# Taking Persian to learn formal Urdu



## alaink

My school offers a semester in modern Persian. I already know how to read/write in Urdu and have a decent command of formal Persian/Arabic based vocabulary (along with colloquial and Sanskrit vocabulary). If I want to become more comfortable with shair-o-shairi Urdu, would taking Persian be helpful for such an endeavor? Just as a note, this will be an introductory semester in Persian.


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## keramus

As a Persian speaker, I don't think taking Persian would be helpful because I can't understand Urdu at all. Persian and Urdu look akin or similar due to the influence of Arabic on them. Although Persian and Urdu have many words in common, I wouldn't suggest you take Persian. For example, the grammar used in Persian is different from that used in Urdu. For this reason , I strongly believe that anyone who wants to learn Urdu shouldn't take a course in Persian.


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## alaink

The grammar is very different, but some Urdu poetry is extremely Persianated, which is why I'm wondering if taking Persian could be an asset. A regular Urdu text wouldn't be familiar at all to a Farsi speaker.


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## eskandar

A single introductory semester of Persian might have a little benefit for literary Urdu, but not a huge amount. You're likely to already know many of the basic Persian words you'd learn which are shared with Urdu (like گرم and خون and برادر and سبزی and so on), whereas most of the more advanced Persian vocabulary that you'd want to learn in order to better access Urdu poetry won't be taught in an introductory class.

If you stuck with Persian beyond the introductory level, there's no doubt that you'd learn plenty of vocabulary and grammatical structures useful for understanding literary Urdu. However it's still a roundabout way of doing it. If you're interested in Persian for Persian's sake, by all means, go for it - it's enormously easier to learn than Urdu. But if your only interest is in ultimately improving your Urdu, you'd be much better off investing the time in reading more advanced Urdu texts than in starting to learn Persian.



keramus said:


> Persian and Urdu look akin or similar due to the influence of Arabic on them.


This is not exactly accurate. The similarities are due to the influence of Persian on Urdu. All of the Arabic words they share entered Urdu via Persian. There are also many Persian words used in Urdu which are not of Arabic origin, like the examples I listed above.


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## keramus

eskandar said:


> This is not exactly accurate. The similarities are due to the influence of Persian on Urdu. All of the Arabic words they share entered Urdu via Persian. There are also many Persian words used in Urdu which are not of Arabic origin, like the examples I listed above.


Thank you for correcting my statement. What I wanted to say is that both Persian and Urdu use Arabic letters. Therefore, anyone who is not familiar with neither Persian nor Urdu may think that they look similar. 




eskandar said:


> If you're interested in Persian for Persian's sake, by all means, go for it - it's enormously easier to learn than Urdu. But if your only interest is in ultimately improving your Urdu, you'd be much better off investing the time in reading more advanced Urdu texts than in starting to learn Persian.



I completely agree with eskandar on this point. Taking an introductory course in Persian won't help you improve your knowledge of Urdu.


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## mundiya

eskandar said:


> If you're interested in Persian for Persian's sake, by all means, go for it - it's enormously easier to learn than Urdu.



Besides having a Persian background that presumably make you more comfortable with Persian, is there a reason you feel this way?  Is gender of words the issue?


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## fdb

If you want to read classical Urdu poetry it is imperative that you learn Persian. Arabic would also help.


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## eskandar

mundiya said:


> Besides having a Persian background that presumably make you more comfortable with Persian, is there a reason you feel this way?  Is gender of words the issue?


Let me just preface my remarks by saying that I learned both Persian and Urdu from scratch, that is to say, I did not grow up speaking Persian though my background certainly did give me an advantage with it and I won't deny my bias in that regard. That being said-- Persian has no grammatical gender, so one does not have to memorize the gender of words nor provide adjective/verb agreement on that basis; Persian adjectives do not decline for number as in Urdu; Persian is consistently accusative, lacking the direct/oblique case distinctions and split ergativity of Urdu; Persian numerals are regular and therefore easier to learn than the unpredictable Urdu numbers. In my view all of these make Persian less complicated to learn than Urdu.


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## keramus

fdb said:


> If you want to read classical Urdu poetry it is imperative that you learn Persian. Arabic would also help.


There is no similarity between classical Urdu poetry and classical Persian poetry. In the city in which I live, there is a Pakistani consulate. Sometimes I see Urdu speaking people and I can't understand what they say (except a few words) . For this reason, I don't suggest you take an introductory course in Persian.


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## eskandar

fdb's remarks are not at all unreasonable. Look at these Urdu couplets (both from different poems by Mirza Ghalib):

*عشرتِ قطرہ* ہے *دریا *میں *فنا* ہو جانا
*درد *کا *حد *سے *گزر*نا ہے *دوا *ہو جانا

*ہستی *کے مت *فریب* میں آجائیو *اسد*
*عالم تمام حلقہ دام خیال* ہے

I've bolded the words of Persian origin. Just because you personally don't understand Urdu doesn't mean "there is no similarity between classical Urdu poetry and classical Persian poetry". In fact classical Urdu poetry is hugely influenced by Persian, and sometimes an entire Persian phrase, hemistitch, or even couplet of pure Persian appears in Urdu poetry. For that reason in the long term Persian is very useful for mastering Urdu. My point above, which I'm not sure you properly understood, was that a mere introductory course of Persian would not necessarily be helpful, but there's no question about the influence of Persian on Urdu.


