Quranic root
صبر
ṣ · b · r
The root centers on holding back or restraining, especially restraining oneself from impatience; it also has distinct branches involving upper edges and hard or collected stone.
The lexical development extends from self-restraint and confinement to things held together, heaped, or made firm, while a separate branch denotes the upper or edge portions of things and stones or stony ground.
- Maqāyīs · row 2747
- 6
- Quran-attested forms
- 8
- Quran senses
- 103
- Quran occurrences
Forms in the Quran
The forms this root actually takes in the Quran. Select one to jump to its senses and examples.
صَبَرَ
ṣabara
- Part of speech
- Verb · Form I
- Form
- I
- Quran occurrences
- 58 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 restrain oneself from impatience and endure hardship with patience; to remain steadfast.
Used for enduring affliction, resisting desire, remaining firm in obedience, and withholding complaint. It may be intransitive, or occur with the self understood or with عَلَى or عَنْ.
- Lane · entry 25267
- Mufradāt · row 813
Selected Quran examples
Quran 11:115word 1
“And be patient”
To wait patiently for an appointed outcome or judgment.
A Quranic use of patient endurance with an expected ruling or outcome, as in صَبْرٌ لِحُكْمٍ; it is more than mere passive delay.
- Mufradāt · row 813
Selected Quran examples
Quran 52:48word 1
“So be patient”
In the exclamatory construction ما أَصْبَرَهُمْ عَلَى النَّارِ: to be astonishingly bold or heedless in exposing oneself to the Fire.
This Quranic construction presents the people addressed as extraordinarily bold to undertake the deeds leading to the Fire, rather than simply praising their patience.
- Lane · entry 25270
- Mufradāt · row 813
Selected Quran examples
Quran 2:175word 9
“their endurance”
صَابَرَ
ṣābara
- Part of speech
- Verb · Form III
- Form
- III
- 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 vie with one another in patience or endurance; to mutually hold firm in trial.
In وَصَابِرُوا, the construction conveys active competition or mutual outlasting in patience, conventionally presented as a stronger progression than merely enduring oneself.
- Lane · entry 25269
- Mufradāt · row 813
Selected Quran examples
Quran 3:200word 5
“and [be] patient”
اِصْطَبَرَ
āiṣṭabara
- Part of speech
- Verb · Form VIII
- Form
- VIII
- 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 labor to maintain patience; to persevere steadfastly.
The Quranic construction اِصْطَبِرْ لِعِبَادَتِهِ emphasizes sustained, effortful perseverance in worship or another demanding course.
- Mufradāt · row 813
- Lane · entry 25273
Selected Quran examples
Quran 19:65word 7
“and be constant”
Quran 20:132word 4
“and be steadfast”
صَابِر
ṣābir
- Part of speech
- Active participle
- Quran occurrences
- 22 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.
One who is patient, enduring, and steadfast.
An active-participial epithet for a person who restrains the self and remains firm through affliction, obedience, struggle, or deprivation; the Quran applies the form to masculine and feminine groups as well as individuals.
- Lane · entry 25300
- Mufradāt · row 813
Selected Quran examples
Quran 2:153word 10
“the patient ones”
Quran 8:65word 11
“steadfast”
Quran 33:35word 11
“and the patient women”
صَبْر
ṣabr
- Part of speech
- Verbal noun
- Quran occurrences
- 15 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.
Patience, endurance, or self-restraint from impatience.
A general noun for maintaining composure and withholding oneself from complaint or impulsive response in hardship, duty, or trial.
- Lane · entry 25275
- Mufradāt · row 813
Selected Quran examples
صَبَّار
ṣabbār
- 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.
Marked by very great or persistent patience; intensely steadfast.
An intensive adjective for someone whose patience involves unusual constancy, effort, or struggle rather than a merely occasional act of endurance.
- Lane · entry 25300
- Lane · entry 25296
- Mufradāt · row 813
Selected Quran examples
Quran 14:5word 20
“patient”
Quran 42:33word 14
“patient”
Occurrences in the Quran
Every place this root appears, in Quran order. The first few are shown here.
