Root · 19 in the Quran · 6 in 4 texts of the library
رشدstraightness of the road; hitting upon the right way (root rshd)
الراء والشين والدال أصل واحد يدل على استقامة الطريق فالمراشد مقاصد الطرق والرشد والرشد خلاف الغي وأصاب فلان من أمره …
Ibn Fāris, Maqāyīs al-lugha · English rendering AI
The family of the root
Patterns computed · our dataThe words of ر ش د that our sources attest: the root's letters in green, the added letters in gold.
18 words4 verbs2 verbal nouns2 participles2 intensives and elatives7 other nouns1 plural
- رُشْد—
- رَشَد—
- رَشِيد—
- رَشَادintegrity; maturity
- مُرْشِدguide; instructor
The whole family6 groups, by pattern; tap a pattern to see what it does
Verbs4رَشَدَ · أَرْشَدَ · رَشَّدَ
The root as an action: the bare Form I, and the Forms made by adding letters before, inside or after the root.grammar →
Form I vowels: فَعَلَ يَفْعُلُ (a – u; the imperfect from Lane's “aor.”)
- رَشَدَhe took, or followed, a right way or course or directionLaneForm IQurʾān ×1library ×1LaneIbn Fāris
- أَرْشَدَguide; directautoForm IVlibrary ×1Lane
- رَشَّدَhe pronounced him to be one who took, or followed, a right way or course or …LaneForm IILaneIbn Fāris
- اِسْتَرْشَدَForm XLane
Verbal nouns2رُشْد · تَرْشِيد
The action itself, named as a noun (maṣdar).grammar →
Participles2مُرْشِد · مَرَاشِد
The one who does it, and the one it is done to.grammar →
- مُرْشِدguide; instructorautoactive, Form IVQurʾān ×1library ×2
- مَرَاشِدthe right places to which roads tendLaneactive, Form IIILaneIbn Fāris
Intensives, qualities and the elative2رَشِيد · أَرْشَد
The quality carried far, held as a trait, or compared.grammar →
Other nouns7رَشَد · رَشَاد · رَاشد
Nouns on other patterns; their meaning is learned word by word.grammar →
Reference
Why this shape?What each of the 11 patterns does
What each pattern does. The pattern gives a tendency, not a rule: many words have drifted into meanings of their own.
The pattern machinePour the root into a pattern; see whether the word exists
Choose a pattern; the root's letters pour into it. Then see whether the word exists in our sources. The machine makes shapes; only usage makes words.
Not in our sources. A possible shape, not a word we can show: the Quran, the library and Lane do not have it for this root.
Place noun with -a. The place noun with the feminine -a. Sometimes it is only a variant of mafʿal; often it names the place where a thing is found in abundance (maʾsada, 'a place full of lions'). So maktab is the place of writing, and maktaba, where writings are gathered: a library, a bookshop. Our summary AI
But: maktaba is not in our classical dictionaries for k-t-b: Lane and al-Jawharī give maktab ('a school'), none gives maktaba. Its sense of 'library, bookshop' fits the pattern of abundance, but that is our reading of the pattern, not a classical entry. Many mafʿala words are single items of usage (maqbara 'cemetery'), which the grammarians call heard, not formed by rule.
