رأيa single root denoting looking and seeing, whether with the eye or with inner insight. (root ry)

Al-raʾy (الرأي) is the opinion of the heart [mind], and its plural is ārāʾ (الآراء). You say: mā aḍalla ārāʾahum (ما أضل آراءهم) ['How misguided are their opinions!'], in the manner of wonderment, and also rāʾahum (راءهم). [One says] raʾaytu bi-ʿaynī ruʾyatan (رأيت بعيني رؤية) [I saw with my own eye, a seeing]. And raʾaytuhu raʾya l-ʿayn (رأيته رأي العين) means where the sight falls directly upon it. From raʾy of the heart [opinion] you say: irtaʾaytu (ارتأيت) [I deliberated/formed a view]. He said: "O you who deliberate (al-murtaʾī) in affairs, its clarification will dispel blindness from you." You say: raʾaytu ruʾyā ḥasanatan (رأيت رؤيا حسنة) [I saw a good dream]. He said: "Perhaps I shall see, while awake, what I saw in sleep as a dream (ruʾyā) — that I was given drink." Al-ruʾyā (الرؤيا) is not pluralized. Some Arabs soften the hamza and say ruwyā (رويا), and some who alter the hamza turn it into a yāʾ, then give it a kasra, saying raʾaytu riyā ḥasanatan (رأيت ريا حسنة). Al-riyy (الري) is what the eye sees of a good state of goods and clothing. Al-riʾī (الرئي) is a jinnī that presents itself [to a man], showing him soothsaying and healing arts; you say: maʿahu riʾī (معه رئي) [he has a familiar spirit]. Some Arabs say raytu (ريت) meaning raʾaytu (رأيت) [I saw], and it is on this basis that [the Qurʾān] was recited: "a-raʾayta lladhī yanhā ʿabdan idhā ṣallā" (أرأيت الذي ينهى عبدا إذا صلى) [Q. 96:9–10, "Have you seen the one who forbids a servant when he prays?"]. And he said: "Abū Ḥafṣ ʿUmar swears by God that he did not see her (mā rāyahā), neither through a hole nor from behind — so forgive him, O God, if he has sinned." Tarāʾā al-qawm (تراءى القوم): the people saw one another. God, exalted and mighty, said: "falammā tarāʾā l-jamʿān" (فلما تراءا الجمعان) [Q. 26:61, "So when the two hosts came in sight of one another"]. [You say]: tarāʾā lī fulānun (تراءى لي فلان), meaning he presented himself so that you would see him. Tarāʾā lahu (تراءى له) [means] his jinn-companion followed him, appearing to him so that he might see it. Al-mirʾāh (المرآة) [mirror] is that in which one looks, and its plural is al-marāʾī (المرائي); those who soften the hamza say al-marāyā (المرايا). Tarāʾaytu fī l-mirʾāh (تراءيت في المرآة): I looked into it. In the ḥadīth: "lā yatamarraʾā aḥadukum fī l-māʾ" (لا يتمرأى أحدكم في الماء) ["let none of you view his reflection in water"],

Ruʾya (الرؤية) [seeing] with the eye takes a single object, and in the sense of knowledge it takes two objects. One says: raʾā Zaydan ʿāliman (رأى زيدا عالما) [he saw/considered Zayd to be knowledgeable]. [One says] raʾā raʾyan wa-ruʾyatan wa-rāʾatan (رأى رأيا ورؤية وراءة), like rāʿatan (راعة). Al-raʾy (الرأي) [opinion] is well known, and its plural is arʾāʾ (أرآء) and also ārāʾ (آراء), which is a metathesized form. Riʾī (رئي) is on the pattern of faʿīl (فعيل), like ḍaʾn and ḍaʾīn (ضأن وضئين). One also says: bihi riʾyun min al-jinn (به رئي من الجن), meaning he is touched/possessed [by jinn]. One says: raʾā fī l-fiqh raʾyan (رأى في الفقه رأيا) [he formed a legal opinion]. And [the discussion] has been left off... [entry continues]

[The letters] rāʾ, hamza, and yāʾ [form] a root that indicates looking and perceiving, whether with the eye or with insight. Thus raʾy (الرأي) is what a person thinks/sees regarding a matter, and its plural is ārāʾ (الآراء). [One says] raʾā fulānun al-shayʾa (رأى فلان الشيء) and rāʾahu (وراءه) [both meaning 'so-and-so saw the thing'], the latter being a metathesized form. Al-riʾy (الرئى) is the good condition/appearance that the eye perceives. The Arabs say raytuhu (ريته) in the sense of raʾaytuhu (رأيته) [I saw it]. Tarāʾā al-qawm (تراءى القوم) means the people saw one another. Rāʾā fulānun yurāʾī (راءى فلان يرائي) [means so-and-so makes a show], and doing that is called riʾāʾ al-nās (رئاء الناس), which is doing something so that people will see it. Al-rawāʾ (الرواء) is a pleasing appearance. Al-mirʾāh (المرآة) [mirror] is well known. Al-tarʾiya (الترئية) — or, if you soften the hamza, al-tariya (الترية) — is what a menstruating woman sees of yellowish discharge after the blood of menstruation, or her seeing some sign of menstruation beforehand. Al-ruʾyā (الرؤيا) [dream-vision] is well known, and its plural is ruʾan (رؤى).

