Root · 70 in the Quran · 555 in 27 texts of the library
عرفIbn Fāris gives two sound roots: things following one another in a connected series, and … (root rf)
العين والراء والفاء أصلان صحيحان يدل أحدهما على تتابع الشيء متصلا بعضه ببعض والآخر يدل على السكون والطمأنينة
Ibn Fāris, Maqāyīs al-lugha · English rendering AI
The family of the root
Patterns computed · our dataThe words of ع ر ف that our sources attest: the root's letters in green, the added letters in gold.
47 words7 verbs6 verbal nouns6 participles3 places and instruments6 intensives and elatives12 other nouns5 plurals2 relatives and abstracts
- عَرَفَknow
- مَعْرِفَةknowledge; information
- مَعْرُوفknown
- عَارِفknowing
- مَعَارِف—
The whole family8 groups, by pattern; tap a pattern to see what it does
Verbs7عَرَفَ · عَرَّفَ · اِعْتَرَفَ
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 يَفْعِلُ (a – i; the imperfect from Lane's “aor.”)
- عَرَفَknowautoForm IQurʾān ×20library ×144LaneIbn Fāris
- عَرَّفَhe made him to know the affair, or caseLaneForm IIQurʾān ×2library ×12LaneIbn Fāris
- اِعْتَرَفَhe acknowledged it, or confessed it, namely, a misdeed, or a thingLaneForm VIIIQurʾān ×3library ×2LaneIbn Fāris
- تَعَارَفَthey knew, or were acquainted with, one anotherLaneForm VIQurʾān ×2Lane
Verbal nouns6تَعْرِيف · عَرَافَة · عَرْف
The action itself, named as a noun (maṣdar).grammar →
Participles6مَعْرُوف · عَارِف · مُتَعَارَف
The one who does it, and the one it is done to.grammar →
- مَعْرُوفknownLanepassive, Form IQurʾān ×38library ×12LaneIbn Fāris
- عَارِفknowingLaneactive, Form Ilibrary ×63LaneIbn Fāris
- مُتَعَارَفpassive, Form VILane
- مُعَرَّفpassive, Form IILane
Place, time and instrument3مَعْرِفَة · مَعْرَفَة · مَعْرَف
Where or when it happens, and what it is done with: the m- nouns.grammar →
Intensives, qualities and the elative6عِرْفان · عَرِيف · أَعْرَف
The quality carried far, held as a trait, or compared.grammar →
- عِرْفانknowledge; recognitionautointensive (faʿlān)library ×5Ibn Fāris
- عَرِيفthe chief, or head, of a people, or partyLanequality (faʿīl)library ×3LaneIbn Fāris
- أَعْرَفmore; most awareautoelative or colour adjective (afʿal)library ×3Lane
- عَرَّافfortunetellerautointensive (faʿʿāl)library ×1Lane
Other nouns12عُرْف · أَعْرَاف · عَرَفَات
Nouns on other patterns; their meaning is learned word by word.grammar →
Plurals5مَعَارِف · عارِفِين · عَوَارِف
Broken plurals rebuild the word on a new pattern; sound plurals add an ending.grammar →
- مَعَارِفbroken plural of مَعْرِفَةlibrary ×26Lane
- عارِفِينplural of knowingfrom the singularsound plural of عارِفlibrary ×9
- عَوَارِفbroken plural of عَارِفَةLaneIbn Fāris
- عَرّافِينplural of fortunetellerfrom the singularsound plural of عَرّافlibrary ×1
- عُرَفَاءbroken plural of عَرِيفLane
Reference
Why this shape?What each of the 24 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.
- Attested: مَعْرِفَة, noun of place (with -a), “knowledge; information” (library, Lane, Ibn Fāris)
- Attested: مَعْرَفَة, noun of place (with -a) (Lane, Ibn Fāris)
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 · 170ʿaraftu al-shayʾ maʿrifatan wa-ʿirfānan (عرفت الشيء معرفة وعرفاناً), 'I knew/recognized the thing.' And amrun ʿārifun, maʿrūfun, ʿarīfun (أمر عارف، معروف، عريف) — [all describing] 'a known/recognized matter.' Al-ʿurf (ال
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 · 393ʿaraftuhu maʿrifatan wa-ʿirfānan (عرفته معرفة وعرفاناً), 'I knew/recognized him.' Their saying: 'mā aʿrifu li-aḥadin yaṣraʿunī' (ما أعرف لأحد يصرعني), 'I do not acknowledge that anyone throws me [in wrestling],' means 'I
al-Jawharī (d. c. 393/1003), al-Ṣiḥāḥ. Admits only usage he judged sound.