The grammarians on this pattern (4)
ما يكون مفعلة لازمة لها الهاء والفتحة … وذلك إذا أردت أن تكثر الشيء بالمكان، وذلك قولك: أرض مسبعة، ومأسدة
Chapter on what is mafʿala, with the -a and the a-vowel always: that is when you mean that a thing abounds in a place, as you say 'a land of many beasts of prey (masbaʿa), of many lions (maʾsada)' AI
Sībawayh (d. c. 180/796), al-Kitāb, ed. ʿAbd al-Salām Hārūn, 3rd ed. (Cairo: al-Khānjī, 1988), 4:94 · OpenITI line 21027–21028 ↗ · on this site · OpenITI RELEASE v2025.1.9, CC BY-NC-SA 4.0
و نحو المظنة و المقبرة فتحا و ضما ليس بقياس
and words like maẓinna and maqbara (with a or u) are not by rule AI
Ibn al-Ḥājib (d. 646/1249), al-Shāfiya fī ʿilm al-taṣrīf, ed. Ḥasan Aḥmad al-ʿUthmān (Mecca: al-Maktaba al-Makkiyya, 1995), 1:30 · OpenITI line 223 ↗ · on this site · OpenITI RELEASE v2025.1.9, CC BY-NC-SA 4.0
- “designate the place where the object signified by the noun from which they are formed, is found in large numbers or quantities” Wright, Grammar I, §247, p. 148 ↗ · on nouns of abundance, maf'ala · 3rd ed. (Cambridge, 1896) · public domain
- “Nouns of time and place not unfrequently take the feminine form” Wright, Grammar I, §225, p. 128 ↗ · on maf'ala as a variant of maf'al · 3rd ed. (Cambridge, 1896) · public domain
About thisWhat “attested” means here; the sources
Attested means found in our data: the Quranic Arabic Corpus (lemmas, verb Forms, participles, verbal nouns, plurals), the library's words (automatic analysis), Lane's Lexicon (his headwords, the Forms he numbers, the verbal nouns and plurals he names) and Ibn Fāris's entry. Nothing is generated for this list. Meanings are Lane's first gloss in his entry, or else the analyser's gloss (“auto”). Vowelling follows the corpus, then Lane, then the analyser; verbs are given in the regular perfect. Lane's Lexicon thins out after qāf, and a few of his entries cover several roots at once: those roots show no Lane. The patterns, written with ف ع ل, are computed by us.
The dictionaries
English: AI translation AIal-Khalīl · 170Rashada (رشد) yarshudu (يرشد) rushdan (رشدا) wa-rashādan (رشادا) — it is the opposite of al-ghayy (misguidance).
al-Khalīl b. Aḥmad (d. c. 170/786), Kitāb al-ʿAyn. The first Arabic dictionary, arranged by permutations of the root letters.
AI AI translation of the Arabic belowal-Jawharī · 393Ar-rashād (الرشاد) is the opposite of al-ghayy (misguidance).
al-Jawharī (d. c. 393/1003), al-Ṣiḥāḥ. Admits only usage he judged sound.
AI AI translation of the Arabic belowIbn Fāris · 395The letters rāʾ, shīn, and dāl form one root indicating the straightness of a path.
Ibn Fāris (d. 395/1004), Maqāyīs al-Lugha. Seeks each root's original sense (aṣl).
AI AI translation of the Arabic belowal-Rāghib · 502Ar-rushd (الرشد) and ar-rushd (الرشد) are the opposite of al-ghayy, used in the sense of guidance (al-hidāyah).
al-Rāghib al-Iṣfahānī (d. c. 502/1108), al-Mufradāt. Quranic vocabulary, from core sense to Quranic usage.
AI AI translation of the Arabic belowLisān · 711Among the names of Allah the Exalted is ar-Rashīd (الرشيد): He who guided creation to what benefits them, i.e., directed and led them to it — on the pattern fa'īl (فعيل) in the sense of muf'il (مفعل).
Ibn Manẓūr (d. 711/1311), Lisān al-ʿArab. The great compendium of the earlier dictionaries (entry shortened).
AI AI translation of the Arabic below
Technical definitions1 · Ibn ʿArabī’s Iṣṭilāḥ, al-Jurjānī’s Taʿrīfāt
المرشد
هو الذي يدل على الطريق المستقيم قبل الضلالة.
Al-murshid (المرشد): he who points the way to the straight path before misguidance. AI
The same letters, turned
The same three letters in all six orders. Choose one.
