Jemputan ke majlis itu dihantar kepada semua saudara-mara kami.

Invitations to that event are sent to all our relatives.

Breakdown of Jemputan ke majlis itu dihantar kepada semua saudara-mara kami.

• itu: that
• ke: to
• kepada: to
• semua: all
• kami: our
• jemputan: the invitation
• majlis: the event
• dihantar: to be sent
• saudara-mara: the relatives

Questions & Answers about Jemputan ke majlis itu dihantar kepada semua saudara-mara kami.

What does jemputan mean here, and is it a noun or a verb?

Jemputan is a noun meaning “invitation” in this sentence.

• The base verb is jemput = “to invite”.
• jemputan is a noun derived from the verb jemput, roughly “the thing invited / the invitation”.

So:

• jemput – to invite (verb)
• jemputan – an invitation (noun)

In the sentence Jemputan ke majlis itu …, it means “The invitation to that event…” (or “Invitations to that event…”, since Malay doesn’t mark plural here).

What is the function of ke in ke majlis itu, and why is it not kepada?

ke is a preposition meaning “to / towards” and is used mainly with places or destinations.

• ke majlis itu = “to that event / to that ceremony”

kepada is also translated as “to”, but it is used with people or recipients, especially in more formal style:

• kepada semua saudara-mara kami = “to all our relatives”

So in this sentence:

• ke is used with the event (majlis = ceremony/event).
• kepada is used with the people receiving the invitations (saudara-mara kami = our relatives).

You cannot just swap them here; ke saudara-mara would sound wrong/unnatural in standard Malay, and kepada majlis is also not right.

Why is it majlis itu and not itu majlis? What does itu do here?

Itu means “that”, and it usually comes after the noun in Malay.

• majlis = event / ceremony
• majlis itu = that event / that ceremony (often also functions as “the event” in context)

In Malay, demonstratives like:

• ini = this
• itu = that

normally come after the noun:

• rumah itu = that house
• buku ini = this book

So majlis itu literally is “event that”, but in natural English we say “that event” or simply “the event” if it’s already known from context.

What does dihantar mean, and what is the difference between dihantar and menghantar?

Both come from the root hantar = “to send”.

• menghantar = active voice, “to send” (someone does the sending)
• dihantar = passive voice, “is/was sent” (focus on what is sent, not who sent it)

So:

• Kami menghantar jemputan ke majlis itu.
  = We sent the invitation(s) to that event.

• Jemputan ke majlis itu dihantar …
  = The invitation(s) to that event were sent …

In the original sentence, dihantar makes it a passive sentence, and the doer (the agent) is not stated. In English, we’d usually translate with “was/were sent”.

There is no word for “was” or a past tense marker. How do we know dihantar is past, like “was sent”?

Malay generally does not mark tense (past, present, future) with verb changes like English does.

dihantar itself just means “sent (in passive voice)”, without a fixed time.
The time is understood from context or from optional markers like sudah, telah, akan, tadi, semalam, etc.

In this sentence, because we’re talking about an invitation that has presumably already been sent, the most natural English translation is:

• “The invitation was sent …” / “The invitations were sent …”

If you really want to stress past in Malay, you can say:

• Jemputan ke majlis itu telah dihantar …
• Jemputan ke majlis itu sudah dihantar …

Both mean approximately “The invitations have already been sent …”

Why is it kepada semua saudara-mara kami and not kepada saudara-mara semua kami or another order?

The natural word order in Malay here is:

1. Preposition: kepada (“to”)
2. Quantifier: semua (“all”)
3. Noun phrase: saudara-mara kami (“our relatives”)

So:

• kepada semua saudara-mara kami
  = “to all our relatives”

Breaking it down:

• saudara-mara = relatives
• kami = we / our (exclusive; see below)
• saudara-mara kami = our relatives
• semua saudara-mara kami = all our relatives

Putting semua before the noun phrase is the regular pattern:
semua + [noun phrase]

So other orders like kepada saudara-mara semua kami are ungrammatical or at least very unnatural.

What exactly does saudara-mara mean? Is it only brothers and sisters?

Saudara-mara means “relatives” in a broad sense: extended family members.

• It is not limited to brothers and sisters.
• It can include aunts, uncles, cousins, nephews, nieces, etc., depending on context.

Compare:

• adik-beradik – siblings (brothers and sisters)
• saudara – can mean sibling/relative, but also sometimes “you” in formal address
• saudara-mara – relatives (extended family)

So semua saudara-mara kami = all our relatives (extended family).

Why is saudara-mara written with a hyphen? Is it just plural?

The hyphen in saudara-mara is an example of reduplication/compounding, but here it behaves as a fixed expression.

• Reduplication in Malay often indicates plurality or variety:
  • orang → orang-orang (people)
  • buku → buku-buku (books)

However, saudara-mara is not simply “saudara-saudara”; it’s a set phrase meaning “relatives” in the extended-family sense. You should treat saudara-mara as a single lexical item: a compound noun meaning “relatives”.

You don’t usually change it to saudara-mara-saudaranya or similar; you keep saudara-mara as is and add other markers around it (like semua, kami, etc.).

What is the nuance of kami here, and how is it different from kita?

Malay distinguishes between exclusive “we” and inclusive “we”:

• kami = we / our (exclusive) – does NOT include the listener
• kita = we / our (inclusive) – includes the listener

In saudara-mara kami:

• It means “our relatives (but not including yours, listener)”, or simply “our relatives” where the group is understood from context (e.g. “my family and I”).

If the relatives belonged to a group including the listener, you could say:

• saudara-mara kita = “our relatives (yours and mine)”

In many English contexts, this distinction is lost, and both become just “our”.

Could I say this sentence in an active voice instead of passive? How would that look?

Yes. An active version would explicitly mention the subject (the sender):

Passive (original):

• Jemputan ke majlis itu dihantar kepada semua saudara-mara kami.
  = The invitation(s) to that event were sent to all our relatives.

Active (with kami as the subject):

• Kami menghantar jemputan ke majlis itu kepada semua saudara-mara kami.
  = We sent the invitation(s) to that event to all our relatives.

The meaning in English is very similar, but:

• The original focuses on the invitations (what happened to them).
• The active sentence focuses on us (kami) as the doer.

Malay uses passive structures quite often in formal writing, so the original passive version is very natural.

Is this sentence formal, informal, or neutral in tone?

The sentence is neutral to formal in tone.

Clues:

• jemputan, majlis, dihantar, kepada, saudara-mara all sound natural in polite / written / semi-formal contexts.
• It could easily appear in a letter, an email, or an announcement.

In casual spoken conversation, people might shorten or rephrase it:

• Kita dah hantar jemputan majlis tu pada semua saudara-mara.
  (colloquial style, using kita and pada instead of kepada)

But the original sentence is perfectly fine as standard, polite Malay.

Can you give a simple word-by-word gloss of the sentence?

Yes. Here is a rough breakdown:

• Jemputan – invitation(s)
• ke – to / towards
• majlis – event / ceremony
• itu – that / the
• dihantar – sent (passive: is/was sent)
• kepada – to (for recipients)
• semua – all
• saudara-mara – relatives (extended family)
• kami – our / we (exclusive of the listener)

Putting it together very literally:

• Jemputan ke majlis itu dihantar kepada semua saudara-mara kami.
  = Invitation(s) to that event were-sent to all relatives our.

Natural English:

• The invitations to that event were sent to all our relatives.
  or
• The invitation to the event was sent to all our relatives.