New Salat Article
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Peace Ayman,
Status can change a language quite a bit. Common languages are untaught. They rely on the innate grammar capacity which makes it possible for us to learn language as children just by hearing it and without having it taught to us.
Again this is not true. What do you mean by common languages? Standard English is the common language for instance for Euro-Americans who grow up in the Midwestern States. Or for those Spaniards who grow up in Castilian territory (madrid for instance) they don't have to be taught standard spanish. Or those Italians who grow up in northern territories, etc. etc. Standard langauges are ususally the dialect of a few within that language group. But no language has to be taught to us technically if our parents and those around us speak that language. The problem is that in our diverse world variant dialects often exist side by side with standard dialects. So those who speak variant dialects usually have to be taught the standard one.
For example, when a language becomes an elite language of prestige, then hypercorrections that serve no real purpose are introduced. The only purpose of such hypercorrections is to make the speaker sound more prestigious or learned. Classical Arabic case endings are precisely such hypercorrections that serve no real purpose. So it is not surprising that they are absent from the real common people language of the great reading as the internal evidence from the great reading clearly demonstrates.
Let me say that the Quran must have alot of hypercorrections because according to the internal evidence (which in your case is just the style of reciters) of the Quran EVERY CASE ENDING IS PRONOUNCED except where the reciter pauses usually to rhyme with a previous pause. Case endings are CLEARLY PRESENT both in the Quranic text and Quranic recitation. So why are you telling half-truths?
No it hasn?t. In reality, the average African-American looks down on this hip-hop street language and thus you will never catch Barack Obama or any other African-American political leader using this language in congress or even at press conferences.
To this I give you a resounding NO, and it is obvious you are speaking about what you don't know here. The average African American DOES speak this hip-hop street language (the langauge came before hip-hop), or some dialect almost identical to it (there are old school and new school styles). Only very educated African-Americans don't speak this and look down on it. Even still, they use very weak versions of it at home and among family and friends. But again you can't assume the African-American dialect (given America's history) to have any prestige outside of the Afro-American community. Furthermore you can't expect educated Afro-Americans who have to emulate Euro-Americans (or find themselves in majority Euro-American contexts) to successfully keep this language. Educated Afro-Americans actually get the most flack as a whole in the Afro-American community for assimilating and abondoning their language (which definitely has a great deal of UNOFFICIAL prestige) behind.
The Lakhmids kings and religious clergy didn?t speak in Arabic. They spoke Aramaic. The Ghassanids kings and religious clergy didn?t speak in Arabic either. They spoke in Greek. In fact, they continued to speak in Greek even after the Saracens? conquests. For example, Arab Ghassanid elites such as John of Damascus (whose real name was Mansoor) continued to use Greek in their writings well into the 8th century CE.
Actually they did speak Arabic, all of them. They ALSO spoke Aramaic and Greek. Don't you see that these people were polyglots. They spoke the official languages of Greek and Aramaic (and probably sometimes Persian) of the empires they vice-ruled with the Persians and the Byzantines, but they also spoke their own Arabic langauges in their own homes. It's no different than Hispanics in the U.S. Go to Miami. Important Cubans speak English AND spanish. The Lakhmids and Ghassanids are like Mexicans in L.A. or Cubans in Miami. But imagine that they had even more political clout. Lower class Mexicans in LA might mainly speak spanish in their house-holds and speak broken English, but the important policiticians are fluent in both. The same goes for the Cubans in Miami. This would naturally be the case of the Ghassanids and Lakhmids, who vice-ruled for the Byzantines and the Persians. And it is natural that they wouldn't write (on the most part) in Arabic because these are not the official languages. Look at John of Damascus. That was his official name but at home what did they call him? MansoorUN. That is Arabic so you can be sure that is what they spoke to him at home as well. Their influence actually went all the way down to Yathrib. So give this some real thought Ayman.
Aramaic and Greek were the languages of politics and religion (and Hebrew in the case of Jews) of the Lakhmids and the Ghassanids but on the street their subjects spoke a variety of vernacular Arabian dialects. One of those, the one spoken in the Lakhmid provinces is the language of the great reading.
Okay I won't say you contradicted yourself here. I'll just say you decided to be more specific. But there is no proof that they spoke distinct varieties of vernaculars. The proof is that they spoke Classical Arabic. That was the vernacular of all Arabs in the whole peninsula besides the Southern Arabic speakers. Nor is there any proof that the Quran is in some Lakhmid dialect. Where did you get his from?
Your theory has several major problems
- Your theory relies on you imagining that Arab men were sex-crazed and when they saw foreign women they suddenly married them on a grand scale. Unfortunately, such wild theories find appeal in some Arab intellectuals? chauvinistic imaginations. Of course, this theory is bogus and it doesn?t explain, for example, what happened to all the Arab women who were suddenly not able to find husbands.
Wow. Sex crazed? What man wouldn't like to have more than one woman if left to his own devices? Most men are naturally sex-crazed, not just Arab men. Secondly, have you never heard of mut'ah? That actually happened. Imagine lonely men on military campaigns. It is not hard to see why they might have gotten married on grand scales, especially since they came from societies where polygamy was acceptable. And what do you mean suddenly not able to find husbands? Again these people did and actually still do believe in polygamy.
And they are not alone in the world.- As in the course of any population movement, some intermarriage would occur. However, your theory ignores the fact that such intermarriage never changes the language of the land. This is because the intermarriage is always of a very small scale compared to the whole population and it actually works in the opposite direction. For example, an American moving to Mexico and marrying a Mexican is more likely to have to learn Spanish than his new wife having to learn English.
That is true for now because in Mexico the official language is Spanish. But if Americans take over Mexico, marry Mexicans move there in masse and then establish English as the superior language Mexicans will have to learn English.
Actually that is what happend in the American southwest, Florida and Louisiana which were all Spanish territories. The native populations there mixed in somewhat (Anglos don't like to intermix) and had to learn English. It was slow but they did it. Actually that is what happened in all of Latin America. Spaniard and Portuguese men went their in masse, mixed with African and Native American populations and guess what you get now? Spanish speaking Mulatos, Mesitzo & Zumbas, Quadroons, Octaroons (considered blancos) and Negros all speaking Spanish. In the US alot of us even call them that, Spanish. Hmmm? That is exactly what happened with the Arabs.- Your theory contends that territories of what is now Iraq, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Egypt were non-Arab. Of course, except for Egypt, this is false. But even in Egypt, an Arabian dialect was spoken in the Sinai so there is no doubt that Egyptians had some familiarity with the Arabian dialects.