ر ش د
الراء والشين والدال أصل واحد يدل على استقامة الطريق فالمراشد مقاصد الطرق والرشد والرشد خلاف الغي وأصاب فلان من أمره رشدا ورشدا ورشده وهو لرشدة خلاف لغيه 2 ( باب الراء والصاد وما يثلثهما )
r-sh-d is a single root indicating the straightness of the path; al-marāshid are the right directions of the paths; al-rushd and al-rashad are the opposite of error [ghayy]; one says aṣāba fulānun min amrihi rushdan, rashadan, and rashdahu; and "huwa li-rushdatin" is the opposite of "li-ghayyihi." (Chapter: rā' and ṣād and what forms a triliteral with them) AI
an entry in Ibn Fārislater sources onlyin none of them
Do these six share one core meaning?
Reference
About thisal-Khalīl, Ibn Jinnī, Ibn Fāris; the counts across the dictionary
al-Khalīl (d. c. 170/786), Kitāb al-ʿAyn, as transmitted by al-Layth: a two-letter word “turns in two ways”, a three-letter word “in six ways” (masdūsa), four letters in 24, five in 120; “its used forms are written down and its unused ones dropped” (line 975 ↗). The dictionary is built on this: each chapter takes a set of letters and names which orders are used (mustaʿmal) and which unused (muhmal). The ring shows that verdict, from the chapter heading as edited (documented in the text; how much of the book is al-Khalīl's own is disputed).
A reported total. al-Suyūṭī transmits, from Ḥamza al-Iṣfahānī, that al-Khalīl put the possible forms, used and unused, of two to five letters at 12,305,412 (al-Muzhir, line 1347 ↗). It is reported, not found in the ʿAyn. It equals exactly the arrangements of 2 to 5 different letters out of 28 (756 + 19,656 + 491,400 + 11,793,600); the breakdown printed beside it is corrupt, and al-Zubaydī's count, given next, differs (6,659,400).
Ibn Jinnī (d. 392/1002), al-Khaṣāʾiṣ, names the greater derivation (al-ishtiqāq al-akbar): bind a three-letter root and its six orders to one meaning, and bring stray members back “by the subtlety of the craft and interpretation” (line 7536 ↗). He says himself that it does not hold for every root (line 167 ↗; line 7603 ↗).
Ibn Fāris (d. 395/1004) gives each root its own aṣl and treats a rearranged word as maqlūb, “turned round”, and so not a root of its own: “j-b-dh is not a root, because it is a single word, turned round” (Maqāyīs, line 6147 ↗). The ring sets his aṣl for each order side by side; whether they meet is the question.
Neighbours on the ring differ by one swap of two letters.
The critique. A source quoted by al-Suyūṭī calls the greater derivation Ibn Jinnī's innovation, “not relied on in the language” (al-Muzhir, line 6159 ↗).
The other axis. The root's letters also go into patterns that keep their order and change the frame: the patterns (awzān) and the verb Forms I–X.
Across Ibn Fāris's dictionary. Of the 2,300 possible sets of three different sound letters (no hamza, w or y), 1,021 have at least one order as an entry. How many of their six orders are entries:
- 1 of 6319
- 2 of 6218
- 3 of 6164
- 4 of 6155
- 5 of 6107
- 6 of 658
- 1 of 6148
- 2 of 6108
- 3 of 6157
- 4 of 6179
- 5 of 6111
- 6 of 643
Of the orders al-Khalīl calls used, 2,097 are entries in Ibn Fāris and 267 are not; 17 that he calls unused are entries in Ibn Fāris.
Attested here means found in our digital texts (Ibn Fāris, Lisān al-ʿArab, Lane, the Quranic Arabic Corpus), with w and y kept apart and hamza spellings merged; it is our data, not a classical verdict. English beside the Arabic is AI translation. Sources and grades: docs/research/root-permutations.md.