AI AI translation of the Arabic belowIbn Fāris · 395ʿAyn, rāʾ, and fāʾ (ع ر ف) are two sound roots: one indicates the succession of a thing, connected part to part, and the other indicates stillness and tranquility.
Ibn Fāris (d. 395/1004), Maqāyīs al-Lugha. Seeks each root's original sense (aṣl).
AI AI translation of the Arabic belowal-Rāghib · 502Al-maʿrifa (المعرفة) and al-ʿirfān (العرفان): the perception of a thing by reflection and consideration of its effect/trace;
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 · 711Al-ʿirfān (العرفان): knowledge (al-ʿilm).
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 ↗
Technical definitions9 · Ibn ʿArabī’s Iṣṭilāḥ, al-Jurjānī’s Taʿrīfāt
العارف والمعرفة
من اشهده الرب نفسه فظهرت عليه الاحوال والمعرفة حاله.
Al-ʿārif (العارف) and al-maʿrifa (المعرفة): [al-ʿārif is] one to whom the Lord has made Himself witnessed, so that [spiritual] states (aḥwāl) manifest upon him, and maʿrifa (gnosis) is his state. AI
الابتداء العرفي
يطلق على الشيء الذي يقع قبل المقصود، فيتناول الحمدلة بعد البسملة.
Al-ibtidāʾ al-ʿurfī (الابتداء العرفي), 'the conventional beginning': applied to that which occurs before the intended [main matter], thus encompassing the ḥamdala after the basmala. AI
الأعراف
هو المطلع، وهو مقام شهود الحق في كل شيء متجليا بصفاته التي ذلك الشيء مظهرها، وهو مقام الإشراف على الأطراف، قال الله تعالى: {وعلى الأعراف رجال يعرفون كلا بسيماهم} وقال النبي صلى الله عليه وسلم: "إن لكل آية ظهرا وبطنا وحدا ومقطعا".
Al-Aʿrāf (الأعراف): it is al-maṭlaʿ (the vantage point/overlook); it is the station of witnessing the Real (al-Ḥaqq) in every thing, manifest through His attributes of which that thing is the locus of manifestation; and it is the station of overseeing all the extremities/sides. God, exalted, said: 'wa-ʿalā al-Aʿrāfi rijālun yaʿrifūna kullan bi-sīmāhum' (وعلى الأعراف رجال يعرفون كلا بسيماهم), 'And upon the Heights (al-Aʿrāf) are men who recognize all by their mark' [Q7:46]. And the Prophet, peace and blessings be upon him, said: 'Indeed every verse has an outward and an inward [meaning], a limit and a point of transition.' AI
الأمر بالمعروف
الإرشاد إلى المراشد المنجية، والنهي عن المنكر: الزجر عما لا يلائم في الشريعة، وقيل: الأمر بالمعروف: أمر بما يوافق الكتاب والسنة، والنهي عن المنكر: نهي عما تميل إليه النفس والشهوة، وقيل الأمر بالمعروف إشارة إلى ما يرضي الله تعالى من أفعال
Al-amr bi-l-maʿrūf (الأمر بالمعروف), 'enjoining what is right': guidance toward the paths of salvation; and al-nahy ʿan al-munkar (النهي عن المنكر), 'forbidding what is wrong': restraining from what does not conform to the [revealed] Law. It is also said: al-amr bi-l-maʿrūf is a command to what conforms to the Book and the Sunna, while al-nahy ʿan al-munkar is a prohibition of what the soul and desire incline toward. It is also said that al-amr bi-l-maʿrūf refers to what pleases God, exalted, among the acts [entry continues] AI
التعريف
عبارة عن ذكر شيء تستلزم معرفته معرفة شيء آخر.
Al-taʿrīf (التعريف), 'definition': an expression referring to the mention of a thing, knowledge of which necessarily entails knowledge of another thing. AI
التعريف الحقيقي
هو أن يكون حقيقة ما وضع اللفظ بإزائه من حيث هي فيعرف بغيرها.
Al-taʿrīf al-ḥaqīqī (التعريف الحقيقي), 'the real/essential definition': it is that the reality of that for which the term was coined, considered as such, is made known by [defining it in terms of] something other than itself. AI
التعريف اللفظي
هو أن يكون اللفظ واضح الدلالة على معنى فيفصل بلفظ أوضح؛ دلالة على ذلك المعنى، كقولك: الغضنفر الأسد، وليس هذا تعريفا حقيقيا يراد به إفادة تصور غير حاصل، وإنما المراد تعيين ما وضع له لفظ الغضنفر من بين سائر المعاني.
