Quranic root
ذلل
dh · l · l
The root centers on yielding, lowliness, submission, and softness, in contrast with strength, resistance, or difficulty.
It develops both toward abasement or weakness and toward becoming tractable, tamed, smoothed, or made easy; this latter branch includes compliant animals, passable paths, and fruit made accessible.
- Maqāyīs · row 1907
- Mufradāt · row 509
- 8
- Quran-attested forms
- 11
- Quran senses
- 24
- Quran occurrences
Forms in the Quran
The forms this root actually takes in the Quran. Select one to jump to its senses and examples.
ذَلَّ
dhalla
- Part of speech
- Verb · Form I
- Form
- I
- Quran occurrences
- 1 occurrence
Selected examples are shown with the sense they illustrate — chosen to teach that sense, not the complete list of this form’s Quran occurrences.
To become lowly, weak, or humiliated.
Used of entering a condition of abasement or weakness.
- Lane · entry 21637
- Mufradāt · row 509
Selected Quran examples
Quran 20:134word 18
“we were humiliated”
ذَلَّلَ
dhallala
- Part of speech
- Verb · Form II
- Form
- II
- Quran occurrences
- 3 occurrences
Selected examples are shown with the sense they illustrate — chosen to teach that sense, not the complete list of this form’s Quran occurrences.
To make tractable; to tame, subdue, or place at one's service.
Used of rendering living creatures manageable or subject to use.
- Lane · entry 21638
- Mufradāt · row 509
Selected Quran examples
Quran 36:72word 1
“And We have tamed them”
To make fruit-clusters hang low, arranged, and easy to reach or pick.
Used of the fruit-clusters in Paradise; the verbal noun denotes this making accessible.
- Lane · entry 21638
- Mufradāt · row 509
Selected Quran examples
Quran 76:14word 4
“and will hang low”
Quran 76:14word 6
“dangling low”
أَذَلَّ
ʾadhalla
- Part of speech
- Verb · Form IV
- Form
- IV
- Quran occurrences
- 1 occurrence
Selected examples are shown with the sense they illustrate — chosen to teach that sense, not the complete list of this form’s Quran occurrences.
To lower, abase, humiliate, or render weak.
A causative use: the subject brings another into a state of lowness or humiliation.
- Lane · entry 21639
- Mufradāt · row 509
Selected Quran examples
Quran 3:26word 16
“and You humiliate”
ذَلُول
dhalūl
- Part of speech
- Adjective
- Quran occurrences
- 3 occurrences
Selected examples are shown with the sense they illustrate — chosen to teach that sense, not the complete list of this form’s Quran occurrences.
Tractable, compliant, or made easy to use or traverse.
Used of an animal that is not refractory, and of land or paths made accessible and yielding.
- Lane · entry 21647
- Mufradāt · row 509
Selected Quran examples
ذِلَّة
dhillah
- Part of speech
- Noun
- Quran occurrences
- 7 occurrences
Selected examples are shown with the sense they illustrate — chosen to teach that sense, not the complete list of this form’s Quran occurrences.
Humiliation, abasement, or a condition of lowliness and weakness.
Used of disgrace or humbling that comes upon people.
- Lane · entry 21644
- Mufradāt · row 509
Selected Quran examples
Quran 2:61word 39
“the humiliation”
Quran 70:44word 4
“humiliation”
ذُلّ
dhull
- Part of speech
- Noun
- Quran occurrences
- 3 occurrences
Selected examples are shown with the sense they illustrate — chosen to teach that sense, not the complete list of this form’s Quran occurrences.
Humility, gentle submissiveness, or yielding deference.
In the expression about lowering the wing toward one's parents, it denotes gentleness expressed through humble compliance.
- Lane · entry 21645
- Mufradāt · row 509
Selected Quran examples
Quran 17:24word 4
“(of) humility”
Lowliness, weakness, abasement, or disgrace.
Used both for a condition of weakness and for humiliating disgrace.
- Lane · entry 21644
- Mufradāt · row 509
Selected Quran examples
Quran 17:111word 19
“weakness”
Quran 42:45word 6
“disgrace”
أَذَلّ
ʾadhall
- Part of speech
- Comparative adjective
- Quran occurrences
- 2 occurrences
Selected examples are shown with the sense they illustrate — chosen to teach that sense, not the complete list of this form’s Quran occurrences.
Lower, more lowly, or most humiliated.
A comparative or superlative adjective, with the precise comparison supplied by context.
