Dabt Filayn fi Matn al-Azhar wa (Faidatan) - ضمن "Athar al-Muallimi
- Author died
- 1386 AH
- Editions
- دار عالم الفوائد للنشر والتوزيع
Dabt Fi‘layn fi Matn al-Azhar wa-I‘tirad wa-Intiqad wa-(Fa’idatan) (Vocalization of Two Verbs in Matn al-Azhar, with Objections, Refutation, and Two Benefits) is a short grammatical and linguistic treatise by the Yemeni scholar Abd al-Rahman al-Muallimi al-Yamani (1313–1386 AH / 1894–1966 CE), published as part of his collected works (Athar al-Mu‘allimi) .
Linguistic Debate on Matn al-Azhar
The main tract originated as a response to an inquiry regarding the vocalization and grammatical basis of two verbs occurring in a legal passage on zakat al-fitr from Matn al-Azhar, a prominent Hadawi Zaydi jurisprudence manual composed by Ahmad ibn Yahya al-Mahdi (d. 840 AH) . The passage under discussion states: «وتسقط عن المكاتب، قيل: متى يرق أو يعتق» ("and it is waived for the contracted slave (al-mukatab); it is said: when he becomes enslaved or emancipated") .
Al-Mu‘allimi determined that both verbs are active present-tense forms (mabniyy li-l-ma‘lum) with a fatha on the initial letter and a kasra on the second (yariqqu and ya‘tiqu), derived from the intransitive verbs raqqa and ‘ataqa meaning "to become enslaved" and "to become free" . He supported his conclusion by citing Arabic lexical sources such as al-Misbah al-Munir by al-Fayyumi and al-Zamakhshari's Asas al-Balaghah .
A scholar who signed under the single letter (‘Ayn)—likely the judge Abdullah al-Amudi, who engaged in frequent scholarly discussions with al-Mu‘allimi—penned objections challenging al-Mu‘allimi's linguistic definitions, citations, and syntax . Al-Mu‘allimi answered the initial objection, and when the critic reiterated his arguments in subsequent marginal notes, al-Mu‘allimi composed a further rejoinder dismantling the second set of objections .
Supplementary Grammatical Notes (Fa’idatan)
Appended to the treatise are two short grammatical reflections (fa’idatan) authored by al-Mu‘allimi:
- Analysis of a Poetic Hemistich: A thought that occurred to him during teaching regarding the poetic line: «يلومونني في حب ليلى عواذلي ... ولكنني من حبها لعميد» ("My blamers reproach me for loving Layla, but on account of her love I am lovesick") . He proposed that lākinnanī originated as the lightened particle lākin followed by innanī, with the vowel of the hamza transferred to the nun of lākin, followed by the elision of the first nun to avoid a sequence of four nuns . He cited a line by the early poet al-Najashi as evidence of the elision of the nun in lākin and noted that his derivation concurred with an opinion previously articulated by al-Zamakhshari .
- Definite Nouns Following Demonstrative Pronouns: A syntactical ruling on whether a definite noun appearing after a demonstrative pronoun (such as hadha Zaydun or hadha al-rajul) serves as an adjective (na‘t), substitute (badal), or explicative apposition (‘atf bayan) . Al-Mu‘allimi posited that the parsing should depend on the hierarchical ranking of definiteness (maratib al-ma‘arif): if the demonstrative is more definite than the following noun, the latter is preferably parsed as an adjective; if they are equal in definiteness, either construction is valid; and if the subsequent noun is more definite, it is preferably parsed as a badal or ‘atf bayan .
Manuscript and Publication
The text survived in a five-folio manuscript preserved in a composite codex (no. 4707) containing letters and various notes . The manuscript was written in an unidentified copyist's hand and subsequently revised by al-Mu‘allimi, who added corrections and emendations, while the interlocutor's objections were recorded at the bottom of the folios in a distinct handwriting . In the treatise, al-Mu‘allimi occasionally utilized Himyaritic Arabic forms, such as the Himyaritic definite article am- (in am-‘arab) .
The work represents an early output of al-Mu‘allimi and was published for the first time in volume 20 of his collected works (Athar al-Mu‘allimi), within the division dedicated to grammatical and morphological treatises .
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