Al-taʿrīf al-lafẓī (التعريف اللفظي), 'the verbal/nominal definition': it is that a term, whose meaning is clear, is explained by a clearer term in indicating that meaning, as in your saying: 'al-ghaḍanfar is the lion.' This is not a real definition intended to convey a conception not already attained; rather, the intent is merely to specify, among all [possible] meanings, that for which the term 'al-ghaḍanfar' was coined. AI
العرف
ما استقرت النفوس عليه بشهادة العقول، وتلقته الطبائع بالقبول، وهو حجة أيضا، لكنه أسرع إلى الفهم، وكذا العادة، هي ما استمر الناس عليه على حكم العقول وعادوا إليه مرة بعد أخرى.
العرفي
ما يتوقف على فعل، مثل المدح والثناء.
The same letters, turned
The same three letters in all six orders. Choose one.
ع ر ف
العين والراء والفاء أصلان صحيحان يدل أحدهما على تتابع الشيء متصلا بعضه ببعض والآخر يدل على السكون والطمأنينة
ʿ-r-f is two sound roots: one indicates the succession of a thing, connected one part to another, and the other indicates stillness and tranquility. 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
- عʿaynmiddle of the throat · voiced, in betweenSīb. · I. Jinnī
- رrāʾtip of the tongue, near the nūn · voiced, in betweenSīb. · I. Jinnī
- فfāʾlower lip and upper teeth · voiceless, continuantSīb. · 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
ع
ومن أوسط الحلق مخرج العين والحاء
From the middle of the throat is the place of the ʿayn and the ḥāʾ. Sībawayh, lines 26548–26549 ↗
ومن وسط الحلق مخرج العين والحاء
From the middle of the throat is the place of the ʿayn and the ḥāʾ. Ibn Jinnī, line 970 ↗
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 ↗
ف
ومن باطن الشفة السفلى وأطراف الثنايا العلى مخرج الفاء
From the inside of the lower lip and the edges of the upper front teeth is the place of the fāʾ. Sībawayh, line 26562 ↗
ومن باطن الشفة السفلى وأطراف الثنايا العلى، مخرج الفاء
From the inside of the lower lip and the edges of the upper front teeth is the place of the fāʾ. Ibn Jinnī, line 985 ↗
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
ع
Level of existence: الطبيعة · Nature
Divine Name: الباطن · The Inward (al-Bāṭin)
Lunar mansion: الثريا · al-Thurayyā (the Pleiades)
Futūḥāt ch. 198, line 63825Spheres of its simples (ch. 2): 9 line 2572 ↗
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 2582ف
Level of existence: الملائكة · the angels
Divine Name: القوى · the Strong (al-Qawī)
Lunar mansion: سعد الأخبية · Saʿd al-Akhbiya
Futūḥāt ch. 198, line 65823Spheres 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
ع
With fatḥa ـَ
فهي اسم لقدوم أو رحيل.
It is a name for arrival or departure.
With ḍamma ـُ
فهي اسم للساكن في الذات التي تقوم به.
It is a name for that which dwells in the self and by which the self subsists.
With kasra ـِ
فهي اسم لخبث الذات.
It is a name for the foulness of the self.
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.
ف
With fatḥa ـَ
فهي لنفي الخبث بعد ما كان جنسه معلوما بالخبث، فهي إشارة إلى أنه طاهر وجنسه خبيث، والخبث مثل المعاصي وما أشبهها.
It is for negating foulness in something whose genus is known for foulness. It thus indicates that the thing is pure while its genus is foul; foulness being like sins and the like.
With ḍamma ـُ
فهي لتزويل الخبث.
It is for removing foulness.
With kasra ـِ
فهي إشارة إلى الذات وما احتوت عليه، وفي بعض الأحيان قد يكون معها التقليل.
It is an indication of the self and what it contains; at times it may carry a sense of diminution.
Two-letter nucleus14 roots in Ibn Fāris’s chapterع ر
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 22110 ↗
- عرزالعين والراء والزاء أصل صحيح يدل على استصعاب وانقباضL22111
- عرسالعين والراء والسين أصل واحد صحيح تعود فروعه إليه وهو الملازمةL22116
- عرشالعين الراء والشين أصل صحيح واحد يدل على ارتفاع في شيء مبني ثم يستعار في غير ذلكQ 33 · L22155
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In the sister scriptsHebrew ע ר פSyriac ܥ ܪ ܦ
| Arabic | ع ر ف |
| Hebrew | ע ר פ |
| Syriac | ܥ ܪ ܦ |
| Ancient South Arabian (musnad) | 𐩲 𐩧 𐩰 |
| Phoenician | 𐤏 𐤓 𐤐 |
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 gives maʿrifa and ʿirfān for knowing.well attested
The lexicographers in chronological order, from al-Khalīl to Lane.