- 2:45بِٱلصَّبْرِthrough patience
- 2:61نَّصْبِرَwe endure
- 2:153بِٱلصَّبْرِthrough patience
- 2:153ٱلصَّـٰبِرِينَthe patient ones
- 2:155ٱلصَّـٰبِرِينَ(to) the patient ones
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 43 Classical meanings
صَبَرَ
To confine, detain, retain, restrain, or withhold a person or thing.
A transitive use, including restraint from or withholding something with عَنْهُ.
- Lane · entry 25267
صَبْر
Boldness or daring in enduring or attempting something.
A lexical extension of endurance toward courageous or audacious undertaking.
- Lane · entry 25267
صَبَرَ / مَصْبُورٌ
To bind or confine a living being until death; a being so held for killing.
Includes deliberate confinement for slaughter or execution, whether by bonds or by setting the victim up to be shot or otherwise killed.
- Lane · entry 25267
- Lane · entry 25306
صَبَرَ / مَصْبُورَةٌ
To confine or constrain someone until an oath is sworn; an oath imposed under such custody.
The associated oath may itself be called مَصْبُورَةٌ by a tropical extension, while the person is the one literally confined.
- Lane · entry 25267
- Lane · entry 25275
- Lane · entry 25306
صَبَرَ
To cleave or cling to someone.
A distinct intransitive or relational use, synonymous with remaining attached to a person.
- Lane · entry 25267
صَبَرَ / صَبِيرٌ
To become responsible or act as surety for someone or something.
The noun صَبِيرٌ denotes the person who undertakes the liability or guarantee.
- Lane · entry 25267
- Lane · entry 25288
صَبَّرَ
To heap or gather a thing into a compact mass.
Applied especially to gathering grain or goods together without measuring or weighing; a related passive description is being collected into such a mass.
- Lane · entry 25267
- Lane · entry 25268
- Lane · entry 25273
- Lane · entry 25306
صَبَّرَ
To urge, command, require, or make someone patient.
May involve promising a reward, attributing patience to someone, or enjoining endurance.
- Lane · entry 25268
صَبَّرَ
To embalm a dead body with the substance called صَبِر.
Reported with explicitly limited authority in the lexical discussion.
- Lane · entry 25268
صَبَّرَ / صَابُورَةٌ
To ballast a ship; ballast placed in the bottom of a ship.
The noun denotes the weight used to stabilize a vessel.
- Lane · entry 25268
- Lane · entry 25303
أَصْبَرَ / اِصْطَبَرَ
To retaliate by killing, wounding, or otherwise answering an injury in kind.
A legal or combative use of the derived forms, distinct from ordinary patience.
- Lane · entry 25270
- Lane · entry 25273
أَصْبَرَ
To become hard or intense.
Applied to a thing that has become firm or severe.
- Lane · entry 25270
أُمُّ صَبَّارٍ
A stony tract or lava field of hard, dark, worn stones.
Includes the terrain called حَرَّةٌ and related hard, smooth, or difficult ground.
- Lane · entry 25270
- Lane · entry 25296
أُمُّ صَبَّارٍ / أُمُّ صَبُّورٍ
A calamity, severe war, or inescapably distressing situation.
An idiom for falling into a grave and perplexing predicament.
- Lane · entry 25270
- Lane · entry 25296
- Lane · entry 25298
صَبِيرٌ
A mountain or particular mountain.
The word may also be used for a prominent elevated mass.
- Lane · entry 25270
- Lane · entry 25288
أَصْبَرَ
Of milk, to become very sour and incline toward bitterness.
A specialized sensory use connected with the bitterness of صَبِر.
- Lane · entry 25270
صَبِيرٌ
A thin, round cake of bread used beneath or with food.
It may be spread beneath food or used at a wedding feast.
- Lane · entry 25270
- Lane · entry 25288
صِبَارٌ
A stopper or plug for a bottle.
Synonymous with سَدَادٌ.
- Lane · entry 25270
- Lane · entry 25286
تَصَابَرَ
To be patient or endure one with another.
Used of a group acting mutually in patience or endurance.
- Lane · entry 25272
تَصَابَرَ عَلَى
To league together and aid one another against someone.
A conventional construction with عَلَى, distinct from mutual endurance itself.
- Lane · entry 25272
اِسْتَصْبَرَ
Of a vapor, to become dense.
A specialized intransitive use.
- Lane · entry 25274
صَبْر
Fasting as an act of self-restraint from food, drink, and sexual intercourse.