Letters & sound
- رrāʾtip of the tongue, near the nūn · voiced, in betweenSīb. · I. Jinnī
- شshīnmiddle of the tongue · voiceless, continuantSīb. · I. Jinnī
- دdāltongue-tip, roots of the teeth · voiced, stopSīb. · I. Jinnī
How each letter is made, in brief, from Sībawayh's and Ibn Jinnī's own sentences (linked); their words are under Reference.
Sharing two of its three letters (computed; kinship of form, not of meaning)
Reference
How it is madeSībawayh and Ibn Jinnī · phonetics
English throughout: AI translation of the Arabic AI
ر
ومن مخرج النون غير أنه أدخل في ظهر اللسان قليلا لانحرافه إلى اللام مخرج الراء
From the place of the nūn, except that it goes a little further onto the back of the tongue, because it leans towards the lām, is the place of the rāʾ. Sībawayh, lines 26557–26558 ↗
ومن مخرج النون غير أنه أدخل في ظهر اللسان قليلا، لانحرافه إلى اللام، مخرج الراء
From the place of the nūn, except that it goes a little further onto the back of the tongue, because it leans towards the lām, is the place of the rāʾ. Ibn Jinnī, lines 980–981 ↗
ش
ومن وسط اللسان بينه وبين وسط الحنك الأعلى مخرج الجيم والشين والياء
From the middle of the tongue, between it and the middle of the upper palate, is the place of the jīm, the shīn and the yāʾ. Sībawayh, line 26553 ↗
ومن وسط اللسان بينه وبين وسط الحنك الأعلى، مخرج الجيم والشين والياء
From the middle of the tongue, between it and the middle of the upper palate, is the place of the jīm, the shīn and the yāʾ. Ibn Jinnī, line 974 ↗
د
ومما بين طرف اللسان وأصول الثنايا مخرج الطاء، والدال، والتاء
From between the tip of the tongue and the roots of the front teeth is the place of the ṭāʾ, the dāl and the tāʾ. Sībawayh, line 26559 ↗
ومما بين طرف اللسان وأصول الثنايا، مخرج الطاء والدال والتاء
From between the tip of the tongue and the roots of the front teeth is the place of the ṭāʾ, the dāl and the tāʾ. Ibn Jinnī, line 982 ↗
Sībawayh, al-Kitāb (ed. Hārūn) and Ibn Jinnī, Sirr ṣināʿat al-iʿrāb; OpenITI digital texts (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0). Full credits on each letter's page.
In the Breath of the All-MercifulIbn ʿArabī · metaphysics
English throughout: AI translation of the Arabic AI
ر
Level of existence: السماء الخامسة · the fifth heaven
Divine Name: المصور · the Form-Giver (al-Muṣawwir)
Lunar mansion: الغفر · al-Ghafr
Futūḥāt ch. 198, line 64675Spheres of its simples (ch. 2): 10 line 2573 ↗
Nature (ch. 2)
المرتبة العشرية فحروفها حارة يابسة
The tenfold rank: its letters are hot and dry.
Ibn ʿArabī, al-Futūḥāt al-Makkiyya, line 2582ش
Level of existence: فلك الكواكب الثابتة والجنات · the sphere of the fixed stars and the Gardens
Divine Name: المقدر · al-Muqaddir, the Determiner
Lunar mansion: الجبهة · al-Jabha
Futūḥāt ch. 198, line 62087Spheres of its simples (ch. 2): 9 line 2572 ↗
Nature (ch. 2)
السين والشين فطبعهما الحرارة واليبوسة
Sīn and shīn: their nature is heat and dryness.
Ibn ʿArabī, al-Futūḥāt al-Makkiyya, line 2581د
Level of existence: السماء الدنيا · the lowest heaven (al-samāʾ al-dunyā)
Divine Name: المبين · the Clarifier (al-Mubīn)
Lunar mansion: الأكليل · al-Iklīl
Futūḥāt ch. 198, line 64682Spheres of its simples (ch. 2): 10 line 2573 ↗
Nature (ch. 2)
المرتبة العشرية فحروفها حارة يابسة
The tenfold rank: its letters are hot and dry.
