al-Muhadhdhab fima waqa fi al-Quran min al-Muarrab
- Author died
- 911 AH
- Editions
- Maṭbaʿat Faḍālah - bi-Ishrāf Ṣundūq Iḥyāʾ al-Turāth al-Islāmī, al-Mushtarak bayna al-Mamlakah al-Maghribiyyah wa-Dawlat al-Imārāt al-ʿArabiyyah al-Muttaḥidah
al-Muhadhdhab fima waqa fi al-Quran min al-Muarrab (The Refined Compendium on What Occurred in the Qur'an of Arabized Vocabulary) is a specialized treatise on foreign loanwords and Arabized terms in the Qur'an by al-Jalal al-Suyuti (d. 911 AH / 1505 CE) . Completed on Friday, 12 Dhu al-Hijjah 878 AH (1474 CE), the work gathers words attested in the Qur'an whose origins trace back to non-Arabic tongues, providing their linguistic attribution and source references .
Purpose and Scope
Al-Suyuti composed the work to comprehensively document and examine Arabized vocabulary (al-mu'arrab) occurring in the Qur'anic text, following years of research and wide reading . The book attributes vocabulary to various linguistic origins, including Ethiopic, Persian, Roman (Greek or Latin), Syriac, Hebrew, Nabataean, Coptic, Indian, Turkish, Zanj, and Berber .
The author opens with an extensive introduction surveying the classical scholarly dispute over whether the Qur'an contains non-Arabic words :
- The majority position: Scholars such as al-Shafi'i, Ibn Jarir al-Tabari, Abu Ubaydah, Abu Bakr al-Baqillani, and Ibn Faris denied the presence of foreign vocabulary, arguing on the basis of verses such as قُرْآنًا عَرَبِيًّا ("An Arabic Qur'an") and وَلَوْ جَعَلْنَاهُ قُرْآنًا أَعْجَمِيًّا لَقَالُوا لَوْلَا فُصِّلَتْ آيَاتُهُ أَأَعْجَمِيٌّ وَعَرَبِيٌّ ("And if We had made it a non-Arabic Qur'an, they would have said: 'Why are its verses not explained in detail? Is it a foreign [recitation] and an Arab [messenger]?'") . Al-Tabari interpreted shared words as instances of linguistic overlap (tawarud al-lughat) .
- The affirmative position: Supported by reports from early figures like Ibn Abbas, Ikrimah, and Abu Maysarah—who stated that "in the Qur'an is [something] from every tongue"—this view holds that the Qur'an incorporated select terms from various languages . Al-Suyuti favored this position, reasoning that since the Qur'an encompasses comprehensive knowledge and was sent to all humanity, it includes the sweetest and lightest expressions adapted by the Arabs from other tongues without ceasing to be predominantly Arabic .
Structure and Content
The entries in the body of the work are arranged alphabetically by word rather than by chapter or language . The dictionary begins with abariq (أباريق), abb (أبّ), ibla'i (ابلعي), and akhlad (أخلد), and concludes with entries for al-yamm (اليم) and al-yahud (اليهود) .
At the end of the text, al-Suyuti notes that Taj al-Din al-Subki had earlier versified 27 such words, to which Ibn Hajar al-Asqalani added an appendix of 24 words . Al-Suyuti supplemented them with an additional 72 items (six of which were near-duplicates), bringing his total collection to 117 words, providing 66 new terms beyond those of al-Subki and Ibn Hajar .
Reception, Summary, and Editions
Al-Suyuti integrated an abridged summary of the treatise into his encyclopedic Qur'anic work al-Itqan fi Ulum al-Quran (The Perfection in the Sciences of the Qur'an) under its thirty-eighth type, and also cited it in Mu'tarak al-Aqran fi I'jaz al-Quran .
Modern scholar Muhammad Taqi al-Din al-Hilali observed that while al-Suyuti possessed vast traditional knowledge, his treatment of non-Arabic loanwords was limited by his lack of direct proficiency in the foreign languages from which these vocabulary items were alleged to derive, relying instead strictly on earlier Arabic transmission .
The work was edited by al-Tuhami al-Raji al-Hashimi and published in Mohammedia, Morocco, in a collaborative edition between Morocco and the United Arab Emirates .
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