.
What happened to the spelling of the word for 'the orphan' in لليتيم?
The standalone word for 'the orphan' is اليتيم. However, there is a special spelling rule in Arabic: when you attach the preposition ل (to/for) to a word that starts with ال (the), the ا (alif) is completely dropped from the spelling. Therefore, ل plus اليتيم becomes لليتيم.
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