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## keramus

eskandar said:


> I've bolded the words of Persian origin


Dear eskandar
Not all the words you've bolded are of Persian origin. عشرت (Arabic) , قطره (Arabic) , فنا (Arabic) , حد (Arabic) , دوا (Arabic), اسد (Arabic) , عالم (Arabic) , تمام (Arabic) , خیال (Arabic). I bet that anyone fluent in Arabic confirms my point.


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## eskandar

I didn't mean that they are not ultimately from Arabic, but that they entered Urdu via Persian. You can hardly deny that these words are used in Persian. There are plenty of other 'native' Persian words (not derived from Arabic) which are also used in Urdu.


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## keramus

eskandar said:


> You can hardly deny that these words are used in Persian. There are plenty of other 'native' Persian words (not derived from Arabic) which are also used in Urdu.


Yes, I completely agree with you.


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## Alfaaz

In addition to acquiring knowledge (in terms of grammar and vocabulary, as discussed above) of the various languages (Arabic, Persian, Sanskrit, etc.) that influence its literature, learning about the religions, cultures, and literary traditions associated with the languages could also be beneficial in understanding Urdu poetry (and literature of any language for that matter!).

Here are a few examples of religious references:

*چراغِ طور* جلاؤ! بڑا اندھیرا ہے 
ذرا نقاب اٹھاؤ! بڑا اندھیرا ہے
وہ جن کے ہوتے ہیں *خورشید آستینوں میں*
انہیں کہیں سے بلاؤ! بڑا اندھیرا ہے

ساغر صدیقی

نہ غم کشود و بست کا، بلند کا نہ پست کا
نہ بود کا نہ ہست کا، نہ *وعدۂ الست* کا
امید اور یاس گم، حواس گم، قیاس گم
نظر کے آس پاس گم، ہمہ بجز گلاس گم

ابو الاثر حفیظ جالندھری

*روشنی در روسنی* ہے اُس طرف
زندگی در زندگی ہے اُس طرف
جستجو جس کی یہاں پر کی منیرؔ
اس سے ملنے کی خوشی ہے اُس طرف

منیر نیازی

ہم دیکھیں گے
لازم ہے کہ ہم بھی دیکھیں گے
*وہ دن کہ جس کا وعدہ ہے
جو لوحِ ازل میں لکھا ہے*

فیض احمد فیض​
Here are a few examples of cultural/literary references (influences from both traditions - Arabic/Persian and Indic):

*بلبل و گل شمع و پروانہ* کو ہم پر رشک ہے
درد جو ہم کو ملا سب سے جداگانہ ملا

کلیم عاجز

*دیپک راگ* ہے چاہت اپنی کاہے سنائیں تمہیں
ہم تو سلگتے ہی رہتے ہیں کیوں سلگائیں تمہیں

ظہور نظر

کس کو خبر تھی سانولے بادل بن برسے اُڑ جاتے ہیں
*ساون* آیا لیکن اپنی قسمت میں *برسات* نہیں

قتیل شفائی

خواب تو حرف ہیں
 خواب تو نور ہیں 
خواب *سقراط* ہیں
 خواب *منصور* ہیں

احمد فراز

مصحفی آپ ہی ہم قتل ہیں اپنے ہاتھوں
ورنہ کیں خواہ تو *رستم* ہے نہ *سہراب* ہے یاں

مصحفی غلام ہمدانی

سلطنت دست بہ دست آئی ہے
جامِ مے خاتمِ *جمشید* نہیں

غالب

معرکہ ہے آج *حسن و عشق* کا
دیکھئے وہ کیا کریں ہم کیا کریں

داغ دہلوی​
A potential benefit of learning Persian would be that it would provide direct access to Persian Literature, as stated above by other forum members! An example from _Maulana Rumi_ and _Allama Iqbal_: 
*پیر و مرید*

مرید ہندی 
چشمِ بینا سے ہے جاری جوئے خوں 
علمِ حاضر سے ہے دیں زار و زبوں

 پیر رومی
 علم را بر تن زنی مارے بود
 علم را بر دل زنی یارے بود

 علامہ اقبال از بالِ جبریل (١٩٣٥) ​


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## Dib

I second eskandar. Since you already have more than a beginner's command of Urdu, a mere introductory semester in Persian won't get you any further in terms of your knowledge of Urdu. However, if you want to master literary Urdu, as fdb mentioned, command of Persian will be very useful; but you'll need a command much beyond the introductory stage to start to reap the benefits.


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## marrish

A decent Urdu syllabus would cater to all necessities of the language; there is no need to learn basic Persian in order to study Urdu. The grammar elements Urdu shares with Persian (Persian, Arabic) should be taught on the grounds of Urdu. It is also to be noted that the pronunciation, meanings and constructions used in Urdu are New Persian but not Modern Persian ones, therefore a prior knowledge of Modern (Iranian) Persian is likely to act oppositely to your purpose, in my opinion.

As to proverbs or phrases which tend to be used in Urdu texts, the supposed need of studying Persian or Arabic in order to understand them is tantamount to the necessity to learn Latin in order to understand English "i.e., e.al., i.a., e.g., cv etc." or "alea iacta est".


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