You know what? The Lakhmids and the ghasaanids were vice rulers and ONE ethnicity in the areas of Jordan, Lower Iraq and parts of syria. But they were not the only ethnicity there. In Iraq everything North of Al-Hillah was not controlled by the Arab Lakhmids. And Aramaic was spoke thoughout the area, and still has some strongholds. upper Syria and Lebanon were not vice-ruled by the Ghassanids, and in Syria there were Greco-Roman and Arameans there. Now I'm really not sure how far into the Sinai the Arabs went so I won't comment on that. However just because Arab tribes might have been in the Sinai doesn't mean that the Copts or other populations there knew anything about Arabic, as it was not an enforced or official language. It was when the Muslim Arabs conquered all these areas completely that Arabic was imposed with natural and ruling force as the language to be adopted. There are even Persian and Turkish dialects of Arabic. So I gave you the proof, it is up to you to accept it.
- Your theory is confused and contradictory. You admit that the language of the great reading was a street language at the time but then you turn around and say that ?street Arabic? was different than the language of the great reading. On the other hand, the simple and free from contradictions fact is that the street Arabic in the Lakhmid provinces at the time was itself the language of the great reading.
No, you are confused. What I am saying is that (1) prior to the expansion of the Muslim Arabs into Ghassanid, Lakhmid and non-Arab territories Classical Arabic was their colloquial langauge. They used it in their homes and in the deserts. In the purely Arab territories of the Ghassanids and Lakhmids where there weren't Greco-Romans, Arameans and others, as well as down towards the Himyarite borders the langauge on the streets was Classical Arabic (the himyarites spoke himyarite, This is a southern Arabic dialect distinct from Classical Arabic although related. I believe it still exists in the form of Mehra)
(2) When the Arabs took over the northern Ghassanid and the Lakhmid territories and Arabic was now the official langauge it was codified, classified and preserved by the educated and high classes. But on the streets it was now coming out of the mouths of those who spoke it as a second langauge and who didn't go to schools to learn it. So they started to corrupt it and that became the Arabic vernaculars of today.
I agree with this statement. Unfortunately, this contradicts what you said earlier about it not being the language of the street in those very same Umayyad territories.
You are not understanding that in the streets of non-Arab territories (everywhere Greek and Aramaic was spoken and were the official languages) it Classical Arabic was quickly corrupted. But in the deserts and back in purely Arab territories it was still the street langauge. This would change as later Arabicized non-Arabs would bring their corrupted Arabics deep into the peninsula.
No it didn?t. As with any language that acquires a higher status, hypercorrections are introduced that serve no real purpose other than to give the impression that the speaker is more learned. Case endings are precisely such hypercorrections.
Again this is a theory that you provide no proof for. Furthermore hypercorrections are more complicated then what you are purporting them to be.
If Hip-Hop suddenly became the language of prestige in the US, then George Bush would be compelled to learn it and he might announce a cabinet meeting by saying ?my homies and I are getting together?. This is an example of hypercorrection of Hip-Hop language, because in reality according to the ?rules of grammar? of Hip-Hop he should be saying ?Me and my homies are getting together?. He might also hypercorrect by replacing ?me? with ?I? and say ?I and my homies are getting together?. Now unlike ?me and my homies? or ?my homies and me? which can be exchanged with no problem, ?I and my homies? and ?my homies and I? despite both being grammatical in English, sound awful in Hip Hop just like reading the great reading with the case endings sounds awful in Arabic.
What does this have to do with anything? D
OK first of all 'me and my' is pretty common in all American speech. So this doesn't count. I'll give you a real hypercorrection. yeah I'm am for yeah I am. that is an accurate hypercorrection. in normal AAVE (that is what is really called) it is would be yeah I'm is or even Yeah I is. But usually Afro-Americans switching between dialects will say this (i'm guilty of it) bringing AAVE dialect grammar into standard English. But here is why it doesn't work in your case. This type of hypercorrection is usually a middle ground between two distinct and real dialects. Where are the two distinct dialects that somehow cause Arabic to be prounounced with case endings? What native grammar or non-native grammar are Arabs bringing into Arabic? And did it result in the addition of case endings, very specific and tied into the grammar of the language that the book uses? You tried to blame Hebrew Niqqud for this earlier but Hebrew doesn't even have case endings! It is the lack of case endings in Aramaic dialects, Greek and Coptic that cause it to dissapear in spoken Arabics.Just like case endings, grammatically ?my homies and I? is a memorized form that serves no real purpose in a street language apart from making the speaker appear more learned. On the other hand, the real Hip-Hop grammar, like that of all street languages, is not memorized or taught. In fact, the ?me and X? form is the default, since it naturally turns up untaught in many dialectal varieties, whereas the ?X and I? form is only found in the taught versions of English. Similarly, the dropping of case endings turns up spontaneously in all Arabic vernacular varieties. So for a street language, which you admit the great reading?s language was, this is the default
.Not at all. X and I is a dialectical form which has been favoured as the standard. It does exist naturally in some cases but in most cases X and me won out on the street and X and I in literature and amongst the educated. Take for instance aks verses ask. These were both interchangeable forms in the 15, 16 and 17th centuries. But ask won out even though axe still exists in some local dialects and is more natural for those dialects. I think the end of this quote demonstrates what I have been telling you for a very long time. You are using modern versions of Arabic to judge Old Arabic and you just can't do that. Modern Greek and Modern forms of Latin also dropped all their case endings. Are we going to assume that the original case endings of Latin and greek are really inventions? Not at all.
Grammar has a purpose. The purpose is not prestige but the purpose is make language understandable. Thus, expressions that violate grammar are incomprehensible nonsense. Since we can perfectly understand the great reading without case endings, we can conclude that case endings are not grammar but are a memorized form. This memorized form came into being when Classical Arabic ceased to be an untaught street language with an intrinsic grammar and became a taught language of prestige with memorized hypercorrections.
This is again not fully true. Grammar does have a purpose. And so do the case endings. Case endings have their purpose in every language that has them. They are to leave no doubt as to the tense, mood, subject or objects of what is being spoken about. Modern Arabics work completely on sentence order. But Old Arabic was not as restricted to sentence order because of these case endings. The same thing goes for Classical Latin as opposed to Vulgar latin and the modern Latin langauges.
- The empirically verifiable fact is that the great reading was meant to be recited without case endings while case endings are an integral part of so-called Jahiliya poems. I am not sure what you mean by Old Arabic poems so unless you went to Arabia and dug out some manuscript or inscription of an Old Arabic poem, I assume that this is a fancy name you concocted for alleged Jahilya poems. Perhaps this way you are hedging your bets since the world is increasingly catching up to the fact that Jahiliya poems are later day inventions.
THis is not empirically verifiable, because as I show you the only words not prounounced with case endings are the ones where the reciter makes a stop usually for rhyme or to end an idea. yes Old Arabic poems are Pre-Islamic poems. And if the world is catching up to that idea then the world is digging itself further into ignorance. But that doesn't suprise me.
