Root · 2 in the Quran · 86 in 18 texts of the library
شخصa single root denoting rising or elevation in something, as the dark figure of a man … (root shkhs)
الشين والخاء والصاد أصل واحد يدل على ارتفاع في شيء
Ibn Fāris, Maqāyīs al-lugha · English rendering AI
The family of the root
Patterns computed · our dataThe words of ش خ ص that our sources attest: the root's letters in green, the added letters in gold.
18 words4 verbs4 verbal nouns3 participles1 place or instrument1 intensive or elative1 other noun2 plurals2 relatives and abstracts
- شَخْصthe body, or bodily or corporeal form or figure or substance, of a man, or …
- أَشْخاص—
- شَخَصَhe, or it, rose
- شَخَّصَhe individuated the thing
- شَخِيصbig, bulky, or corpulent
The whole family8 groups, by pattern; tap a pattern to see what it does
Verbs4شَخَصَ · شَخَّصَ · أَشْخَصَ
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 يَفْعَلُ (a – a; the imperfect from Lane's “aor.”)
Verbal nouns4شَخَص · شُخُوص · تَشْخِيص
The action itself, named as a noun (maṣdar).grammar →
Participles3شَاخِص · مُتَشَاخِص · مُشَخَّص
The one who does it, and the one it is done to.grammar →
Place, time and instrument1مَشْخَص
Where or when it happens, and what it is done with: the m- nouns.grammar →
- مَشْخَصnoun of place or timeLane
Intensives, qualities and the elative1شَخِيص
The quality carried far, held as a trait, or compared.grammar →
- شَخِيصbig, bulky, or corpulentLanequality (faʿīl)library ×1LaneIbn Fāris
Other nouns1شَخْص
Nouns on other patterns; their meaning is learned word by word.grammar →
- شَخْصthe body, or bodily or corporeal form or figure or substance, of a man, or …Lanenounlibrary ×47LaneIbn Fāris
Plurals2أَشْخاص · شُخُوص
Broken plurals rebuild the word on a new pattern; sound plurals add an ending.grammar →
- أَشْخاصbroken plural of شَخْصlibrary ×12
- شُخُوصbroken plural of شَخْصlibrary ×1Ibn Fāris
Relative and abstract2شَخْصِيَّة · شَخْصِيّ
-iyy relates a thing to its source; -iyya makes an abstract noun.grammar →
- شَخْصِيَّةidentity; personautoabstract noun (-iyya)library ×1
- شَخْصِيّprivate; personalautorelative adjective (-iyy)library ×1
Reference
Why this shape?What each of the 15 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 · 170Shakhṣ (الشخص) is the dark form/silhouette of a person when you see him from afar.
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 · 393Shakhṣ (الشخص) is the dark form of a person or anything else that you see from a distance.
al-Jawharī (d. c. 393/1003), al-Ṣiḥāḥ. Admits only usage he judged sound.
AI AI translation of the Arabic belowIbn Fāris · 395Shīn, khāʾ, and ṣād form one root that indicates elevation/rising in something.
Ibn Fāris (d. 395/1004), Maqāyīs al-Lugha. Seeks each root's original sense (aṣl).
AI AI translation of the Arabic belowal-Rāghib · 502Shakhṣ (الشخص) is the dark standing form of a person seen from a distance.
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 · 711Shakhṣ (الشخص) [collectively denotes] the bodily form of a person or anything else;
Ibn Manẓūr (d. 711/1311), Lisān al-ʿArab. The great compendium of the earlier dictionaries (entry shortened).
AI AI translation of the Arabic belowLane · 1876English, synthesising the classical dictionaries.
E. W. Lane (d. 1876), An Arabic-English Lexicon. English, synthesising the classical dictionaries.
Lane, Arabic-English Lexiconread Lane's entry online ↗
The same letters, turned
The same three letters in all six orders. Choose one.
