LINGUISTIC RESEARCH IN THE HOLY QURAN
Year:2015 | Volume:4 | Issue:2 (8) |Papers Count:7

Regarding the articulation of the word “Ghorfa” (غرفة) in the Quranic Verse “indeed Allah will be testing you with a river. So whoever drinks from it is not of me, and whoever does not taste it is indeed of men, excepting one who takes [from it] in the hollow of his hand” (Quran, 1: 249) there are discrepancies. Some readers articulate it as “Ghorfra”, some others articulate it as “Gharfa”. Abu Amr believes that the amount of water contained in one’s hand is called “Gharfa” and the water contained in a container is called “Ghorfa”; therefore, he accepts the articulation of “Gharfa” and Kasaei refers to the linguistic register of the verse and states: if instead of the verb “Ightaraf”, the verb “Gharaf” was used, I articulate it Gharfa”. This issue indicates that the meaning of words and linguistic discussions have effects on the mode of reading a text. The present study is to analytically investigate the meanings of “Gharfa” and “Ghorfa” by investigating lexical, phonetic, interpretative, and narrative resources using a descriptive method. Analyzing the mentioned resources in illustrating the meaning of these two words indicates how lexicographers and Quran readers can have relations with each other. Lexicographers by stating the meaning of these two words, assign the discrepancies in the meanings of these two words to Yunus, the disciple of Abu Amr of Basra, and Fara’, the disciple of Kasaei. Therefore, this hypothesis that sometimes lexicographical ideas of scholars are influenced by the articulation of those who read the Holy Quran is reinforced. The findings of the present study indicated that there is no scientific and firm reason for confirming one of the articulatory aspects of these two words, and the reasons assigned to articulatory aspects can be criticized. The narratives about the register of the verse only clarify that this word means the amount of water in the hands of somebody (Gharfa), and in the holy verse, regarding the fact that the word “Ightaraf” (اغتراف) is used versus Shorb (شرب), this word refers to drinking once.

Translating some of the words and phrases from the Qur'an is faced with difficulties, and it is not possible to understand the exact meaning of that word only by referring to the lexical books or Qur'anic usage of that word. In addition to these two, the translator of the Qur'an should consider the style and context of the Qur'an (including the context of the word, verse, verses, sentences and even chapters) and narrations. ’Annā («أنّی ») is one of these words which is used in twenty-eight verses of the Qur'an. This study via Descriptive - analytical method and through analysis of Persian translations of the Qur'an has shown that there is no any disagreement among the translators regarding the translation of eighteen verses in which this word has been used. However, in ten verses where the word has been used, many of the translators have slipped in a way that there are five different kinds of translations regarding verse 223 in chapter Baqarah. This paper has attempted to clarify the true and exact meaning of the word ’Annā (« أنّی ») which translators disagree about its meaning, i.e. ten cases, through referring to the lexical books, regularity of the Qur'an, role of context, exegetes and jurists view points, as well as narrations.

Language is an alive and changing phenomenon. Changes in time, place, and culture might change the whole structure of a language or part of it such as its lexicon. Arabic as the language of the Quran is no exception. In this article one branch of Quranic and linguistic science that is the semantic changes of lexicons in the Quran and Arabic language prior to the revelation of the book and particularly in the pre-Islamic poetry will be examined to see whether the words used in the Quran kept their pre-Islamic meanings or were used with new meanings and thus turned into special Quranic terms. The article deals with the changes in meaning of these terms since with the increase in the depth of and expanse of linguistic studies new looks are needed to be presented.

Although human reason can' t achieve the deep meanings of the Quran and only bright and sage eyes can achieve its merits "which none touched save the purified" but this subject should not distract us from Quran's values, importance and necessity of survey. It is a necessity for Arabic language researchers to understand the Quran. This study that is unique in its kind uses the Paradigmatic and Syntagmatic relationships of different constructions of Quranic term of "Bain" with Analytic- Descriptive method and by studying these constructions; it develops a framework for a dominant meaning for these constructions. Among the most important findings of this study is proving that there is no basic and independent meaning for the term Bain. For this term, without considering the noun which is usually pursued by it, has no meaning. It becomes meaningful only after the noun after it has been mentioned. The terms "Khelal' and "Vasat" are the words which can substituted by Bain and are considered in Paradigmatic axe. However, the word "Vasat" is not an absolutely similar synonym for Bain. The structures like "Baidhalik" (between those) and "Bain Ahad" (between none) and "Bain Aydi" (can be studied as examples for Syntagmatic relationships. Based on the findings of the study, contrary to the idea held by early scholars saying that Bain has no tense, some of its structures have tenses.

