What it means
تحمل (tahammol) means the act or capacity of tolerating, enduring, or putting up with something difficult. It comes from Arabic, where the root ح-م-ل (h-m-l) means to carry or bear a burden. The Arabic masdar (verbal noun) تحمّل (tahammul, Form V) carries the sense of taking a burden upon oneself willingly. In Persian it functions as a plain noun: تحمل این کار رو داری? means “can you handle this job?” A close related word is طاقت (tâghat), which is more about physical or emotional capacity to endure; تحمل focuses more on the act of putting up with someone or something. The verb form is تحمل کردن (tahammol kardan): to tolerate, to bear.
How to use it
- تحمل این آدم رو ندارم. (tahammol-e in âdam ro nadâram.) “I can’t stand this person.”
- باید یه کم تحمل داشته باشی. (bâyad ye kam tahammol dâshte bâshi.) “You need to have a little patience.”
- تحمل درد بعد از عمل خیلی سخت بود. (tahammol-e dard ba’d az amal khyli sakht bud.) “Tolerating the pain after the operation was very hard.”
- این بچه تحمل نه شنیدن رو نداره. (in bachche tahammol-e na shenidan ro nadâre.) “This child can’t handle being told no.”
Cultural note
تحمل appears constantly in everyday Persian conversation, from parenting contexts to workplace complaints to medical discussions. The phrase تحمل کن (tahammol kon), meaning “bear with it” or “just put up with it,” is a staple response to complaints in Iranian family culture. In a society where direct confrontation is often avoided, urging someone to تحمل کردن is both practical advice and a social norm. The word also appears in moral and religious discourse about patience as a virtue, though صبر (sabr) is the more spiritually charged term for patience.