Ibn ʿArabī, al-Futūḥāt al-Makkiyya, line 2582Meaning by vowelal-Dabbāgh · a visionary claim about a primordial “Syriac”, not historical Syriac
English throughout: AI translation of the Arabic AI
ر
With fatḥa ـَ
فهي إشارة إلى جميع الخيرات الظاهرة والباطنة.
It is an indication of all goods, outward and inward.
With ḍamma ـُ
فهي إشارة إلى الواحد في نفسه وهو ظاهر.
It is an indication of the one in itself, and it is manifest.
With kasra ـِ
فهي إشارة إلى الشيء الذي فيه الروح وليس من بني آدم، أو إشارة إلى الروح نفسها.
It is an indication of a thing that has spirit in it but is not of the children of Adam, or an indication of the spirit itself.
ش
With fatḥa ـَ
فهي إشارة إلى الرحمة التي لا يعقبها عذاب، وتكون إشارة إلى من خرجت منه النقمة ودخلت عليه الرحمة وتظهر.
It is an indication of mercy that is not followed by punishment. It also indicates one from whom vengeance has departed and upon whom mercy has entered and becomes manifest.
With ḍamma ـُ
فهي إشارة إلى عال في نفسه مع التعظيم.
It is an indication of something lofty in itself, with veneration.
With kasra ـِ
فهي إشارة إلى الشيء الذي من طبعه الستر، وقد تكون الإشارة إلى ما هو مستور في القلب وما أشبه ذلك.
It is an indication of the thing whose nature is concealment; the indication may be to what is concealed in the heart and the like.
د
With fatḥa ـَ
فهي إشارة إلى خارج عن الذات.
It is an indication of something external to the self.
With ḍamma ـُ
فهي إشارة إلى ما هو قليل أو قبيح ومعه غضب فيهما.
It is an indication of what is small or ugly, accompanied by anger in both cases.
With kasra ـِ
فهي إشارة إلى ما في الذات أو إلى ما هو داخل عليها أو إلى ما هو قريب منها.
It is an indication of what is in the self, or what is entering upon it, or what is near to it.
Two-letter nucleus4 roots in Ibn Fāris’s chapterر ش
Ibn Fāris groups his roots under two-letter chapters (“the X and the Y and what makes them three”). These are the roots of this root's chapter with the core sense he gives each. Setting them side by side is our juxtaposition; he does not himself draw a shared meaning. His chapter heading, line 11370 ↗
- رشفالراء والشين والفاء أصل واحد وهو تقصي شرب الشيء والرشف استقصاء الشرب حتى لا يدع في الإناء شيئا رشف يرشف ويرشف وفي كتاب الخليل الرشف بقية الماء في الحوL11371
- رشقالراء والشين والقاف أصل واحد وهو رمي الشيء بسهم وما أشبهه في خفة فالرشق مصدر رشقه بسهم رشقا والرشق الوجه من الرمي إذا رمى القوم جميعهمL11375
- رشمالراء والشين والميم كلمة واحدة لا يقاس عليها وليس في الباب غيرها وذلك الأرشم الذي يتشمم الطعام ويحرص عليهL11382
- رشىالراء والشين والحرف المعتل أصل يدل على سبب أو تسبب لشيء برفق وملاينة فالرشاء الحبل الممدود والجمع أرشية ويقال للحنظل إذا امتدت أغصانه قد أرشى يعني أنهL11387
In the sister scriptsHebrew ר ש דSyriac ܪ ܣ ܕ
| Arabic | ر ش د |
| Hebrew | ר ש ד |
| Syriac | ܪ ܣ ܕ |
| Ancient South Arabian (musnad) | 𐩧 𐩦/𐩪 𐩵 |
| Phoenician | 𐤓 𐤔 𐤃 |
Letter for letter, by the regular sound correspondences of the Semitic languages (Arabic keeps several sounds the others merged). This shows how the root would be spelled; whether a related word exists is a separate question, answered in the Semitic lens. Where an Arabic sibilant (s, sh) continues two older sounds, both spellings are shown.