- The internal evidence from the great reading which is corroborated by epigraphic evidence and which clearly indicates that the language of the great reading was a common street language. This means that it relied on intrinsic grammar. On the other hand, the Classical Arabic language of Jahiliya poetry relies heavily on memorized forms that serve no real purpose other than making the speaker sound learned.
These are your opinions which are obviously from your experience with Classical Arabic. Firstly we all memorize our langauges and their grammar and then once we know them through and through we use them intrinsically. You are creating dichotomies that really don't exist and that just explain your relationship as a speaker of Modern Arabic with Classical Arabic. Case endings have intrinsic meaning as I explained before leaving very little doubt as to the mood, tense, object and subject and allow more flexibilty in sentence order. Modern Arabics are very different in this aspect and a historical review which I've already given you explains why.
- The Arabic Tashkil is borrowed wholesale from the Hebrew Niqqud, which was only used in religious texts or texts where prestige played a factor. The Tashkil exhibits the same exact systemic problems as Niqqud and the evidence points to both being invented at a later date after the language was formalized. You are in reality taking a dogmatic view about the Arabic Tashkil that is exactly the same as that of fundamentalist Christians who think that the Hebrew Niqqud is inspired.
I really don't like it when you confuse text with speech and all vowels with just case endings. The tashkil did descend from then niqqud. But why can't you understand that this is a writing convention. It is also the reason why you can distinguish the difference between a ra, z, dawd, sawd, dha, taw, seen, sheen etc. in the text. Obviosly these letters were always distinguishable in speech. There is a difference between the development of a text and the language that that text is suppose to represent. Obviously spoken Arabic always made a distinction between, dawd and sawd, seen and sheen and ra and za etc but the text took time to reflect that. So your comparison is innaccurate. Futhermore everything we humans do is inspired in someway. But I don't think that the Arabic text or the Classical Arabic language is more divine than any other langauge. So your comparison is inappropriate.
Nobody here sings the great reading and yet all of us, even those reading a chapter for the very first time, naturally follow the inherent rhyme in it. So stop making up irrelevant arguments. If you read the great reading with all the case endings then it would be just to appear learned but people would probably laugh at you on the inside because you would sound so awful and pretentious (in other words like a wannabe making hypercorrections) so I hope that you would be wise enough not to do it.
But you do sing it. And like I said you don't follow any natural rhyme, you imitate those who came before you who sung the Quran as well. Again you are imposing your socio-linguistic modern view of Classical Arabic and its relation to the versions of Arabic spoken today into reality. Maybe people who speak with case endings today just appear to be learned or stuck up, but people who did it in ancient times only spoke their language. It's the same deal if someone tries to speak in Eilzabetan English today. Furthermore even Quranic reciters pronounce 99 percent of the case endings in the Quran. Only straying from this when they pause. If you count all the case endings they do pronounce as opposed to the ones they don't you would see this.
Godbless,
Anwar.I'll respond to your next post in the next posting. I'll need some time. This is very time consuming.
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Peace,
I just wanna say briefly that what we were discussing as hypercorrections aren't really that. I think the example got the point across, but a hypercorrection is like saying inter for inner (becasue the t after n in American English is usually dropped so you add one where it doesn't go). This is also done in dominican spanish for instance. Because s's are usually not pronounced they will add s's where they don't go in an effort to sound proper. And dominican Spanish is not considered a prestigious language nor are the American dialects that hypercorrect with pronouncing t's in inn, in or ind clusters to compensate for silent t's in int clusters. Yeah, I'll try to find a correct defnintion for hypercorrection, so that alteast we aren't talking about the wrong thing.
Godbless,
Anwar -
Peace, Ayman,
Dramatic stories based on real life are created after the past events. On the other hand, Jahiliya poetry was allegedly created as part of the event. It is good that at least you admit that Jahiliya poems are dramatic stories.
But let me say that Pre-Islamic poems are not alone in this matter. We have many stories of kings and queens and wars and the like that were handed down through poetic stories. For instance the Trojan horse and alot of the greek wars were recorded like that. I don't see why Pre-Islamic poetry needs to be discriminated against. Again it could be pre-Islamically fabricated or just pre-islamically exaggerated. I'm going to give it the benefit of the doubt unless I have some real evidence to think that these stores are fabricated. But I will never rule out that possiblity. But again let's not confuse their pre-islamic authorship with whether the stories conveyed in them are historically accurate.
Have you ever heard a king or an ancestor spontaneously utter poetry at every precisely opportune minute in his live? The problem that you don?t seem to be aware of is that in Jahiliya poetry the author and the hero of the story are supposedly one and the same. So by admitting that Jahiliya poems are like odes to kings and ancestors, you admit that the ?kings and ancestors? didn?t really utter them but they were uttered by later storytellers. It is good that you are becoming more rational since we started this discussion.
I have always had these ideas in mind. You are the one who assumed the ideas that I believed about the pre-islamic poems. So please don't tell me I'm becoming more rational, it is just that your assumptions about the way I think are being exploded as you find out more about what I really believe, in the course of this discussion. As for the rest of this story I think what i said earlier explains this. Ths is common in Greek history and many other ancient histories, i.e. they are poeticized and then passed on to other reciters through the centuries until it is written down at some point (but even still the stories may continue to be memorized and recited orally). It is like the griot tradition of West Africa. This is how the Quran was mainly preserved as well. But here's the catch The more people you have reciting the same thing the more reliable it is and the fewer the people the less reliable. This is the basis of the Quran's 4 witness rule for speech that can fall in the category of rumor/hearsay. If there is a text side by side that is also better (but this also relies upon the efficiency of the writing system used. The early Arabic writing system was not very reliable).
It certainly doesn?t make them true either. The burden of proof is on you and those Arabicists who make the extraordinary claim that the poems? heroes really paused even when no one was listening and spontaneously uttered what you admit are ?stories? at every opportune moment in the story itself and that those ?stories? were not invented by later storytellers, whose job is, well... to invent stories.
Believe me, I understand this. But I'm not arguing in absolutes or opposites. The burden of proof is not on me or those Arabicists because we understand the phenomon of poeticized histories and biographies by the local masters of langauge of those times. So the fact that it has been peoticized does not make it untrue again. These are intentional interpretations of the real events in order to convey the story in a poeticized form. But there's no evidence pointing away from the authenticity of the story, or the fact that it was originally composed during those times. Again this phenomonena is well known in the Greek literary tradition. So it is not a suprise or a historical outrage to those who are learned. The burden of proof is actually yours because the poeticism of these stories can be logically explained within the context of the historical authenticity of these stories. A grain of salt is automatically assumed considering how these stories are originally composed. But unless there is obvious contradicting evidence, to doubt the authenticity of these stories is overly-suspicious assumption.
