Collection of Arabic proverbs, sayings and popular sayings in the Arab world, already translated into Italian, verbal expressions that represent an interesting testimony of how this people manages to express deep concepts in a few simple words.
Arabic idioms
- An army of sheep led by a lion will defeat an army of lions led by a sheep.
- Live together as brothers and do business with each other as foreigners.
- Live soberly and be as rich as a king.
- Under the desert sun the camel driver makes his plans, but the camel also does them.
- You can bring a camel to the source but you can't force it to drink.
- Even a donkey can go to Mecca, but this does not mean he is a pilgrim.
- Do not linger on your tiredness, your strength will be in proportion to the measure of your desire.
- When the collection of dates is over, everyone has to blame the palm.
- The greedy is bald and demands a comb.
- Those who eat alone choke on their own.
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- Speak only when you are sure that what you say is more beautiful than silence.
- The richest man is the one who knows what to do the next day.
- The void gives the way to full.
- The real mosque is the one built at the bottom of the soul.
- You can't get flour out of a bag of coal.
- A half-truth is a whole lie.
- There is no man without sorrows; and if there is one, he is not a man.
- Whoever wants to enter between the onion and its peel, gets nothing but its stench.
- The day will come when the smart ones will be crushed like garlic.
- He who does not know and does not know he does not know He is a fool. Avoid it. He who does not know and knows he does not know He is a boy. Instruct. He who knows and does not know he knows He is asleep. Wake him. He who knows and knows he knows He is a wise man. Follow him.
- The lie has only one leg, the truth two.
- Those who cannot understand a glance cannot understand long explanations.
- Epigrams succeed where epic poems fail.
- The eye sees, but the hand cannot reach it.
- Do not throw the stone into the well after drinking it.
- Man is afraid of time, but time is afraid of pyramids.
- There are five degrees to reach wisdom: keep silent, listen, remember, act, study.
- Allah will pay back twice as long as he has not given up to be seen by others.
- Those who live see a lot, those who travel see more.
- The neighbor who is close to you is preferable to the distant brother.
- Everything written on the forehead is always seen.
- Let the sword decide what cunning has not solved.
- The anger of God is always mixed with mercy.
- Knock on the door before entering.
- The friend recognizes himself in need.
- Man is like a palm tree on the sea beach, he agitates with the wind of life.
- What is sunlight for, if you have your eyes closed?
- Who does not choose starves.
- To love a person well, one must love him as if he were to die tomorrow.
Arabic sayings
- The air of Paradise is the one that blows between the ears of a horse.
- If you feed the mouth, the eye becomes shy.
- There are no fans in hell.
- The eye is what it eats.
- The sigh of a cute girl can be heard more distant than the lion's roar.
- A mother's tenderness towards her children is as discreet as the dew that kisses the earth.
- Who has health, has hope and who has hope, has everything.
- Eat as much as you want for breakfast; share the lunch with a friend and leave the dinner to your enemy.
- Whether it's long or thin doesn't matter, as long as it satisfies in abundance.
- Men are the wool of the tribe, but women are the weavers of the weave.
- The eye eats before the mouth.
- Never sit in the place of a man who can tell you to get up.
- A man without a friend is like the right hand without the left.
- The poor man is a foreigner at home.
- Even if with a golden saddle on its back, a donkey does not become a horse.
- Air is an obvious reality. But be careful not to breathe it.
- The traveler's path is traced by the stars and not by the sand dunes.
- Each eye has its gaze.
- You can live without brothers, but not without friends.
- Every monkey, in the eyes of his father, is a gazelle.
- If you have health, you have hope. If you have hope, you have everything.
- When there is a destination, the desert also becomes a road.
- An apple never falls too far from its tree.
- Those who think well of others will always have a friend, those who think badly of others will die abandoned.
- The ignorant are enemies of themselves.
- As soon as the camel enters the tent, it enters it with its whole body.
- A madman can be recognized by six things: anger without reason, meaningless speech; change without progress; questions without object; trust to strangers; and misunderstanding enemies for friends.
- Review what is being said, not what it is talking about.
- When the sky is red, saddle your horse, put on your gandara and get ready to gallop.
- Do good and throw it into the sea.
- Destiny awaits you on the road you have chosen to avoid it.
- When you were born, everyone was happy and you were crying. Live so that when you die everyone will cry and you will be happy.
- A man can be worth a hundred and a hundred not worth one.
- Give the poor man a date and you will taste its true flavor.
- The eye is never above the eyebrow.
- Only the fool runs along the path of life without pausing to observe the beauties of creation.
- The appearance of a piece of bread depends on whether you are hungry or not.
- The past is the root of the present and the present is the seed of the future.
- If a cat is bitten by a snake, then it will also be wary of a rope.
Arab proverbs
- The less the heart is noble, the more the head is erect.
- Allah made the desert like a woman, who must be conquered and loved.
- The injury caused by a brother hurts more than that inflicted by an enemy.
- Don't you dare mistreat the face you see in the morning.
- The donkey realizes that he has lost his tail only when there are flies.
- Honest is he who changes his mind to accord it to the truth. Dishonest is he who changes the truth to accord it to his own thought.
- Even the goose chick floats.
- The person in love does not hate.
- If unfortunately your fate is to beg, only knock on the big gates.
- Who cries for everything and everyone ends up losing his eyes.
- Wash your heart like you wash a dress.
- The war will only end when fathers love their children more than they hate their enemies.
- The nature of the rain is always the same, yet it gives rise to thorns in the quagmire and flowers in a garden.
- One hand cannot applaud.
- The best men are the ones who do best with women.
- Ask those who have experience rather than the educated.
- A barber learns the work on the heads of orphans.
- The human race is divided into three categories: the immovable, those can be moved, and those that move.
- Who is one-eyed has mercy on the blind.
- You have to go to Sana'a, and if the trip has to be very long, it doesn't matter.
- Everyone is satisfied with their intellect, but not with their money.
- If you stop every time a dog barks, you will never end your way.
- Those who have good friends are truly wealthy.
- A sandstorm passes, the stars remain.
- Whoever sees the misfortunes of others considers his misfortune light.
- The house belongs to our father and the stranger drives us out.
- Not all desert camels are enough to buy you a friend.
- If your kiss has the heat of the sun, the rose will give you all its perfume.
- The case must turn the ant to see the sky.
- Entrust your camel to the providence of God, but first tie it to a tree.
- The horse is a gift from God to men.
- Fear is like a dog, if you run away it bites.
- Nobody will plow the earth except your cows.
- Whoever digs a ditch with malice, ends up in it.
- The fruit of peace hangs on the tree of silence.
- Heaven does not know anger as when love turns to hatred.
- The tank that has no water wants to contain the fish.
- Nobody will cut the head, except the one who made it.
- Lengthen your step according to the size of your carpet.
- Throw your heart in front of you, and run to reach it.
- It is good to know the truth, but it is better to talk about palm trees.