With regard to the importance and central function of the Name “Rabb” in the semantic system of the Holy Qur’ān, this study aims to find the meaning of the word “Rabb”, its semantic change and usage to refer to the True God/ Creator in the Semitic languages, and under what circumstances it has been transferred to Pre-Classical Arabic, using historical semantics and historical comparative linguistics approaches. In the first part, this study represents the comparison between the Arabic “Rabb” and its cognates in the Semitic language family and also the Egyptian language. Thus, the initial concept of "great" for Semitic rab and its Egyptian cognate nib have been figured out as well as the relationship between the two Semitic roots r-b-b and r-b-w/y.In the second part, it was paid more attention not to the Semitic word rab, but to the usage of its concept in the pre-Islamic religious context and the other words referring to this concept in the Semitic languages and Jewish and Christian texts via a historical approach. Therefore, beside specifying the historical revolving of usage of the meaning “Lord/ Owner of a slave” referring to the True God/ Creator and introduction of Hebrew ’Adonāy, Greek Kyrios, Aramaic Mār’/ Māry and SyriacMoryo, all of them referring to this concept, archaeological evidences have revealed that rab has been used as one of the Names of God in the Sabaic language for the first time in the early 5th century A.D. Then, this usage has made its way to Hijaz and the Arabic language used in the emergence of Islam.

Islamic teachings taking advantage of all the layers of meaning in the Holy Qur'an insists that, Comprehensiveness and multilayer nature of the generous Quran requires a science being able to recognize the depth and the nature of this dignified book. In each of the tools in the hands of scientists and researchers there Quantic studies with the help of new spaces and tips trademark of the Qur'an, have been discovered and extracted. Semantics as one of the ways of new literary criticism is explained as processes and in different dimensions, such as "semantics square" theories. This article seeks to make clear the semantic features of some of the Quranic Verses, and also review and analyze the process of semantics square through analytical and description method. One of the most important results of this research is that the majority of mooted theories in this field are the one rooted in western linguistics and criticism. But there exists a point which is worth mentioning and that is the greater part of these theories have been mentioned in old texts of Muslims that just their names were been changed in new surveys.

The term "Kitab" (book) is one of the fundamental concepts receiving much attention from the Quranic researchers since early times. The term has been used in the Quran 231 times and has been paired with the keywords such as "Quran", "Haq" (Truth), "Imam" (Religious leader) and "Hikmah" (Wisdom). The intensive usage if this term in the Quran and its syntagmatic relation with other Quranic concepts reveals its specific position among Quranic verses and clarifies how necessary it is to explain its meaning. Considering the semantic approach as an impressive method in analyzing the Quranic terms, one can refer to the syntagmatic axis the term book has with other Quranic terms. Investigation of the terms with which "book" has syntagmatic relation shows that it has three syntagmatic relations of adjectival, verbal and nominal kind. In syntagmatic relation of the term "book" with adjectives such as "Munir", "Karim", "Aziz", "Ma' lum", "Musadiq", "Maknun", "Hakim" and "Hafiz" the five meanings of "Heavenly books", Well-Guarded tablet, "letter" and "Doomed Date of Death" can be obtained. The syntagmatic relation of the term "book" with the thirteen verbs in the Quran, causes the four meanings of "Quran", "Heavenly books", "Torah" and "Treatise of Acts" to be understood. The syntagmatic relationship of the "book" with the nouns like "Um", "Ahl", Imam", "Rahmah" and "Tafsil" indicates that this term has the following main meanings of: "well-guarded tablet", "Firm verses", "Torah" and "Quran". The present article using the semantic approach tries to elaborate on the meaning of the "book" and its semantic field in the Quran.