The basic premise of Jahilya poetry is that it was uttered by the very poets whose life stories are intertwined in the poem. Since you admit that those are in reality stories about the past and the poets didn?t really say those poems but they were invented by storytellers then this makes this basic premise untrue and one cannot assume that the language in those poems is the language that the supposed ?heroes? spoke.
As it concerns the language of the poems being in the original language of the acutal heroes well that is naturally going to be a matter of the narrators understanding of the story in its original language (as the language changes over time, or as they intentionally poeticize it). That is on the same level of the targums which are translations of Hebrew into Aramaic by those who knew Hebrew (we don't know how much Hebrew they really understood) and converted it to Aramaic. But this is an issue of language change and I don't think there is any evidence of real langauge change in Old Arabic (yes I mean Classical Arabic) from the 3rd century until the 6th and and 7th and as it progressed into a literary and educated langauge in the 8th, 9th and 10th centuries (again we know that in the 8th, 9th and 10th centuries Classical Arabic as a street, desert, home and market language began to phase out and be replaced with mixed Arabo-Aramean/Greco-Roman creole with influences from Berber, Coptic, Himyarite, Chadic and Nubic in their respective territories (even Greek and Romance dialects in the southern European territories which were later reconquered by Europeans.) But also if the hero's langauge is Classical Arabic and then it is poeticized in Classical Arabic that does not change the fact they the hero still spoke Classical Arabic. Poeticization does not change the identity or grammar of a language it just tells the story though the poetic styles of that language. It is still said language. There are very minimal differences from poem to regular talk that warrant any real attention or speculation to doubt the fidelity of the langauge used in poems to regular speech.
By asking me to prove a negative, you are demonstrating the typical fallacious thinking that permeates and clouds the minds of the majority of Arab-educated intellectuals. They also ask prove that Mohamed didn?t say this or that. You should really be asking the opposite question ?Does that mean that those events or that person existed?? The answer is a resounding NO. So the burden of proof is on you.
No, my friend. Innocent until proven guilty. Overwhelming doubt and suspicion can "prove" anything. Now you can actually prove that Muhammad didn't say this or that through the actual Quran, as well as through pointing to the weakness of Isnad. In the end the Quran gives us the answer to why we should or should not accept rumor and hearsay. Because that hearsay/rumor COULD be true. Just because it is hearsay or rumor does not mean that it is not true. You are starting from the guilty until proven innocent stance and that is prone to excessive suspicion and unjust judgements. But this idea may be our fundamental difference and I will try to find some Quranic passages that convey the correctness and justice in this approach.
It is great that you admit that they are merely stories and that they can be fictional because the SOLE AUTHORITY for Jahiliya poetry is based on that they were uttered by the very heroes of the poems at the exact time where the story took place. If this basic premise is placed in doubt then one can no longer assume that anything in them is pre-quranic in the same way that one can no longer assume that any of the Hadiths was actually uttered by the prophet.
This is a big jump in logic on your part. And you even accused Taha Hussein of making this same assumption. To doubt their historical accuracy and then to claim that they are automatically (because of that) post-Quranic is a totally unjust and assumptious decison. Again I have seen nothing to really cause doubt as to the Pre-Islamicness of the poems (again whether they are true to the events of those times or not is another story. And I would assume them to be true because I have not come accross anything that really says otherwise). And nothing you have said has been real evidence to its contrary. As it concerns the hadeeth, you will not find me so ANTI-Hadeeth. I don't follow them and I consider them rumor but there is still a possiblity that some of them (the ones that don't contradict each other and the Quran) might be true. But the case is much stronger against the Hadeeth. First you have the contridictory Hadeeth and the ones that say that there should even be Hadeeth. Plus we know that alot of them were fabricated, we know that isnaad does not really authenticate content and we know that there were no schools or classes of people dedicated to learning and memorizing the same events during the prophet's time. Additionally, Quranically we know that the last prophet (God bless him) had nothing to add to the Quran, that he did not explain the Quran, that he only followed the Quran and that for a rumor or hearsay to be considered valid it must have 4 witnesses to a narrator or narration. That means 4 different lines of isnaad for each and every saying or for each narrator 4 witnesses to even be considered as possibly authentic, and I have not come across a hadeeth that even stands up to that test.
What you believe is irrelevant. You need to provide evidence for such belief. You have provided no evidence that they are pre-Islamic. You already admitted the obvious fact that they are merely ?stories? uttered by storytellers. So you now have to prove that the storytellers were pre-quranic despite the forces of demand and supply that resulted in the wholesale creation of such stories being post-quranic.
Honestly you have supplied no evidence your self. Your two main arguments are
- The stories might have been fabricated during Pre-Islamic times which makes them unhistorical. And in that case it is even more possible that they were fabricated in Post-Quranic times.
There is obviosly no real logic to this statement. Just one great big unfounded assumption.
- Because there was a demand for poems MODELED AFTER Pre-Islamic poems (and not even REAL pre-islamic poems) people invented poems and claimed that they were really pre-islamic.
This is another logically inconsistent argument. Becuase if there is a demand for shakespearean-like poetry, who is going to write a poem and claim that it is shakespeare? That was not the demand. What you are saying is the equivalent of saying that if there is a demand for pies made with artificial strawberries that people are going to provide pies with real strawberries. But the market will meet the actual demand and the demand is for artificial strawberries not real strawberries. And in this case the demand was for poetry modeled after the pre-islamic style, not real pre-islamic poetry. (see A literary history of the Arabs)
This is false. The early dotting was not for the Tashkil. The early dotting was for disambiguating the Nabataean script that Arabic was written in. In fact, this is so early that it is also seen in some pre-quranic inscriptions. On the other hand, dotting for Tashkil doesn?t appear until the 9th-10th century CE. The same exact useless dotting was used for Hebrew Niqqud long before Tashkil appeared. So Tashkil simply borrowed the concept from Hebrew when Arabic became an elitist language and hypercorrections were introduced.
I read up on this and there are a few texts that use dots to distinguish Arabic sounds by dotting the evolved nabatean letters. But it was not widespread. (I'll be looking into if this was pre-Quranic) There are still many texts well into the Islamic era that do not distinguish between ra, za, fa, qaf, dhal, dal, taw, dhaw, seen sheen, sawd, dawd, or ta and thaa. And you can see this in early texts and scripts as well, Even early Quranic scripts. Dots were then also introduced for vowel purposes. I've seen texts that use dots for vowels and not letters and texts that use no dots, niether to distinguish the differences between the above Arabic letters or for vowels. As I have said for a long time the Arabic texts back then and well into the mideival times were a work in progress with different writing conventions used alongside each other and even within the same text.