Lenses
AIClassical lexiconal-Khalīl (al-ʿAyn) sets rashada/rashida as opposite of ghayy and ḍalāl respectively, and treats rushda ('legitimate birth') as opposite of ghiyya ('illegitimate birth'), citing verse contrasting rushda-born and ghiyya-born sons in battle;well attested
The lexicographers in chronological order, from al-Khalīl to Lane.
al-Khalīl (al-ʿAyn) sets rashada/rashida as opposite of ghayy and ḍalāl respectively, and treats rushda ('legitimate birth') as opposite of ghiyya ('illegitimate birth'), citing verse contrasting rushda-born and ghiyya-born sons in battle; he also notes irshād as dalāla/hidāya, and al-rashād as a plant/stone name given by taboo-avoidance. al-Jawharī (al-Ṣiḥāḥ) records the dialectal doublet rashida/rashuda yarshudu, glosses al-marāshid as the intended points of roads and al-ṭarīq al-arshad as the most direct route, and preserves the legitimate/illegitimate-birth contrast (li-rushda vs. li-zinya). Ibn Fāris (Maqāyīs) reduces the root to a single sense, the straightness of a road, from which al-marāshid (the right points of roads) and rushd/rashad (opposite of ghayy) both derive. al-Rāghib (al-Mufradāt) treats rushd as equivalent to hidāya, distinguishing across verses the practical competence tested in an orphan (4:6) from the higher rushd granted to Abraham prior to his mission (21:51), a gap he calls būn baʿīd, and reports a view that rushd (worldly competence) is more specific than rashad (which may extend to religious matters). Ibn Manẓūr (Lisān) makes al-Rashīd a divine name, He who guided creation to their welfare, or whose governance proceeds to its proper ends without need of any adviser, and cites the hadith on al-khulafāʾ al-rāshidūn (Abū Bakr, ʿUmar, ʿUthmān, ʿAlī) as the ism fāʿil of rashada.
Draws on: al-ʿAyn · al-Ṣiḥāḥ · Maqāyīs al-Lugha · al-Mufradāt · Lisān al-ʿArab
- Wiktionary root appendix ر ش د (link not verified)
Letters & soundIn the akbarian tables given, rāʾ is tied to the fifth heaven and, per al-Dabbāgh, indicates all goods, outward and inward;speculative
What the theorists of sound symbolism would say of these letters. Speculative by nature.
In the akbarian tables given, rāʾ is tied to the fifth heaven and, per al-Dabbāgh, indicates all goods, outward and inward; shīn is tied to the sphere of the fixed stars and the Gardens, and al-Dabbāgh reads it as mercy unfollowed by punishment, the state of one from whom vengeance has departed; dāl is tied to the lowest heaven and, for al-Dabbāgh, indicates something external to the self. A symbolic reading might trace رشد as a movement from 'goods' (ر) through unpunished 'mercy' (ش) toward something realized 'outside the self' (د) — a good end reached through mercy and made externally manifest, consonant with rashad as guidance that arrives at its goal. This is speculative letter-symbolism in the akbarian/Dabbāghian tradition; mainstream linguistics does not treat individual Arabic letters as stable bearers of meaning.
Draws on: akbari letter-heaven table · al-Dabbāgh letter meanings
Root structureIbn Fāris's ر-ش nucleus-siblings show no unifying sense: رشف is exhaustive sipping, رشق a light throw of an arrow, رشم an isolated word for one who sniffs after food, and رشى a rope or a gently-extending cause — the pairing carries no evident semantic freight toward 'right direction.' Among the six permutations of ر-ش-د, رشد (19 Quranic occurrences) is by far the most productive;uncertain
The two-letter nucleus (Ibn Fāris's own chapters) and the permutations of the letters (Ibn Jinnī).
