Discover the meaning of the term Al-ndaʾ (نداء) in Islamic vocabulary.
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Updated on 11 April 2026 at 1:05 AM
📖 2 min readBringing the absent near, alerting the present, turning toward the averted, freeing the busy, and stirring the idle.
With kasra and lengthening: a linguistic term (in Persian: 'avaz dadan'); the verbal noun of 'nada', and it may also be vocalized with damma by ranking it among sounds, like crying and weeping. In terminology: requesting turning (attention) by a particle substituting for 'ad'u' (I call), as a word or by implication. On the vocative particles, the majority differ in holding them letters; with some, they are verbal nouns, complete with what follows them. It has been reported that the declension of some of them is not nominal declension, because the dissimulation of the first-person pronoun in nouns is impossible; and the vocative particles render the meaning of 'ad'u', wherein the first-person pronoun is dissimulated, as the particles resembling verbs render the meanings of verbs: so consider.
In the sense of invocation (du'a) and raising the voice with meaning; this is sometimes said also of bare sound; nida and tathwib thus agree in invocation and raising the voice, but nida is broader than tathwib. [al-Misbah al-munir (n-d-w), al-Mufradat pp. 486-487, al-Mawsu'a al-fiqhiyya 10/149].
The raising of the voice and its manifestation; sometimes said of bare sound. Ibn al-Kammal said: nida brings the absent near, alerts the present, turns toward the averted, frees the busy, and stirs the idle.
Applies to requesting attention by a particle substituting for 'ad'u' (I call), as a word or by implication; the one whose attention is requested is called 'munada' (the vocative).