Quranic root
بوأ
b · w · ʾ
The root centers on returning to, occupying, or making a fitting place, with a related branch of equality and equivalence.
Its spatial orientation develops into taking or assigning a place, settling, and returning while bearing something; the second principal branch concerns being equal or equivalent, especially in retaliation.
- Maqāyīs · row 870
- Mufradāt · row 86
- 4
- Quran-attested forms
- 4
- Quran senses
- 17
- Quran occurrences
Forms in the Quran
The forms this root actually takes in the Quran. Select one to jump to its senses and examples.
بَاءَ
bāʾa
- Part of speech
- Verb · Form I
- Form
- I
- Quran occurrences
- 6 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 return bearing, incurring, or becoming answerable for something, especially a sin, anger, or other burden.
In the Quranic constructions, the thing borne or incurred is expressed with بِـ; the verb can convey returning in a state of liability, acknowledging the burden, or becoming subject to its consequence.
- Lane · entry 37394
- Mufradāt · row 86
Selected Quran examples
Quran 2:61word 41
“and they drew on themselves”
Quran 5:29word 4
“you be laden”
Quran 3:112word 14
“And they incurred”
بَوَّأَ
bawwaʾa
- Part of speech
- Verb · Form II
- Form
- II
- Quran occurrences
- 6 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 lodge or settle someone, or to assign and prepare a place or position for occupation.
A causative placement verb: it may concern a dwelling, a settlement, or an assigned station such as a place prepared for action or residence.
- Lane · entry 37395
- Mufradāt · row 86
Selected Quran examples
Quran 3:121word 5
“to post”
Quran 10:93word 2
“We settled”
Quran 22:26word 2
“We assigned”
Quran 16:41word 9
“surely We will give them position”
تَبَوَّأَ
tabawwaʾa
- Part of speech
- Verb · Form V
- Form
- V
- 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.
To take up a place of residence, establish oneself in a place, or settle there; also to secure dwellings for a group.
The form is generally reflexive or self-directed, with the place or dwelling as the location taken or occupied; the Quran also uses it for arranging dwellings for others.
- Mufradāt · row 86
Selected Quran examples
Quran 10:87word 6
“Settle”
Quran 12:56word 6
“to settle”
Quran 39:74word 9
“we may settle”
Quran 59:9word 2
“settled”
مُبَوَّأٌ
mubawwaʾun
- Part of speech
- Passive participle · substantivized
- 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.
A place assigned or prepared for settlement; a dwelling or established place.
The passive participle is used substantivally for the place in which someone is settled or enabled to reside.
- Mufradāt · row 86
- Lane · entry 37395
Selected Quran examples
Quran 10:93word 5
“(in) a settlement”
Occurrences in the Quran
Every place this root appears, in Quran order. The first few are shown here.
- 2:61وَبَآءُوand they drew on themselves
- 2:90فَبَآءُوSo they have drawn (on themselves)
- 3:112وَبَآءُوAnd they incurred
- 3:121تُبَوِّئُto post
- 3:162بَآءَdraws
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 32 Classical meanings
بَاءَ
To return, go back, or withdraw to a person, place, or thing; in some usage, to attach oneself exclusively as a companion or associate.
An ordinary return or withdrawal construction, distinct from the Quranic construction of returning while bearing a burden.
- Lane · entry 37394
بَاءَ بِهِ إِلَيْهِ
To return, take back, or bring something back to someone.
A transitive construction involving an object returned to its recipient.
- Lane · entry 37394
بَاءَ بِكَفِّي
To come to rest or remain in someone’s hand.
An idiomatic use describing an object, especially a weapon, as resting in or returning to the hand.
- Lane · entry 37394
بَاءَ بِفُلَانٍ
To be equal, equivalent, or a fitting match for another, especially so that one person may be taken in retaliation for the other.
The equality may concern persons, blood, or legal retaliation; the construction can also describe making one blood equivalent to another by retaliation.
- Lane · entry 37394
بَاءَ
To exalt oneself or act proudly.
An independently reported, etymologically explained use, not a Quranic Form I sense.
- Lane · entry 37394
بَوَّأَ
To have sexual intercourse or to marry, as an idiomatic extension of providing or occupying a dwelling.
A figurative or euphemistic use; the supplied evidence presents intercourse and marriage as related expressions.
- Lane · entry 37396
تَبَوَّأَ
To marry, used euphemistically.
A conventional figurative use of the Form V verb, distinct from its spatial sense.
- Mufradāt · row 86
نَكَحَ
To marry or take in marriage.