What you are claiming is patently false. There are many early manuscripts, including mundane non-quranic ones (for example PERF 55, where these were dotted and as I said there are even pre-quranic inscriptions where they are dotted
.I explained myself above. There are also many early manuscripts that are not dotted.
http//www.muslimheritage.com/uploads/Quran_Kufe_script.jpg
Here the dots are vowels only.http//upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/54/Kufic_Quran_7th_Cent.jpg
Here we have no dots at all not even for letter diffierentiation.Anwar, you can?t just dogmatically attribute everything to an African origin and then expect to be taken seriously in professional circles. The Ethiopic language didn?t even appear until the middle of the 300s CE. On the other hand, Sabaic and the other Arabian dialects used the Musnad script as early as BCE times.
And that is not what i was doing. Please stick to the topic. I already put forth information on the earliest occurence of the south Arabic text in Abysinnian territory during the reign of D'mt. He's the problem historically Euro-centric historians and ethnologiest have tried to mislable Arabs as Caucasian (denying their mulatoe origins) (despite the obvious native Black Arabs and other Black natives like the Mahra) in order to claim credit for the ancient developments in the areas. They have refused to recognize the original Ethiopian substrate of Arabia, and also refused to recognize the true origins of this script. And they try to say that people from the Arab peninsula came to Africa and left their civilizations there earlier than they did in their own lands. Obviously this is false and racist but it is mainstream. There are a few historians who challnege this. A Peter R. Schmidt I believe is one of them. The fact that the script evolved and continued to be used in Ethiopia is no accident. And the fact that vowel signs were added to the text later as in Arabic only represents the elitist origins of the the texts. Ancient Egyptian was the first to do this and that is the origin behind the practice in Middle Eastern lands. The Egyptians actually came from the Ethiopian area (they claimed to have originated in the land of Punt to the south of Modern Egypt.) So this is not Afro-centrism, it is truth. And you have unfortunately been brainwashed to think something else that is not true to what your origins really are.
I think that you mean ?part? not ?apart?.
I agree that over the years since I have known you on Free-minds you have progressed a lot beyond the average Muslim intellectual. Even in the course of this discussion, I see progress. For example, it is great that you now acknowledge that Jahiliya poems are merely stories told by later storytellers. This would be unfathomable to most Muslim intellectuals who cling to Jahiliya poetry as if their faith depended on it. This just tells you how weak their faith really is.
Yes that is what i meant. And you can keep the rest of your patriarchal descending words to yourself. Maybe it is you that has progressed as you are actually starting to understand some of the things that I have been saying for so long. I will not be so arrogant as to pretend to judge your intellecutal progression since I have been in contact with yor on free-minds. My ideas about Jahiliyah poetry are slightly different but very similar to the traditonal ideas but my reasons are not dogmtic but logical and as objective as God has allowed me to be. But I did not admit what you say I admit. Please don't put words into my mouth and understand what I am really saying here. I admitted the possiblity but still believe in the improbablity of what you claim that I admit.
Since we can?t know the inner motives of people then they are irrelevant in scientific studies. Telling me that I am a follower of Rashad Khalifa because I concluded that Hadiths were not uttered by the prophet but by later religious storytellers is as wrong as you saying that I am a follower of Taha Hussein because I concluded that Jahiliya poems were not uttered by their heroes but by later storytellers. As for Taha Hussein, you would do well by reading his work first before making baseless judgments.
I never sid that you were a follower of Khalifa. Please don't invent things. Now I did think that you were a follower of some of Hussien's ideas in a blind way (because of your overly suspicious and revisionist attitudes) but I never thought you were one of his followers and you obviously criticized some of his beliefs although you turned around and espoused them later. Lastly we are talking about ideas here not people, although I will admit that I am doubtful of the genuiness and solidity of his ideas because the intentions that his actions (as I know of them) express. You can say that is unscientific or unprofessional if you want but I am dealing with logic here not some fancied definition of scientific and professional
Perhaps you misunderstood what I was trying to say. What I said is that Taha Hussein fails to see is that whether the poems have a strong personality and the author really existed or not has no bearing on the dating of the poem (i.e. pushing the dating back to pre-quranic times). It simply speaks about the level of skill of the (post-quranic) author of the poem. If you still agree then great.
Exactly. You criticize him so I don't think you are a follower of his, like I said before.
So is the word ?alrahman? in 551 a phrase?!!
Yes, an incomplete one. Words with their definite or indefinite articles are automatically types of phrases.
They would get it from the Hebrew religious texts which employed the SAME EXACT useless Tashkeel but they call it Niqqud. Did you really think that Tashkil was invented by Arabs? Well sorry to bust your Arab nationalistic bubble.
The idea of using dots to distinguish anything is obviously a borrowing of Hebrew/Armaic niqqud. Look at the word niqqood. it is a close cognate to naqt (dotting) and a possible plural form of it (based off of fa'l) is nuqoot (as well as the more common nuqat and niqaat).
There is a difference between sukoot and sukootan with a final Alif. On the other hand, making ?sukoot? as ?sukootun? doesn?t add any meaning that can?t already be figured out from ?sukoot? and ?sukootan? in the context.
Please don't take this from a modern Arabic point of view. sukootun can mean 'there is a sukoot, a sukoot, or any sukoot" The dammah tanween has its place in Old Arabic. It is obvious that the case endings have fallen out of use in modern ARabic and sentence structure and context are relied on more. But you are comparing apples with oranges. You can't try to make assumptions about Ancient Greek, English, Latin or Arabic based on Modern Greek, English, Latins and Arabic. It just doesn't work like that. Everything needs to be studied within its own context, even if it does share a common name.
They were nomadic. So unlike city dwellers they covered large swaths of land and came into contact with more diverse populations and their language is going to reflect this diversity.
True and not true. That is only true if they were in borderland regions with other linguistic influences and ethnicities. But if they were in plain Arabic speaking territory then this would not be true. Whereas city areas on caravan routes would be in more constant contact with foreigners and foreign influences.
Godbless,
anwar -
Peace,
SECOND PART
Most Arabic words have in fact their origin in a different language. So Classical Arabic dictionaries trying to attribute almost each and every single word meaning to an Arab origin is a clear example of the Arab nationalistic bias that ails Classical Arabic studies. For example, Lisan Al-3arab falsely classifying ?allat? (5319) under LTT and claiming that it was called so because of an Arab man mixing dough (ltt) at her idol when the Nabataean origin and classification under ALH is readily obvious is moronic and dishonest Arab nationalism at its best. We are talking here about the most authoritative Classical Arabic dictionary suffering from such dishonesty and moronic bias. Fortunately, with an intelligent reading of Classical Arabic dictionaries one can easily separate the real meanings from the ones that were invented to promote Arab nationalism. So your claim that all meanings in Classical Arabic dictionaries, whether for ?salat? or any other word are 100% valid is simply false wishful thinking not grounded in reality.