Al-Khalīl gives maʿrifa and ʿirfān for knowing. He also lists these senses: ʿurf as al-maʿrūf, the good that is recognised; ʿarīf, the overseer of a people; ʿArafa and ʿArafāt; taʿrīf, both the standing at ʿArafāt and the public announcement of a found object; iʿtirāf, confession of a fault together with abasement and acceptance of it; and nafs ʿarūf, a soul that settles when made to bear something. Al-Jawharī adds ʿurf as smell, good or bad; ʿurf as the horse's mane; maʿrūf as the opposite of munkar; and the acknowledgment formula lahu ʿalayya alf ʿurfan. Ibn Fāris orders all this under two roots. The first is continuous succession: the mane, sand-grouse flying ʿurfan ʿurfan, and the ʿurfa ridge. The second is sukūn: knowing, and also pleasant scent, since the soul settles on it (Q 47:6). Al-Rāghib defines maʿrifa as perceiving a thing through reflection on its traces, narrower than ʿilm and opposed to inkār. For that reason one says a person yaʿrifu Allāh, while God is said to yaʿlamu, never to yaʿrifu. Ibn Manẓūr equates ʿirfān with ʿilm but notes Ibn Sīda's remark that the two can be told apart by a finer definition, and cites Sībawayh that ʿarīf is faʿīl with the sense of fāʿil. Lane glosses 'he knew it; he had cognition of it', notes the Miṣbāḥ restriction to the five senses, and quotes al-Rāghib.
Draws on: al-Khalīl · al-Jawharī · Ibn Fāris · al-Rāghib · Ibn Manẓūr · Lane
- Ibn Fāris, Maqāyīs al-lugha, s.v. ʿ-r-f
- al-Rāghib al-Iṣfahānī, al-Mufradāt, s.v. ʿ-r-f
- Lane, Arabic-English Lexicon, s.v. عرف
- Wiktionary: Arabic root ع ر ف ↗
Letters & soundThe grammarians class rāʾ as the repeated letter (mukarrar).speculative
What the theorists of sound symbolism would say of these letters. Speculative by nature.
The grammarians class rāʾ as the repeated letter (mukarrar). An imsās-style reading in Ibn Jinnī's manner could connect that trilled articulation with Ibn Fāris's first root, succession of one thing after another as in the mane. In Ibn ʿArabī's correspondence of letters to cosmic levels, rāʾ is assigned to the Fifth Heaven and fāʾ to the Angels; the data give no assignment for ʿayn. Al-Dabbāgh, as reported in al-Ibrīz, reads ʿayn as arrival or departure, rāʾ as all goods outward and inward, and fāʾ as the negation of foulness in something whose genus is foul. Of these, the fāʾ reading sits suggestively beside maʿrūf as the approved good. Mainstream linguistics treats all such letter-meaning claims as suggestive at most, since Semitic root meanings are not generally predictable from their consonants.
Draws on: Ibn ʿArabī letter-cosmology · al-Dabbāgh (al-Ibrīz) · Ibn Jinnī imsās
- al-Lamaṭī, al-Ibrīz min kalām ... ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz al-Dabbāgh
- Ibn ʿArabī, al-Futūḥāt al-Makkiyya, ch. 198 (the Breath)
Root structureSeveral of Ibn Fāris's ʿ-r siblings carry senses that sit beside ʿ-r-f's root of sukūn.speculative
The two-letter nucleus (Ibn Fāris's own chapters) and the permutations of the letters (Ibn Jinnī).
Several of Ibn Fāris's ʿ-r siblings carry senses that sit beside ʿ-r-f's root of sukūn. He glosses ʿ-r-s as mulāzama (constant attachment), ʿ-r-n as thubāt (fixity), and one root of ʿ-r-w as thubāt and mulāzama. His ʿ-r-š denotes elevation in something built, which can be read alongside ʿurf and aʿrāf as raised ground. Among the permutations, r-f-ʿ (29 Quranic occurrences, 'the opposite of lowering'), f-r-ʿ ('height, loftiness, fullness') and r-ʿ-f ('precedence, going ahead') form a cluster of height and forwardness. That cluster is the kind of material Ibn Jinnī's greater derivation would group with the mane and ridge senses of ʿ-r-f. ʿ-f-r is attested with various meanings, and the data give no aṣl statement for f-ʿ-r. These alignments are juxtapositions only; Ibn Fāris himself does not link the siblings.
