What it means
کبد (kabed) means the liver, the organ. It is a loanword from Arabic كبد (kabid) and belongs to formal and medical Persian: you hear it from doctors, on lab reports, and in health articles. The native, everyday word is جگر (jegar), which is what most people say in normal conversation and which also carries an affectionate sense, as in جگرم (jegaram), “my darling.” So کبد and جگر point to the same organ, but کبد sounds clinical while جگر sounds ordinary and warm.
How to use it
- دکتر گفت کبدم سالمه. (doktor goft kabedam saleme.) “The doctor said my liver is healthy.”
- باید آزمایش کبد بدم. (bayad azmayesh-e kabed bedam.) “I have to get a liver test done.”
- بهم گفتن کبد چرب دارم. (behem goftan kabed-e charb daram.) “They told me I have a fatty liver.”
- عمل پیوند کبدش موفق بود. (amal-e peyvand-e kabedesh movaffagh bud.) “His liver transplant surgery was successful.”
Cultural note
In Persian the liver has two faces. Medically it is کبد, the Arabic-derived term you see in clinics, prescriptions, and blood test results. In daily life and in poetry the same organ is جگر (jegar), an old Iranian word that doubles as a term of endearment, since traditionally the liver, not the heart, was seen as the seat of deep feeling. This is why a parent might call a child جگرگوشه (jegar-gushe), literally “a piece of the liver,” meaning someone deeply loved. When the topic turns clinical, though, کبد is the word that fits.