وجود

What it means

وجود (vojud) means existence, being, or presence. It is borrowed from Arabic وُجُود (wujud), a verbal noun from the root و-ج-د (w-j-d) meaning to find, to be found, or to exist. In Islamic philosophy وجود is a central term in discussions of existence and essence, and Persian absorbed it in that philosophical register as well as in everyday use. In daily speech, the compound verb وجود داشتن (vojud dâshtan) means simply to exist or to be present: «این مشکل وجود داره» (this problem exists), «چنین چیزی وجود نداره» (no such thing exists). The phrase به وجود آوردن (be vojud âvardan) means to create, to bring into being, or to cause something to come about. A related word is هستی (hasti), a pure Persian near-synonym meaning existence or being, which is more common in poetic and literary contexts while وجود covers both the philosophical and the everyday.

How to use it

• این قانون دیگه وجود نداره (in ghânun dige vojud nadâre) “This law no longer exists.”
• مشکل از اول وجود داشت (moshkel az aval vojud dâsht) “The problem existed from the start.”
• چطور این رو به وجود آوردی؟ (chetour in ro be vojud âvardi?) “How did you bring this into being?”
• حضور تو برام مهمه، وجودت رو حس می‌کنم (hozur-e to baram mohimme, vojud-et ro hes mikonam) “Your presence matters to me, I feel your being.”

Cultural note

وجود carries weight beyond its functional use in Persian because of its deep roots in Sufi philosophy and classical poetry. Ibn Arabi’s concept of وحدت وجود (vahdat-e vojud, unity of being) traveled through Persian Sufi thought and became a cornerstone of poets such as Rumi and Hafez. A Persian speaker using وجود in everyday conversation is drawing on a word that has been philosophically loaded for centuries, which gives phrases like «وجودت برام عزیزه» (your existence is precious to me) a resonance that a straightforward word like «هستیت» might not carry to the same degree.

References

• Dehkhoda
• Vajehyab