- Lane · entry 21655
Selected Quran examples
Quran 58:20word 8
“the most humiliated”
Quran 63:8word 9
“the more humble”
أَذِلَّة
ʾadhillah
- Part of speech
- Adjective
- Quran occurrences
- 4 occurrences
Selected examples are shown with the sense they illustrate — chosen to teach that sense, not the complete list of this form’s Quran occurrences.
Humble, gentle, and merciful in one's bearing toward others.
Used of a commendable self-humbling disposition toward the believers.
- Lane · entry 21648
- Mufradāt · row 509
Selected Quran examples
Quran 5:54word 15
“humble”
Lowly, weak, or reduced to humiliation.
Used of persons characterized as weak or brought into a low and humiliated state.
- Lane · entry 21648
- Mufradāt · row 509
Selected Quran examples
Quran 3:123word 6
“weak”
Quran 27:37word 11
“(in) humiliation”
Occurrences in the Quran
Every place this root appears, in Quran order. The first few are shown here.
- 2:61ٱلذِّلَّةُthe humiliation
- 2:71ذَلُولٌۭtrained
- 3:26وَتُذِلُّand You humiliate
- 3:112ٱلذِّلَّةُthe humiliation
- 3:123أَذِلَّةٌۭ ۖweak
Broader Classical Arabic meanings
Recorded for this root in the Classical lexicons beyond its Quran usage. These are secondary to the Quran senses above.
Show 19 Classical meanings
ذَلَّ
To come easily or readily, said of rhymes to a poet.
A figurative literary use.
- Lane · entry 21637
ذَلَّ
To become much broken or demolished at the edge.
Said of a watering-trough, tank, or its upper edge.
- Lane · entry 21637
ذَلَّلَ
To beat or tread a road so that it becomes even and easy to travel.
A figurative extension of making tractable.
- Lane · entry 21638
ذَلَّلَ
To make an affair easy for someone.
Used with an affair or matter as object.
- Lane · entry 21638
أَذَلَّ
To become a person whose companions are lowly or base.
An intransitive Form IV usage.
- Lane · entry 21639
أَذَلَّ
To enter a low or base condition.
An intransitive Form IV usage.
- Lane · entry 21639
اِسْتَذَلَّ
To deem or find someone lowly or contemptible.
Form X.
- Lane · entry 21641
اِسْتَذَلَّ
To remove ticks from a refractory camel in order to obtain relief and ease with it.
A specialized camel-related expression.
- Lane · entry 21641
تَذَلْذَلَ
To be in commotion or agitation, and become lax, slack, or pendulous.
A reduplicated quadriliteral form.
- Lane · entry 21643
ذِلّ
A beaten and level part of a road; figuratively, an easy or proper course in which affairs proceed.
Also occurs in the plural أَذْلَال in sayings about letting matters take their fitting course.
- Lane · entry 21645
ذُلُل
Made easy to pierce, said of spearheads sharpened thin and slender.
A poetic application of the plural.
- Lane · entry 21647
ذَلِيل
Low, base, abased, humiliated, or weak.
An adjective, with plurals including أَذِلَّة.
- Lane · entry 21648
ذَلِيل
Even, smooth, beaten, and easy to travel.
Said of a road, land, or ground.
- Lane · entry 21648
ذَلِيل
Low; also low and thin, or short.
Said, according to context, of a wall, building, mountain, or spear.
- Lane · entry 21648
ذَلِيل
Intensely low or abasing; an intensive adjective that can mean one who lowers or abases.
An intensive adjectival use.
- Lane · entry 21648
ذَلُولِيّ
Good and easy in natural disposition.
An adjective of character or temperament.
- Lane · entry 21649
ذُلْذُل
The lower trailing parts of a long shirt; figuratively, the last or lowest people.
The figurative use can denote the baser or meaner among a group.
- Lane · entry 21651
مَذَلَّة
A wooden pin, peg, or stake.
An idiomatic nominal use, associated with a battered or broken head.
- Lane · entry 21657
مُذَلَّل
Having fruit-racemes bent down so that the fruit may be easily gathered.
Especially said of palm-trees; also discussed in relation to making access easy.
- Lane · entry 21658
Cautions
Points that affect how this root should be read.
Classical sources distinguish ذُلّ, abasement imposed through overpowering, from ذِلّ, yielding or tractability after resistance; Quranic readings and context can bring the two semantic shades close together, especially in 17:24.