Draws on: Ibn Fāris nucleus ʿ-r · permutations · Ibn Jinnī al-ishtiqāq al-akbar
- Ibn Fāris, Maqāyīs al-lugha, ʿ-r chapter
- Ibn Jinnī, al-Khaṣāʾiṣ, bāb al-ishtiqāq al-akbar (link not verified)
Semitic kin & loanwordsNo confident Northwest Semitic cognate exists for the sense 'to know'.plausible
Cognates in the sister languages, and whether the word was borrowed.
No confident Northwest Semitic cognate exists for the sense 'to know'. Geʿez ʿarafa 'to rest, cease, repose' is regularly compared (Leslau). If the comparison holds, it matches Ibn Fāris's second root of stillness and tranquillity rather strikingly. Hebrew ʿōref 'nape, back of the neck' is sometimes set beside Arabic ʿurf 'mane'; this is plausible but not certain. The Arabic word shows no sign of being borrowed.
Draws on: Geʿez · Hebrew · no loan
- Leslau, Comparative Dictionary of Geʿez, s.v. ʿarafa
- Brown–Driver–Briggs, s.v. ʿōref
Quranic exegesisQ 2:146 says the People of the Book 'know him as they know their sons'.well attested
How the classical exegetes read the word in the Quran.
Q 2:146 says the People of the Book 'know him as they know their sons'. Al-Ṭabarī reads this as their recognition of the Prophet, or of the truth of the qibla change, from their own scripture. Q 2:89 ('when there came to them what they recognised, they disbelieved in it') is read the same way, as recognition met with denial, and al-Rāghib cites it for maʿrifa as the opposite of inkār. Bi-l-maʿrūf in the retaliation and bequest verses (2:178, 2:180) is taken as what is equitable and customarily acknowledged. Q 40:11, fa-ʿtarafnā bi-dhunūbinā, uses iʿtirāf in al-Khalīl's sense of confessing a fault. The exegetes derive al-aʿrāf (7:46) from ʿurf as elevated ground: a height between Garden and Fire. Al-Ṭabarī reports that its people are those whose good and evil deeds balance. For 77:1, al-mursalāti ʿurfan, al-Zamakhsharī and al-Rāzī give both 'in succession like a horse's mane' and 'sent with what is good (maʿrūf)'.
Philosophy & kalāmIn kalām, maʿrifat Allāh is widely named as the first obligation (awwal wājib) on the responsible person, with debate over whether it is reached by rational inquiry (naẓar) and whether naẓar itself comes first.plausible
The word as a technical term in falsafa and theology.
In kalām, maʿrifat Allāh is widely named as the first obligation (awwal wājib) on the responsible person, with debate over whether it is reached by rational inquiry (naẓar) and whether naẓar itself comes first. Avicenna gives ʿārif a technical place in the ninth namaṭ of al-Ishārāt wa-l-tanbīhāt, 'on the stations of the knowers'. There the ʿārif is marked off from the ascetic and the worshipper by directing his thought to the holiness of the Real. Al-Ghazālī and later authors commonly contrast maʿrifa with discursive ʿilm, in line with al-Rāghib's lexical distinction.
Draws on: kalām · Avicenna
- Avicenna, al-Ishārāt wa-l-tanbīhāt, namaṭ 9
- SEP: Ibn Sina ↗
Akbarian readingIn Faṣṣ Ādam, the knowledge of the origin of the forms of the world receptive to their spirits cannot be known (lā yaʿrifuhu) by the intellect through reflective consideration;well attested
The word in Ibn ʿArabī's text and terminology.
In Faṣṣ Ādam, the knowledge of the origin of the forms of the world receptive to their spirits cannot be known (lā yaʿrifuhu) by the intellect through reflective consideration; it comes only from divine unveiling (kashf). The chapter also states that no one knows of the Real except what his own essence gives. The angels' objection to Adam is traced to their not knowing themselves: 'had they known (ʿarafū) themselves they would have known (ʿalimū), and had they known they would have been protected.' The sentence places ʿarafa and ʿalima in sequence and echoes the self-knowledge saying he frequently cites. His Iṣṭilāḥ defines the ʿārif as one whom the Lord has made witness Himself, so that states appear upon him; maʿrifa is that person's ḥāl.
Draws on: Fuṣūṣ, Faṣṣ Ādam · Iṣṭilāḥāt
- Ibn ʿArabī, Fuṣūṣ al-ḥikam, Faṣṣ Ādam
- Ibn ʿArabī, Iṣṭilāḥ al-ṣūfiyya, s.v. al-ʿārif wa-l-maʿrifa
Reference