A conventional designation for fasting, presented as a type of restraint rather than as the general noun's primary meaning.
- Lane · entry 25275
صُبْرٌ
The upper part, side, edge, or thickness of a thing.
Used of the upper edges or sides of vessels and graves, and figuratively for taking something altogether.
- Lane · entry 25276
صُبْرٌ
Land containing pebbles but not rugged ground.
A terrain term related to stony ground.
- Lane · entry 25276
صَبَرٌ
Ice.
A nominal lexical item, distinct from صَبْرٌ meaning patience.
- Lane · entry 25278
صَبِرٌ
Aloe or the expressed juice of a bitter medicinal plant.
Includes the dried medicinal extract and its uninflected plant name.
- Lane · entry 25279
صَبِرٌ
Myrrh.
Reported by Freytag, while the lexical discussion notes that independent authority for this identification is lacking.
- Lane · entry 25279
صَبْرَةٌ
Urine and dung of camels or other beasts compacted together in a watering place.
A specialized concrete noun for a compacted accumulation.
- Lane · entry 25281
صَبْرَةٌ
A particular bird with a red body and dark head, wings, and tail.
The bird is also reported under closely related diminutive or variant forms.
- Lane · entry 25281
صُبْرَةٌ
A quantity of grain or another commodity collected and heaped without measuring or weighing.
Includes reaped or threshed grain gathered in the place where it is processed.
- Lane · entry 25282
صُبْرَةٌ
Wheat sifted with a net-like implement.
A specialized agricultural use of the noun.
- Lane · entry 25282
صُبْرَةٌ
Rough or rugged stones collected together.
A pluralized or collective material use of the same lexical item.
- Lane · entry 25282
صُبَارٌ / صِبَارٌ
The intensely acid fruit of a tree, used medicinally.
The صِبَارٌ spelling is reported as possibly an error for صُبَارٌ.
- Lane · entry 25285
- Lane · entry 25286
صُبَارَةٌ
A stone, a piece of stone, a mass of stones, or a piece of iron.
The plural and variant forms can refer collectively to stones or other hard pieces.
- Lane · entry 25290
صَبِيرٌ
The chief, director, or manager of a people's affairs.
Explained as one who patiently manages affairs for and with a group.
- Lane · entry 25288
صَبِيرٌ
A solitary man without offspring or a brother.
Reported by Golius but explicitly suspected in the source of being an error for صُنْبُورٌ.
- Lane · entry 25288
صَبِيرٌ
A white or dense cloud, especially one stationary or layered above another.
The lexical descriptions include clouds slow to move, remaining stationary, or arranged like steps.
- Lane · entry 25288
صَبِيرٌ
A hill consisting of stones.
A separately reported, weakly attested terrain sense.
- Lane · entry 25288
صَبَارَّةٌ
The intense cold of winter, or the middle of winter.
The term may denote either the severity of winter's cold or its central period.
- Lane · entry 25295
صَبَّارَةٌ
Rugged, elevated, hard ground without herbage.
A terrain term for barren ground rising above adjacent land.
- Lane · entry 25299
صَابِرٌ
Long-suffering or forbearing, especially as an epithet of God who does not hasten to avenge disobedience.
A specialized theological application of the patience epithet, emphasizing deferred vengeance and clemency.
- Lane · entry 25300
أَصْبَرُ
More or most patient; more enduring than another.
A comparative adjective used for unusually great endurance.
- Lane · entry 25304
أَصْبِرَةٌ
Sheep, goats, or camels that return morning and evening to their owners.
A plural noun reported as having no established singular.
- Lane · entry 25305
Cautions
Points that affect how this root should be read.
The QAC Form I grouping includes the exclamatory occurrence ما أَصْبَرَهُمْ عَلَى النَّارِ; it is represented separately from ordinary patience because its Quranic interpretation is boldness or heedlessness.
Several rare classical branches are explicitly qualified in the evidence, especially the reported myrrh sense, the solitary-man sense, and the uncertain collected-flesh report.
Unassigned or ambiguous evidence
lane-unit:Sbr:25307:g1:main contains an uncertain report of مصطير being مُصْطَبِرٌ in the sense of collected flesh, but the identification is explicitly tentative and cannot be assigned confidently.