ش خ ص
الشين والخاء والصاد أصل واحد يدل على ارتفاع في شيء
sh-kh-ṣ is one root that denotes elevation in something. 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
- شshīnmiddle of the tongue · voiceless, continuantSīb. · I. Jinnī
- خkhāʾtop of the throat · voiceless, continuantSīb. · I. Jinnī
- صṣādtongue-tip, by the front teeth · voiceless, continuant, velarisedSīb. · 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
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 ↗
خ
وأدناها مخرجا من الفم: الغين والخاء
The nearest of them to the mouth in place: the ghayn and the khāʾ. Sībawayh, line 26549 ↗
ومما فوق ذلك مع أول الفم، مخرج الغين والخاء
From above that, at the start of the mouth, is the place of the ghayn and the khāʾ. Ibn Jinnī, line 971 ↗
ص
ومما بين طرف اللسان وفويق الثنايا مخرج الزاي، والسين، والصاد
From between the tip of the tongue and just above the front teeth is the place of the zāy, the sīn and the ṣād. Sībawayh, line 26560 ↗
ومما بين الثنايا وطرف اللسان، مخرج الصاد والزاي والسين
From between the front teeth and the tip of the tongue is the place of the ṣād, the zāy and the sīn. Ibn Jinnī, line 983 ↗
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
ش
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 2581خ
Spheres of its simples (ch. 2): 10 line 2573 ↗
ص
Level of existence: التراب · earth
Divine Name: المميت · al-Mumīt, the Death-Giver
Lunar mansion: البلدة · al-Balda
Futūḥāt ch. 198, line 62111Spheres of its simples (ch. 2): 8 line 2571 ↗
Nature (ch. 2)
الثمانية فحروفها حارة يابسة
The eightfold [rank]: its letters are hot and dry.
Ibn ʿArabī, al-Futūḥāt al-Makkiyya, line 2580Meaning by vowelal-Dabbāgh · a visionary claim about a primordial “Syriac”, not historical Syriac
English throughout: AI translation of the Arabic AI
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.
خ
With fatḥa ـَ
فهي طول إلى النهاية مع رقة.
It is length to the utmost, together with fineness/thinness.
With ḍamma ـُ
فهي اسم لكمال في الحيوانات.
It is a name for a perfection in animals.
With kasra ـِ
فهي اسم لكمال في الجمادات.
It is a name for a perfection in inanimate things.
ص
With fatḥa ـَ
فهي جميع غبار الأرض في الموقف بين يدي الله عز وجل.
It is all the dust of the earth at the Standing (on the Day of Judgement) before God, Mighty and Majestic.
With ḍamma ـُ
فهي جميع نباتاتها.
It is all its (the earth's) plants.
With kasra ـِ
فهي الأرضون السبع.
It is the seven earths.
Two-letter nucleus6 roots in Ibn Fāris’s chapterش خ
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 15996 ↗
- شخرالشين والخاء والراء الأصل الصحيح يدل على صوت وقد حكيت فيه كلمة أخرى إن صحت فالأصل الشخير تردد الصوت في الحلق ويقال الشخير رفع الصوت بالنخر وهذا مشهور L15997
- شخسالشين والخاء والسين أصل صحيح يدل على اعوجاج وزوال عن نهج الاستقامةL16004
- شخصالشين والخاء والصاد أصل واحد يدل على ارتفاع في شيءQ 2 · L16009
- شخلالشين والخاء واللام ليس بشيء وحكيت فيه كلمة ما أراها من كلام العرب على أنها في كلام الخليلL16014
- شخمالشين والخاء والميم كلمة تدل على تغير في شيءL16016
- شختالشين والخاء والتاء كلمة واحدة وهو الشيء الشخت وهو الدقيق من خشب وغيره وقال : — وهل تستوي المران تخطر في الوغى … وسبعة عيدان من العوسج الشخت —L16019
In the sister scriptsHebrew ש ח צSyriac ܣ ܚ ܨ
| Arabic | ش خ ص |
| Hebrew | ש ח צ |
| Syriac | ܣ ܚ ܨ |
| Ancient South Arabian (musnad) | 𐩦/𐩪 𐩭 𐩮 |
| Phoenician | 𐤔 𐤇 𐤑 |
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 defines shakhṣ as a person's dark outline (sawād) seen from afar, extended to any thing whose bodily form one sees.well attested
The lexicographers in chronological order, from al-Khalīl to Lane.
al-Khalīl defines shakhṣ as a person's dark outline (sawād) seen from afar, extended to any thing whose bodily form one sees. He also lists shukhūṣ (setting out from one land to another), a wound swelling, the gaze raised to the sky, a word sticking in the mouth, and shakhīṣ (great of body). al-Jawharī adds shakhaṣa baṣaruhu, of a man who opens his eyes and does not blink. He also gives an arrow that overshoots the target from above, and, from Abū ʿUbayd, ashkhaṣa/ashkhasa bi- 'to backbite'. Ibn Fāris unifies the root under irtifāʿ: the figure rises into view, the traveller 'rises' from his land, and a troubled man's place 'throws him up'. al-Rāghib specifies the standing human figure seen from afar and glosses the Quranic staring as eyelids that do not blink. Ibn Manẓūr cites the ḥadīth lā shakhṣa aghyaru min Allāh; he explains shakhṣ as any body with elevation and visibility, borrowed here to affirm the essence (dhāt), and notes a variant with shayʾ. Lane puts 'rose, became raised' first, including of a star.