It is obvious that some words don't have Arab origins. But I would not accuse Lisaan al-Arab of this as it only relates it back to word usage and form usage within the Arabic language. Lisan al-Arab does relate some words duly back to foreign origins. That mentality is more of a modern one than an ancient one. Tafsirs and lisan al-arab are full of words relating back to foreign origins. Modern Arabs however are resistant to the inclusion of foreign words into MSA so they invent Arabic words based on Arabic pattern for modern phenomena. You are confusing Classical Arabic Academic trends with MSA trends. I disagree with your assessment of allat. It is obviously a local notion with the origin of the word. It does not follow the lam, ta ta form and is just a guess at the word. But that is not lisaan-al-arabs fault. I'm sure if you look a little closer you will see how that meaning is attributed to a certain scholar. And that is where you have assessed my mentality wrong. I believe in examining all Classical Arabic dictionary meanings. But some meanings are obviously the opinion of some Islamic scholars and don't make sense within the context of Arabic grammar. Such meanings obviously must be left behind. But you are blaming the dictionary instead of the source that was clearly listed for you.
This is simply false and thus you can?t produce examples despite them being abundant. Take for example, ?alansar? in 9100 and 9117 or ?alawthan? in 2230 or ?alasbat? in 2136, 2140, 384 and 4163. They all have the same exact form and derivations as ?ala?rab?. So something having to do with idols/?alawthan? is ?something wathany?, something having to do with ?alansar? is ?something nasary? and something having to do with ?alasbat? is ?something sabaty?, etc... Therefore, something having to do with ?ala?rab? is ?something ?araby?. Certainly ?ala?rab? doesn?t mean ?people who speak more clearly? or ?people from a certain genealogy? but the term is clearly used in the great reading to mean people from the wilderness in contrast to city people or civilized people. Of course, it is not surprising that you completely ignore this empirically verifiable meaning of ?ala?rab? in your false arguments.
You show a complete lack of knowledge of Arabic form and you are obviosly having linguistic interference with your Modern Arabic vernacular language. al-asbaatu comes from sabt (NOT sabat), ansaar from nasr (NOT nasar). There are no such things as sabaty or nasary in the known language. This is a modern pronunciation of yours with originations in the poetic style of qalqalah. Where Waqt becomes waqit or waqat. You are in clear error here. Now, the form fa'l differs from the form fa'al. For instance sakr is different from sakar, and sabr is NOT sabar. These two forms convey different meanings but share a pluralized form af'aal. fa'al usually conveys a meaning of maf'ool or fa'aal (fa'aal can be an informational noun or something that embodies the root fa'ala). Whereas fa'l usually conveys the meaning of an information noun or faa'il, the active participle. But sometimes they are nouns with no root meaning being of foreign origin, especially if they are proper nouns. For instance e tair for Tyre (Misr doesn't follow any root meaning either, nor does nooh) and as I see it 'arab for the Arab originated outside of, or before an there was, an Arabic context.
In fact, even in Lisan Al3arab, the meaning for the verb ?a?rab? is given as ?speaking in a rude or boorish way? and ?i?rab during sex? means ?dirty talking during sex?. Those meanings cannot be reconciled with genealogy or with speaking clearly but is completely reconciled with having something to do with vulgar people from the wilderness.
Your concept of classical versus vulgar is imaginative and unfounded. Classical langauges also have explicit words and concepts like these. And as in the case of Classical Arabic a vulgar (colloquial) language became a respected, archaic and taught (i.e.Classical) language through a process of gaining status that involved Arab/Islamic military, religious and cultural conquests as well as academic classification of the Old/Classical Arab language. But it never changed grammatically as a langauge as it moved into the realms of education, status and the classics.
Anwar, from what I have seen so far, all your knowledge of Classical Arabic (other than the progress that you made in the course of our discussion) is merely theoretical standard issue. Nothing you have said is beyond what is taught at secondary education level in any Arab government educational program. If you disagree then please list even one point that you made about Classical Arabic which is beyond that level.
At least what you have understood. But if that is so maybe you need to go back to the basics. You say it is theoretical, but all Arabic texts pre 1900 fit into this "theoritical standard" context. Whereas what you have conjectured up is not even consistent with real texts or even the Quranic text or recitation which you have biasedly tried to use as evidence for your theory. In the end what you are proposing is the theory and what I have been saying all along is to be found in every piece of non-Modern Arabic literature dating all the way back to pre-Islamic days, including and most especially the Quran, in all its forms.
Yes now you do and you would not have learned this if you kept sticking to standard Arab governmental Classical Arabic secondary education.
You should rather say "standard governmental Mondern Standard Arabic secondary education". Because what they are teaching is close to but not really Classical Arabic.
What Old Arabic literature? It takes a lot of imagination to claim that Classical Arabic literature is Old Arabic. So unless you went to Arabia and unknowingly to the rest of the world dug out some Old or Proto-Arabic literature then please stop using this Old Arabic term so haphazardly.
I'm using the term appropriately not haphazardly. If I wanted to talk about Proto-Arabic literature then i would. But Proto-Arabic is not Old Arabic. Old Arabic is Classical Arabic. And Modern Arabics are dialects and MSA.
They are not exception. There is not a single instance in the great reading where the meaning cannot be figured out without case endings. So the fact that case endings are useless is not an exception and indeed it applies to the whole language.
This is not true. Not including case endings can change meanings. Again you are comparing apples to oranges. If I say yaqool instead of yaqoolu that is subjective as opposed to present/present progressive. And there is a difference even between laa ilaaha illa allahu and laa ilaahun illa allaahu. or illa allahu and illa allaha. The point here is that in modern Arabic alot of this is not included and you base meanings more off of intonation and simpler forms. But Classical Arabic is specific leaving no doubt and that is why Classical Arabic is the language of the Quran and not Modern Arabics. Classical Arabic is the perfection of specificity and internal forms and patterns of meaning allowing for interpetation while at the same time allowing for as little doubt as possible through subtlties of case. But if you don't know or understand this, it just seems overly complicated. That is Classical Arabic, and Modern Arabics have evolved away from that.
What are you talking about? Whether Classical Arabic is a close approximation of the language of the great reading or an exact one is THE issue. What else is the issue? You never spoke Classical Arabic in your life and neither did anyone else. So there is no issue of learning Classical Arabic for communication.
They certainly did speak it in the past and all evidence points to that. If you deny this you are unduely conjecturing falsehood. But it is not spoken any more generally (although some news casters on Al-jazeerah do use every case ending and the Quran is still recited like this as well as Umayyad an Abbasid literature, plus Hadeeths, dua's and whoever recites pre-islamic poetry). It can be used for communication but its specificness for those who are not used to langauges that are of this class and calibre seems redundant. Old Arabic is a sythetic language and that was the tendency for Latin, Greek and other ancient langauges. Modern Arabic is more analytic (cnoveying subtle meanings through combination of vocabulary) and that seems to be the tendency of most modern languages. So don't feel bad if you see such subtlies as redundancy. They are not, but you are looking at it from the lense of an analytical language.