Ibn Fāris's ر-ش nucleus-siblings show no unifying sense: رشف is exhaustive sipping, رشق a light throw of an arrow, رشم an isolated word for one who sniffs after food, and رشى a rope or a gently-extending cause — the pairing carries no evident semantic freight toward 'right direction.' Among the six permutations of ر-ش-د, رشد (19 Quranic occurrences) is by far the most productive; شرد (1 occurrence, sense of driving away, startled flight, and scattering) is also attested, while ردش, شدر, درش, دشر are unattested. A speculative Ibn-Jinnī-style greater derivation might note that رشد ('finding the right way') and شرد ('bolting off the way, in flight') share the same three radicals in reversed order and stand almost as semantic opposites — road found versus road lost — though this remains only a suggestive juxtaposition, not an established etymological link, and Ibn Fāris keeps the two roots entirely separate.
Draws on: Ibn Fāris nucleus · permutation table · Ibn Jinnī al-taṣrīf al-akbar
Semitic kin & loanwordsNo confident Semitic cognate for the root ر-ش-د in the sense 'right guidance' is attested in Hebrew, Aramaic/Syriac, Akkadian, or Geʿez;uncertain
Cognates in the sister languages, and whether the word was borrowed.
No confident Semitic cognate for the root ر-ش-د in the sense 'right guidance' is attested in Hebrew, Aramaic/Syriac, Akkadian, or Geʿez; the nearest Hebrew-looking forms (e.g. root רשם 'to mark,' root רשע 'wickedness') differ in a radical and are not cognate. The root appears to be a native Arabic development around the sense of a straight road, without evidence of borrowing.
Draws on: no confident cognate identified
Quranic exegesisAt 2:256, 'the rushd has become clear from the ghayy' is read by al-Ṭabarī, al-Zamakhsharī, and al-Rāzī as the truth of Islam having been made evident and distinguished from misguidance, so that the preceding 'no compulsion in religion' follows because the evidence is already manifest and needs no coercion.well attested
How the classical exegetes read the word in the Quran.
At 2:256, 'the rushd has become clear from the ghayy' is read by al-Ṭabarī, al-Zamakhsharī, and al-Rāzī as the truth of Islam having been made evident and distinguished from misguidance, so that the preceding 'no compulsion in religion' follows because the evidence is already manifest and needs no coercion. At 4:6, exegetes read rushd, the condition for returning an orphan's property, primarily as sound practical judgment in managing wealth (ḥusn al-taṣarruf), with debate over whether it also requires religious probity, feeding directly into fiqh definitions of legal majority. At 21:51, 'We gave Abraham his rushd before' is read as God granting Abraham prophetic maturity and sound judgment in his youth, prior to his mission — al-Rāghib treats this as a higher-order rushd than the practical competence tested in orphans. At 18:24 and 18:10, rashad/rushd mark the guidance sought by the Companions of the Cave and by Moses toward al-Khiḍr's knowledge.
Draws on: al-Ṭabarī · al-Zamakhsharī · al-Rāzī · al-Rāghib
Philosophy & kalāmIn fiqh and its theological underpinnings, rushd becomes the technical threshold of legal competence (ahliyyat al-rushd) required, per 4:6, before an orphan's property may be returned to him.plausible
The word as a technical term in falsafa and theology.
In fiqh and its theological underpinnings, rushd becomes the technical threshold of legal competence (ahliyyat al-rushd) required, per 4:6, before an orphan's property may be returned to him. Jurists debate whether rushd is purely financial competence (ḥifẓ al-māl, sound management of wealth) or must also include religious rectitude (dīn, ʿadāla); Ḥanafī and Shāfiʿī positions diverge on this point. The term thus functions as a legal-theological criterion of moral and practical maturity, distinct from its broader Quranic sense of guidance as opposed to error.
Draws on: uṣūl al-fiqh, ahliyyat al-rushd
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