Draws on: al-Khalīl · al-Jawharī · Ibn Fāris · al-Rāghib · Ibn Manẓūr · Lane
Letters & soundal-Dabbāgh reads shīn as mercy not followed by punishment and khāʾ as utmost length with thinness.speculative
What the theorists of sound symbolism would say of these letters. Speculative by nature.
al-Dabbāgh reads shīn as mercy not followed by punishment and khāʾ as utmost length with thinness. He reads ṣād as all the dust of the earth at the Standing before God, which a symbolic reader might set beside the Quranic eschatological staring of 14:42 and 21:97. No correspondences in the Breath are given for these letters. On Ibn Jinnī's principle that emphatic letters suit stronger senses, one might contrast emphatic shakhaṣa (rise, stare) with plain shakhasa (crookedness), though he does not treat this pair. Mainstream linguistics treats such readings as suggestive at most.
Draws on: al-Dabbāgh · Ibn Jinnī imsās
Root structureThe sh-kh siblings in Maqāyīs are shkhr (sound echoing in the throat), shkhs (crookedness, departure from the straight), shkhm (change) and shkht (thinness).plausible
The two-letter nucleus (Ibn Fāris's own chapters) and the permutations of the letters (Ibn Jinnī).
The sh-kh siblings in Maqāyīs are shkhr (sound echoing in the throat), shkhs (crookedness, departure from the straight), shkhm (change) and shkht (thinness). None clearly shares the sense of rising. Beside shkhs one can set al-Jawharī's report of ashkhaṣa/ashkhasa as variants, a possible ṣ/s substitution (ibdāl). All other permutations (shṣkh, khshṣ, khṣsh, ṣshkh, ṣkhsh) are unattested, so the root stands isolated within its letter-set. Ibn Jinnī's greater derivation therefore has nothing to work on.
Draws on: Maqāyīs nucleus sh-kh · permutations
Semitic kin & loanwordsNo confident cognate is known in Hebrew, Aramaic/Syriac, Akkadian, Geʿez or South Arabian.uncertain
Cognates in the sister languages, and whether the word was borrowed.
No confident cognate is known in Hebrew, Aramaic/Syriac, Akkadian, Geʿez or South Arabian. The root appears to be Arabic-internal as far as present evidence goes. Nothing suggests a loanword, and it does not figure in Jeffery's list of foreign Quranic vocabulary.
Draws on: no confident cognate
Quranic exegesisBoth Quranic occurrences concern eyes on the Last Day.plausible
How the classical exegetes read the word in the Quran.
Both Quranic occurrences concern eyes on the Last Day. At Q 14:42 (li-yawmin tashkhaṣu fīhi l-abṣār) al-Ṭabarī and al-Zamakhsharī explain that the eyes stay wide open and fixed in terror, neither blinking nor settling on anything. At Q 21:97 (fa-idhā hiya shākhiṣatun abṣāru lladhīna kafarū) the exegetes give the same sense; al-Rāghib glosses it as 'their eyelids do not blink'. al-Zamakhsharī discusses the syntax, taking hiya as an anticipatory pronoun explained by abṣār. The Quranic use rests on the lexicographers' shukhūṣ al-baṣar, a special case of the root's sense of rising.
Draws on: al-Ṭabarī · al-Zamakhsharī · al-Rāghib
Philosophy & kalāmIn falsafa, shakhṣ is the technical term for the individual, Greek atomon or tode ti, under a species (nawʿ).well attested
The word as a technical term in falsafa and theology.
In falsafa, shakhṣ is the technical term for the individual, Greek atomon or tode ti, under a species (nawʿ). Tashakhkhuṣ is individuation, and mushakhkhiṣāt are the individuating factors. For Avicenna the common nature is in itself neither universal nor particular. It is individuated in concrete things through matter and accidents, and the question of what individuates became central in later philosophy and kalām. Among theologians, the ḥadīth lā shakhṣa aghyaru min Allāh prompted interpretation (taʾwīl) as affirmation of the divine essence, to avoid anthropomorphism.
Draws on: Avicenna · falsafa logic · kalām
Akbarian readingIn Faṣṣ Ādam, Ibn ʿArabī uses shakhṣ strictly in its falsafa sense.well attested
The word in Ibn ʿArabī's text and terminology.
In Faṣṣ Ādam, Ibn ʿArabī uses shakhṣ strictly in its falsafa sense. Universal realities such as humanity are wholly present in each individual of the species. They are not divided or multiplied by the multiplicity of individuals, and they remain intelligible (maʿqūla). He then applies this to God and creatures: we are many by individual and by species, yet one reality gathers us, so there must be a differentiator by which individuals are distinguished. Otherwise there would be no multiplicity within the One. The term serves his account of how one reality appears as many determinate forms. No Iṣṭilāḥ definition is given for this root.
Draws on: Fuṣūṣ, Faṣṣ Ādam
Reference