It is not surprising that everything in Abbasid literature is IDENTICAL to Hadiths and pre-Islamic poems because this is EXACTLY what one would expect if those Hadiths and poems were developed DURING the Abbasid era. So your observation actually confirms that they are post-Quranic.
It is not suprising at all, as the Ummayads and the Abbasids were still connnected to the then living tradition of Classical Arabic.
On the other hand, the language of the great reading is different as evidenced by the following obvious facts
- The great reading was meant to be recited without case endings.
How is this a fact when Quranic recitation to this day proves the opposite? For every 10 words recited 9 are recited with case endings and the ones that aren't are poetic pauses for rhyme.
2
. You admit that the language of the great reading was a vernacular. Case endings are useless memorized forms of hypercorrections that would not have been part of the intrinsic grammar of an untaught vernacular language. This is why they are spontaneously non-existent in ALL vernacular Arabic varieties.This is your incorrect conjectured asssesment. Case endings have their obvious grammatical place, all language forms are memorized first then use intrinsically but as case endings have no place in modern Arabics of course trying to insert them without understanding their full grammatical intention would seem useless. And they obviouly do not fall into the category of hypercorrections and cannot even be traced to Hebrew niqqood because Hebrew does not have case endings. Classical Arabic WAS a vernacular language, just as Classical, Latin, Greek and Old English. Because they fell out of use as vernaculars does not mean they were somehow different than how we know and learn them today when they were still spoken vernaculars. And the reason why cases are non-existent in all MODERN verncular Arabics is because vernacular Arabics are the result of creolization between Classical Arabic and non-case, analytical languages like vulgar Greco-greek, Aramean, berber, Coptic,Chadic, Nubic and Himyaritic languages. Creolization on its own usually reduces resulting languages to an analytic category.
- The great reading contains what would be glaring grammatical errors.
Only according to the modern MSA are these glaring grammatical errors.
- Unlike Hadith and Jahiliya poetry, the vocabulary of the language of the great reading reflects earlier non-religious and non-Arab-Nationalistic usage (like ?a3rab? being used in contrast to city dwellers and not having anything to do with Arab nationalistic genealogy and Allat as the name of the Nabataean deity The Goddess as opposed to having anything to do with some Arab mixing dough, etc.).
This idea is based on a lack of consideration of Arabic forms and meanings. It is well known that city dwelling Arabs considered desert dwelling Arabs to be more culturally genuine to Arabs roots of pastoralism and free range movement. So that is how &arab in its plural form also took on A meaning of desert/nomad Arabs. But it can also refer to all of the Arab tribes. The same thing happened with the word for Persian and how it began to communicate poor communication and barbarism, obvious results of Persian immigration to the area and their difficulty with the langauge and local xenophobia. As far as the explanation of allaat, this I am sure is sourced to a scholar's opinion. Just like Islam as submssion to God is sourced as a scholars opinion in Lisaan al-Arab. The dictionary is not to be blamed for this baseless (but obviously generally accepted) opinion nor is the meaning to attributed to the actual dictionary.
Godbless,
Anwar -
peace,
Which verse(s) are you referencing for the example with Mary?
Are you working along the lines of since 'B' is mentioned in the same verse/context as 'A' then that means 'B' is done during 'A'? Or is it simply one of the possibilities?
I'm still waiting Anwar.
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Whatever position you are in, whatever the way you are facing, God always sees us.
And you can do the prayer as true as you can, if the prayer isnt sincere, then what is the use of it
That's why i avoid public places like mosques, i feel like i pray just because everyone prays. That's bad.
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Wakas,
Sorry I forgot about you.
343 O Mary! Remain thou truly devout unto thy Sustainer, worship (asjudi), and bow down (arka'i) with those who bow down."
I also beleve that zakaat meaning betterment or what is right/just aa'too az-zakaata can mean do what is right (give yourself (for III) to what is right).
So in the below and in other passages that say the same
243 and be establish prayer, do what is right and bow down (along) with all who bow down.
Waaqeemoo alssalata waatoo alzzakata wairkaAAoo maAAa alrrakiAAeena555 yuqeemoona alssalata wayutoona alzzakata wahum rakiAAoona
912 alrrakiAAoona alssajidoona (these go together)
4829 Thou canst see them bowing down, worshipping seeking favour with God and goodly acceptance
Godbless,
Anwarsajada means to worship generally and to prostrate in worship (reverence) as thas was the custom of showing reverence then. I don't think prostration is necessary but it is totally acceptable.
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peace Anwar,
Thanks for clarifying.
So, from the verses you referenced Mary is not linked to "bowing" in "salat" but as part of "sajada" which you translate as "worship" from the possibilities. In my opinion this is not what I call solid evidence for your statement below
Now the Quran does associate raka&a (which is to bow or kneel) with Salat in particualr Mary's salat.
And in the other verses you referenced, you cant make a direct link to "bowing" in "salat" but make this link based on "sajada" being "worship" and presumably its proximity to the word "salat" in some contexts. Is this correct?
Also, I dont think you answered my second question. I will clarify it you imply that bowing is part of prayer (I will assume you mean "salat" by prayer) due to its proximity in context (or do you have some other evidence?) so my point was do you also consider other things mentioned in close proximity to "salat" as part of "salat", e.g. "atawoo az-zakat"? If not, what is your criteria for what you think is part of it and what is not or do you have no criteria?
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Peace,
Yes you are correct that is based on sajada. I'll do my best to find some contexts where it is mentioned more specifically with the word Salat. But I will say that I think it is logical that when our Salat means prayer and it is directed towards God that it implies worship. As I said also eetaa' uzzakaat is doing what is right/just, so in the contexts where it is mentioned with Salaat it can be connected to Salaat or considered on its own. I'm sure at one time I had enough evidence for this, which is why i bow in some form when I pray. But honestly, when I come accross this evidence I apply it in my life and don't write it down or formulate it to prove it to others because in the end many won't accept what I have to say anyway. There are so many things I have seen in my study of the Quran that I don't decide to write down and bring up here on free-minds, that when the topics come up I'm at a loss for soild evidence to disprove the unquranicness of the many erroneous statements people say here. I'm sure those are just words to many of my enemies and critics here. But they can buzz off, because it is truth. So I apply these discoveries in my life and live and let live. But you'll have to give me some time to more deeply re-discover where and why i came to this conclusion, and the other verses that may have pointed me in this direction. As of this point I could care less about challenges to give concrete evidence. If you'd like to know my reasons for your own edification I'd be happy to dig up the passages and my reasonings and give them to you however. I'm sure you can easily see how any context where we are bowing to God in worship is salat (in its meaning of prayer.)
