Do you mean the feminine form of Allah? This one seems more plausible to me, actually.
For Pacifica - random quotes on Arabic and Qur'an
- Thread starter Bestiola
- Start date
Yes.
My favorite of the three goddesses is العزى.
I like that she was later associated with deities like Ishtar and Isis, but mostly it's the name.
فانثال عليها العلماء انثيال جودها على الصفات
I didn't understand جودها على الصفات so I looked up the French translation. It says "les savants s'y rassemblèrent en nombre si considérable qu'on ne peut le décrire". With that help, my literal interpretation of the whole clause is "the scholars thronged in/toward it with a thronging whose abundance (i.e. number, multitude) is against descriptions (i.e. makes description impossible)". Is that right?
I didn't understand جودها على الصفات so I looked up the French translation. It says "les savants s'y rassemblèrent en nombre si considérable qu'on ne peut le décrire". With that help, my literal interpretation of the whole clause is "the scholars thronged in/toward it with a thronging whose abundance (i.e. number, multitude) is against descriptions (i.e. makes description impossible)". Is that right?
Ah, no, that can't be quite right. ها- can't be referring to انثيال as it's the wrong gender. I guess then ها- refers to the scholars? "Scholars thronged with a thronging, with a number of them (= scholars) against descriptions (= beyond description)"?
Or maybe جود is a type-2 verb, and ها- the object. I was thinking such a verb might mean something like "to fill (abundantly)" but I found it with another meaning: "to improve". So... "with a thronging that improved it (= the caliph's residence) beyond description"? Grammatically that seems a better fit than my previous theory, but the meaning would kind of seem to imply that the caliph's residence may not have been excellent before, and I'm not sure the praiseful author would have dared give even the slightest hint of such an idea.
That’s the only hypothesis I was familiar with, actually.
Maybe the other hypothesis has some validity, but my hunch is that medieval Muslim scholars would have found the word Allah to be too sacred and unique to be associated with the etymology of something so temerarious as a false deity.
Again I copy-pasted the sentence and stumbled upon this version which is great because it’s got vocab footnotes! : https://books.google.fr/books?id=iLtsDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA25&lpg=PA25&dq=فانثال+عليها+العلماء+انثيال+جودها+على+الصفات&source=bl&ots=Ji45b_XvSj&sig=ACfU3U2xVJcCXPf9Cpc6FgZ-tE9FKPYzFw&hl=fr&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi67vuA_cj3AhUk-YUKHaOkCBEQ6AF6BAgWEAM#v=onepage&q=فانثال عليها العلماء انثيال جودها على الصفات&f=false
I had the same suspicion.
And the Arabic ’interpretation’ of the... Arabic is very different from the French one.
الجود = المطر الغزير = heavy rain
الصفة - الصخرة الملساء- smooth rock
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Yes, at least that’s how I guessed what it meant the first time I heard it!
I looked that one up because it sounded strange to me, and there is yet another possibility, صفة also refers to a porch in front of a mosque where people could take shelter when it rained. Which would make perfect sense here.
Interesting how many seemingly valid interpretations one can come up with, with that kind of texts.
Here I’ve got some Latin for you:
The "taking shelter when it rained" may be just me conflating the actual definitions and the original sentence!
The "taking shelter when it rained" may be just me conflating the actual definitions and the original sentence!
I would say ها refers to the city/residence الحضرة
So, scholars flock to this place (pour down on it) like its (the place’s) heavy rains pour down on its porches.
I heard the word تسويف in that series I'm watching, saw it translated as "procrastination" in the subtitles and I was like "Wait... could it be???!!!"
This is exceedingly awesome!