Quranic root
ردأ
r · d · ʾ
The root centers on reinforcement: a support or strengthening element, extending to personal aid, assistance, and mutual support.
The concrete image is a buttress or attached support for a wall; this develops into the senses of helping, aiding, and supplying support. Related forms also record badness and, under separately headed forms, ruin or destruction.
- Lane · entry 22944
- Lane · entry 22948
- Lane · entry 22947
- Mufradāt · row 544
- 1
- Quran-attested forms
- 1
- Quran senses
- 1
- Quran occurrences
Forms in the Quran
The forms this root actually takes in the Quran. Select one to jump to its senses and examples.
رِدْءٌ
ridʾun
- Part of speech
- Noun
- 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 helper, aide, or supporting associate who accompanies another to assist him.
In the Quranic construction, the رِدْء is one sent with another to support and aid him, specifically to help confirm his speech. This sense denotes personal assistance, not the separate concrete sense of a wall-buttress.
- Lane · entry 22948
- Mufradāt · row 544
Selected Quran examples
Quran 28:34word 9
“(as) a helper”
Occurrences in the Quran
Every place this root appears, in Quran order. The first few are shown here.
- 28:34رِدْءًۭا(as) a helper
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 20 Classical meanings
رَدَأَ
To prop or strengthen a wall, person, or thing by means of an attached structure or other aid; hence, to help or assist.
A transitive verb of supporting one thing or person by means of another.
- Lane · entry 22944
رَدَأَ
To take good care of camels by tending and pasturing them.
A figurative or extended usage.
- Lane · entry 22944
رَدَأَ
To cast or throw a stone at someone.
A distinct transitive usage.
- Lane · entry 22944
رَدُؤَ
To be bad, corrupt, vicious, depraved, low, vile, or weak and impotent.
Used of a thing or a person according to the cited lexical descriptions.
- Lane · entry 22944
أَرْدَأَ
To settle, establish, or confirm a person or thing in its state.
A Form IV transitive usage.
- Lane · entry 22946
أَرْدَأَ
To still or quiet a person or thing.
A Form IV causative usage.
- Lane · entry 22946
أَرْدَأَ
To let down a veil or curtain.
The object is a veil or curtain in the cited construction.
- Lane · entry 22946
أَرْدَأَ
To render something bad, corrupt, vicious, or depraved, or to declare or hold it to be bad.
A Form IV causative or evaluative usage.
- Lane · entry 22946
أَرْدَأَ
To do a bad deed, or to encounter or experience something bad.
A distinct Form IV construction concerning an act or an experienced event.
- Lane · entry 22946
أَرْدَأَ
To exceed a stated age or number of years.
Reported with عَلَى in expressions such as exceeding fifty, sixty, or one hundred; this usage is disputed, and an alternative form is preferred by some authorities.
- Lane · entry 22946
تَرَدَّأَ
To help, aid, or assist one another.
A reciprocal Form V usage.
- Lane · entry 22947
رِدْءٌ
A buttress or similar structure by which a wall is strengthened and supported.
A concrete noun for a physical supporting structure.
- Lane · entry 22948
رِدْءٌ
A thing by which another is helped, aided, or assisted.
An inanimate or abstract means of assistance, distinct from the Quranic personal helper sense.
- Lane · entry 22948
رِدْءٌ
An accession, addition, or supplementary element supplied to another thing.
A noun for something added as reinforcement or support.
- Lane · entry 22948
رِدْءٌ
A load paired with another load to balance it on the opposite side of a pack animal; also, a heavy load.
A figurative or extended use based on one load supporting or balancing another.
- Lane · entry 22948
رَدِيءٌ
Bad, corrupt, vicious, depraved, low, ignoble, vile, or mean; also weak and impotent.
An adjective applied to things or people; its plural is used of a group of people.
- Lane · entry 22950
أَرْدَأُ
Worse or worst; more or most corrupt or vile.
A comparative or superlative adjective.
- Lane · entry 22951
مِرْدَأَةٌ
A stone so large that a strong man can scarcely lift it with both hands.
The related form مِرْدَاةٌ is also reported for this meaning.
- Lane · entry 22952
رَدَى
Destruction, ruin, or perdition.
A separately headed related form, not an additional meaning of رِدْءٌ.
- Mufradāt · row 544
تَرَدَّى
To expose oneself to destruction, or to perish and fall into ruin.
A separately headed related verbal form used for falling into destruction.
- Mufradāt · row 544
Cautions
Points that affect how this root should be read.
The reported meaning of أَرْدَأَ as “to exceed” is lexically disputed and is retained with that restriction.
The destruction meanings رَدَى and تَرَدَّى are listed under their own related headwords and are not assigned to the Quranic noun رِدْءٌ.