Godbless,
Anwar -
Peace,
Don't worry. I just checked it. My conclusion is definitely based on the fact that when we pray we are definitely in worship. And I remember being of the opinion that whenever we pay respects (the real meaning of worship) we should bow in some way. So yes, when we worship God we should bow or kneel in someway. To me that can be a head bow, a full kneel or prostration it doesn't really matter. I have not been able to connect this with the specific word Salaat but if the logic is sufficient and prayer is obviously a form of worship, is that necessary? Do you see what I mean? Looking forward to your comments.
Godbless,
Anwar -
peace,
Do you see what I mean?
I understand what you are trying to link and how you are trying to link it, but I dont consider it solid. I have no qualms about what prayer and worship may or may not involve, to kneel or not kneel, as a general point, only that you said bowing/kneeling was part of Mary's "salat", when this is not what is said in AQ. That was my main point, and it was related to my following point to take a word mentioned in close proximity to "salat" and then say it's part of "salat" with no evidence.
As a sidenote, in your explanation, you implied sajada=worship. In terms of AQ's usage, I disagree. That is not it's primary usage, however I do not wish to discuss it, as it has been discussed in detail many many times before.
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Peace all,
I was reading the Quran and a couple of verses reminded me of this thread
969 Have you seen the one who deters,
9610 A servant from communing?
9611 Have you seen if he was being guided,
9612 Or he ordered righteousness?
9613 Have you seen if he lied and turned away?
9614 Did he not know that God can see?
9615 Alas, if he does not cease, We will strike the frontal lobe.
9616 A frontal lobe which lies and errs.
9617 So let him call on his supporter.
9618 We will call on the guardians.
9619 So do not obey him, prostrate and come near.This seems to signify prostrating and coming near is part of "communing". It could be more than a case of proximity. Anyway I hope this helps your discussion.
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Peace,
Aalmakto,
It is that word "prostrating" that we are discussing. It can mean to prostrate or to worship (and worship means to pay homage to).
Wakas,
I understand your point. And for the most part I have done my best to connect issues of salat to contexts with just the word salat mentioned. However, we may disagree on this point, because I feel that when we pray to God we are paying homage/respects to God and when paying respects/homage we are to bow or kneel in someway. As for the contexts of the Quran and sajada, I think you know that this word is used in many places only in the meaning of to pay homage/respects. However, I do understand that the word can also mean to prostrate in homage. I believe I may have rejected this last meaning previously. As far as I know I don't know if i had a good reason to. Although I will say that to prostrate and then kneel is a very backwards and almost illogical kind of wording. To kneel is to go from a standing position down or an upright position to a less upright one. So to say 'prostrate in homage and bow down/kneel' is definitely more of an ambiguous wording than 'worship and bow down/kneel.' I'll be giving this some more thought. Thanks Wakas, it might have been time for me to refresh my conclusions on this topic.
Godbless,
Anwar -
peace bro aalmakto,
A few points
9610 has the verb form "salla".
You can study the verb form occurrences in PRL. It poses problems for a "prayer" understanding
salla (ي vb.II m.
perf. act. 7531, 8715, 9610
impf. act. 339, plu. neg. 4102, plu. 4102, tusalli (ل neg. 984, yusallee (ي sing. 3343, yusalloona (ن plu. 3356
salli (ل impv. 9103, salloo (ا plu. 3356, 1082
musalleena (ن pcple. act. plu. acc. gen. 7022, 7443, 1074It does link sjd with "salla", perhaps not in a concrete way, but reasonable. What we can deduce from this usage is that "sjd and come near" (to God) is contrasted to "obey him" (i.e. the person who was deterring). If it was a physical prostration, it obviously does not mean "come near" in a literal sense, as one would be stationary when prostrating. The primary usage of sjd in AQ is 'to acknowledge / give recognition', which also fits the context. I'm not aware of an occurrence in whic sjd clearly means "prostrate" but I am aware of occurrences where it definitely cannot mean to physically "prostrate" (124, 4154, 25.
It should also be read in conjunction with chapter 107.
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Peace be upon you,
To "sujood" to God is to submit to God, this draws us closer.
Islam is peacefulness, not submission.
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Peace,
Yeah, based on the meanings of the CLASSICAL ARABIC words found in the Quran and the wording when it comes to the use of sujood I am going to stick with the position I laid out in my last post in this topic (two posts above). Wakas, you have done a lot of research and have made alot of resources available about these Classical Arabic words I would hope that you would not abondon that because of the naive and simple idea of the Quran somehow being a dictionary of the words it borrowed from the Classical Arabic language. Anyways, to God within I'm not going to comment on your meaning of sujood as I think my position is clear on context guessing and not using Classical Arabic dictionaries to understand the Old Arabic words used in the Quran. (I use Old Arabic and Classical Arabic as synonyms). However as for your definition of Islam, that is only ONE of the definitions of this word. Now you won't find that meaning in any dictionary but you will find it in the connotations of form 4 when the root salima is used. (For those who think that I am somehow contradicting myself here I have always said that dictionary defintiions AND grammatical, formed based connotations are the rules to understand the langauge that the Quran uses. That has been my stance for a very long time now. So if you misunderstood me that was your misunderstanding not my contradiction.)
Godbless,
Anwar -
peace,
I would hope that you would not abondon that because of the naive and simple idea of the Quran somehow being a dictionary of the words it borrowed from the Classical Arabic language.
I have no idea why I would abandon that based on the above, but erm, ok, thanks for the advice.
I follow a methodology that gives more weight to Quranic usage than to Dictionary usage, you dont, simple.
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Wakas,
I follow a methodology that gives more weight to Quranic usage than to Dictionary usage, you dont, simple.
We could continue this on a pm basis if you would like because I don't want this to sound like a challenge or for it to get out of hand because of what may be interpreted as antogonistic comments. But anyway, I would like to know why you follow this methodology and your reasons for it. My first set of questions following this will be clarification for my own edification and then I will follow up with a set of possibly challenging, but respectful, questions.
I will also explain that from my perspective there is really no such thing as Quranic usages versus dictionary usage, as you imply. The Quran uses/chooses from the dictioanary uses so the two will never conflict. (you may find more usages in the dictionary but the usage that fits the Quran's context will always be there as well). In addition to that grammatical connotations which cannot be found in the dictionary but are apart of the usage of Classcical Arabic words is another source for understanding Classical Arabic words in Quranic context or any other context. Honestly, I just don't fully understand your phrasing above because the Quran borrowed the Classical Arabic language and the dictionaries are tools for exposing the usages of this language, which again the Quran borrowed, in their entirety. So I don't see the dichotomy and as such I don't see the reasoning in your above phrasing. Thanks.
Godbless,
Anwar