This meaning is recorded under the supplied نَكَحَ headword and is not reassigned to a b-w-ʾ-derived headword.
- Lane · entry 37397
بَوَّأَ الرُّمْحَ
To direct or level a spear toward someone, confront him with it, or ready it for thrusting.
A weapon-directed construction.
- Lane · entry 37397
أَبَاءَ
To bring camels or other livestock back to their resting place, or make them lie down there.
The resting place is the watering-place station where the animals are made to lie down; the verb can also mean bringing the animals back for someone.
- Lane · entry 37399
أَبَاءَ الأَدِيمَ
To put a hide or skin into tanning liquid.
A specialized craft-related transitive construction.
- Lane · entry 37399
أَبَأَ مِنْهُ
To flee from him.
An intransitive Form IV use.
- Lane · entry 37399
أَبَأَ
To extend or run on into another desert, said of a broad tract of desert.
An idiomatic description of the amplitude of a desert.
- Lane · entry 37399
أَبَأَ
To make someone acknowledge or confess something, especially responsibility for a claim or blood.
A causative acknowledgment construction.
- Lane · entry 37399
تَبَوَّأَ مِنْ أَهْلِهِ
To exercise mastery, authority, or power over his wife, as over his house.
A specialized construction explicitly applied to the marital relationship.
- Lane · entry 37400
تَبَاوَأَ
To become equal in retaliation, especially when two slain persons are treated as equivalents.
A reciprocal Form VI construction concerning equality in retaliation.
- Lane · entry 37401
اِسْتَبْأَأَ
To seek retaliation: to ask that a slayer be killed in return for the slain.
A Form X request or legal-retaliation construction.
- Lane · entry 37402
اِسْتَبَاءَ
In one attested interpretation, to take a protected or respected man’s wife as one’s own.
A specialized interpretation of a poetic passage, presented alongside the retaliation interpretation.
- Lane · entry 37402
بَاءٌ
A libidinous or sexually wanton man.
A rare nominal use.
- Lane · entry 37403
بَاءَةٌ
Sexual intercourse or marriage.
A figurative noun associated with the place of abode and the marital household; it may also refer to the marriage contract or its provision.
- Lane · entry 37404
بِيئَةٌ
A mode or manner of taking a place of abode; hence, a state or condition.
The extended sense describes someone’s general condition, whether good or bad.
- Lane · entry 37405
بَوَاءٌ
Equality, equivalence, likeness, or agreement; equal division or accord.
It can describe equal persons, equal shares, equivalent blood, equally matched wounds, or a group giving one consistent reply.
- Lane · entry 37405
مَكَانٌ بَوَاءٌ
A place that suits its occupant, being even, fitting, or not rejecting the one who settles in it.
A spatial adjective or noun expressing suitability of place.
- Mufradāt · row 86
مَبَاءَةٌ
The resting place of camels, sheep, or goats, especially the station at a watering-place to which they return.
The animal-resting-place sense is the primary concrete use reported for this noun.
- Lane · entry 37409
مَبَاءَةٌ
A place of abode where people alight and remain.
A general human dwelling-place sense, including a place beside a valley or at the foot of a mountain.
- Lane · entry 37409
رَحِيبُ المَبَاءَةِ
Generously bountiful or ample in hospitality.
A figurative idiom based on the breadth of one’s place of abode.
- Lane · entry 37409
مَبَاءَةٌ
The covert or shelter of a wild bull.
A specialized zoological use.
- Lane · entry 37409
مَبَاءَةٌ
A nest or resting place of bees.
The evidence reports both a mountain nest and, in another account, the bees’ nightly resting place without restricting it to a mountain.
- Lane · entry 37409
مَبَاءَةٌ
The part of the womb where the child has its abode.
An anatomical use referring to the child’s place within the womb.
- Lane · entry 37409
مَبَاءَةٌ
The place in a well where water returns or collects after being drawn.
A technical well-related use.
- Lane · entry 37409
مَبَاءَةٌ
The place where the driver of a water-drawing animal stands.
A technical sense associated with a well and its water-drawing apparatus.
- Lane · entry 37409
مُبِيئَةٌ
A vehement, pressing, and necessary need.
Used of a want whose urgency makes it compelling.
- Lane · entry 37410
Cautions
Points that affect how this root should be read.
The Quranic Form I usage is constructionally associated with returning while bearing or incurring a burden; it should not be collapsed with the broader ordinary-return or equality branches.
The supplied evidence reports competing classical interpretations for the Form X poetic passage; both the retaliation and wife-taking interpretations are retained as classical evidence rather than assigned to a Quranic form.