Raʾā (رأى): its [middle radical] ʿayn is a hamza, and its [final radical] lām is a yāʾ, according to their saying ruʾya (رؤية). The poet metathesized it, saying: [entry continues]

Ruʾya (الرؤية) [seeing] with the eye takes a single object, and in the sense of knowledge it takes two objects; one says: raʾā Zaydan ʿāliman (رأى زيدا عالما) and raʾā raʾyan wa-ruʾyatan wa-rāʾatan (رأى رأيا ورؤية وراءة), like rāʿatan (راعة). Ibn Sīdah said: al-ruʾya (الرؤية) is looking with the eye and with the heart [mind]. Ibn al-Aʿrābī related: ʿalā riyatika (على ريتك) meaning ruʾyatika (رؤيتك) [your seeing], though there is weakness in it. Its true origin is that he meant ruʾyatika (رؤيتك), then substituted a wāw for the hamza, a regular substitution, saying ruwyatika (رويتك); then he assimilated [it], because this wāw had become a weak letter owing to the substitution imposed on it, saying riyatika (ريتك); then he gave the rāʾ a kasra because of the adjacency of the yāʾ, saying riyatika (ريتك). One says raʾaytuhu raʾyatan wa-ruʾyatan (رأيته رأية ورؤية) [I saw him, a seeing], and the tāʾ marbūṭa in raʾya (رأية) here does not indicate a single occurrence; rather it is a maṣdar [verbal noun] like ruʾya (رؤية) — unless you intend a single occurrence, in which case raʾaytuhu raʾyatan (رأيته رأية) would be like saying ḍarabtuhu ḍarbatan (ضربته ضربة) [I struck him once]. But if you do not intend this, raʾya (رأية) is like ruʾya (رؤية), the tāʾ not indicating a single occurrence. Raʾaytuhu riʾyānan (رأيته رئيانا): like ruʾya (رؤية); this is on the authority of al-Liḥyānī. And raytuhu (ريته) is [the same, formed] by elision. Thaʿlab cited [these verses]: "A large, hollow-flanked [she-camel] — one who had not seen her before, at a glance (raʾyatan), would think her a male camel, until four created [features] indicate [her true nature] — in her clinging, adjoining flanks, and she surged upward." ['Four created features' means the shrunken state of her teats, and inshamala (انشمل) means 'rose up,' like inshamara (انشمر). He means: whoever had not seen her before would think her a male camel, owing to her great size, until the shrunken state of her udder shows [otherwise], whereupon one knows she is a she-camel, since the male camel has no udder.] Ibn Jinnī cited: "Until whoever sees him (raʾāhu), when he sees him (rāhu), says: Alas for him! What a wretched camel he is, how unfortunate!" [He meant: everyone who saw him when he saw him — he made the hāʾ quiescent and cast the vowel of the hamza onto the preceding letter.] And his saying: "Who is there like Miʿdān ibn Yaḥyā (man rā mithla Miʿdān ibn Yaḥyā), when the girth-strap grows long upon the mount? And who is there like Miʿdān ibn Yaḥyā, when a Syrian wind blows, [leaving him] bare?" The origin of this is man raʾā (من رأى); the hamza was then lightened, on the pattern of lā hunāka al-martaʿ (لا هناك المرتع), so that two alifs came together, and one was elided owing to the meeting of two quiescent letters. Ibn Sīdah said: its origin is raʾā (رأى), the hamza being changed to a yāʾ, just as one says, for saʾaltu (سألت), saylatu (سيلت); for qaraʾtu (قرأت), qarītu (قريت); and for akhṭaʾtu (أخطأت), akhṭaytu (أخطيت). When the hamza, being the middle radical, was changed to a yāʾ, they further changed the yāʾ to an alif because of its being vowelled with the preceding letter open [i.e. having a fatḥa]; then the alif converted from the yāʾ that is the final radical was elided owing to its being quiescent together with the quiescence of the alif that is the middle radical. He said: I asked Abū ʿAlī [al-Fārisī]: for one who says 'man rā mithla Miʿdān ibn Yaḥyā,' how then should the [first-person] verb from it be formed? He said: riyaytu (رييت), placing it in the pattern of ḥayītu (حييت) and ʿayītu (عييت). He said: because the hamza in this position, when converted from a yāʾ, is [further] transformed. Abū ʿAlī held, in some of his discussions, that he meant raʾā (رأى) and elided the hamza just as it is elided in araytu (أريت) [for arʾaytu] and the like. However the matter may be, [entry continues]