# خلق / جعل



## figgles

Hey all!

I'm trying to understand the difference between the verbs َخَلَق and َجَعَل. They both are frequently translated to English as "create" or "make", but I'm not sure if there are more subtle semantics -- like when is it appropriate to use one and not the other? Are "create" and "make" even appropriate translations? "Create" and "make" in English, for example are similar, but not identical -- "create" almost always implies "from nothing" or perhaps done by a power (God, the mind, etc.), while "make" is more like constructing something from materials.

Any help or examples are greatly appreciated!


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## cherine

figgles said:


> "create" almost always implies "from nothing" or perhaps done by a power (God, the mind, etc.), while "make" is more like constructing something from materials.


It's the same in Arabic, this is why خلق is almost exclusively used with God. But another equivalent of create أبدع is commonly used in the field of art أبدع لوحة رائعة (although some refuse this usage too).

For make, we have صنع، جعل and maybe other verbs, it depends on the context.


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## abdu-ki

hi there , خلق often comes with the God .
جعل comes with both God and other but if it comes with God it take the meaning of خلق .
here there is something to know , خلق comes with an additional meaning for the arabic listener its to make something up from nothing by a power and no one else can do it so it comes with God , while جعل means to make someone do something so its not to make something up itself . i hope you understand what i mean


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## figgles

Hi Cherine and Abdu-ki,

Thanks for the replies. OK - so خلق sounds like one of the words reserved for God then, sort of like ربّ?

What sort of places would I see جعل?


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## cherine

رب is not reserved for God. We say رب العمل، رب الأسرة .

I don't think we use جعل with the meaning of "to make" in moderna fuS7a with the meaning of "to make something". The more common usage is "to make someone do something", like: جعلها تبكي he made her cry, or جعلوني مجرما they made me a criminal (that's actually a title of an Egyptian movie).


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## Arabic_Police_999

just a notice
in the gulf and najdi arabic
جِعْلْ/جِعِل ji3l/ji3il is used to indicate that you wish someone something, I heard it mostly in negative
جعلها الموت= *ji3lahaa*/*ji3ilhaa *elmout 
جعل البيبان تِتْفتّحله من كل طريق= *ji3lah*/*ji3alah *elbeeban titfatta7lAh min kil 9ireeg ( I've never heard ji3il used to refer to male only females, same for ji3alah)


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## abdu-ki

word رب is not only for god but when you say it as our god < ربنا > it can tasks the verb خلق  
verb جعل is not very sued in the new arabic language but if you are learning the old arabic which is the original one you should look it up in the dictionary and you will see that جعل  has a plenty of meaning depending on the context and the pronunciation


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## figgles

Thank you to everyone for all of the answers and clarification!


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## Albert Schlef

Is it possible that جعل has, in fact, nothing to do with creating/making things?

Perhaps the reason the asker brought this up is only because the English idiom ("to make X Y") has the word "make" in it. So he typed "make" into his dictionary and the dictionary listed جعل too because, and only because, the English translation had "to make X Y".

In other words:

 Perhaps it's only in English that جعل is translated using the word "make", and that's as part of an idiom?


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## إسكندراني

If you're puzzled about the meaning of a word, it's a good idea to look it up in the Qur'an.
جعل السقاية في رحل أخيه
جعل الله الكعبة البيت الحرام
جعل لكم من أنفسكم أزواجا
جعل لكم الأرض ذلولا
إلخ


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## figgles

Actually (and perhaps ironically), I was reading surat an-naba', both appear very frequently but I wasn't sure why one word was used instead of the other. I noticed that جعل was used more like "made <something> as <something else>", where the <something else> was more abstractly related to purpose or appearance. For example 78:9

"وَجَعَلْنَا نَوْمَكُمْ سُبَاتًا"

but in the verse before (78:8):

وَخَلَقْنَاكُمْ أَزْوَاجًا

it sounds more about the act of creation itself (created essentially as heterosexual pairs), rather than purpose. 

Most translations of the Bible in Arabic, in contrast, use خلق almost exclusively where English would use "create".

Arabic isn't my native language, I'm mostly just trying to see if I can do some analysis of how it used to guess the more specific semantics of when to use or not use each word.


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## Albert Schlef

@Iskandrani: I looked up these 4 verses and their جعل has the following meanings:

- put
- appoint
- give
- make X Y

So it seems to corroborate my suspicion that جعل has nothing to do with creating/making things and that this impression is created by the English idiom only.


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## Albert Schlef

(I started a new thread, "Yemenite: جعلة", which probably isn't related to the current thread, but since it uses the same root (I think so; but I may be wrong) I also mention it here in case people could help there as well.)


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## إسكندراني

Albert Schlef said:


> @Iskandrani: I looked up these 4 verses and their جعل has the following meanings:
> 
> - put
> - appoint
> - give
> - make X Y
> 
> So it seems to corroborate my suspicion that جعل has nothing to do with creating/making things and that this impression is created by the English idiom only.



There are many other verses, I was starting you off. You may or may not be correct, it just seems you're very keen to quickly jump to conclusions without considering sources on the matter.


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## zj73

cherine said:


> It's the same in Arabic, this is why خلق is almost exclusively used with God. But another equivalent of create أبدع is commonly used in the field of art أبدع لوحة رائعة (although some refuse this usage too).
> 
> For make, we have صنع، جعل and maybe other verbs, it depends on the context.


But since God created everything from nothing why does He use جعل about himself?


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## Romeel

لأن جعل لها عدّة معاني منها: خلق، صنع، وضع، صيّر


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