Root · 1 in the Quran · 279 in 22 texts of the library
عنوIbn Fāris groups the weak root under three linked senses: directed concern/exertion … (root nw)
العين والنون والحرف المعتل أصول ثلاثة الأول القصد للشيء بانكماش فيه وحرص عليه والثاني دال على خضوع وذل والثالث ظهور شيء …
Ibn Fāris, Maqāyīs al-lugha · English rendering AI
The family of the root
Patterns computed · our dataThe words of ع ن و that our sources attest: the root's letters in green, the added letters in gold.
18 words5 verbs4 verbal nouns2 participles1 place or instrument1 intensive or elative3 other nouns1 plural1 relative or abstract
- مَعْنَىmeaning; sense
- عَنَتِhe was, or became, lowly, humble, or submissive, to him
- مَعانِي—
- مَعْنَوِيّmoral; spiritual
- اِعْتَنَىgive attention to; show concern for
The whole family8 groups, by pattern; tap a pattern to see what it does
Verbs5عَنَتِ · اِعْتَنَى · عنّا
The root as an action: the bare Form I, and the Forms made by adding letters before, inside or after the root.grammar →
- عَنَتِhe was, or became, lowly, humble, or submissive, to himLaneForm IQurʾān ×1library ×41LaneIbn Fāris
- اِعْتَنَىgive attention to; show concern forautoForm VIIIlibrary ×1
- عنّاhe imprisoned him, or confined him, long, straitening himLaneForm IILaneIbn Fāris
- اعناhe rendered him lowly, humble, or submissiveLaneForm IVLane
- تعنّىForm VLane
Verbal nouns4عَنْوَة · عُنوّ · عُنُوّ
The action itself, named as a noun (maṣdar).grammar →
Participles2مُعَنَّى · مُعْتَنَى
The one who does it, and the one it is done to.grammar →
- مُعَنَّىpassive, Form IILaneIbn Fāris
- مُعْتَنَىconscientious; attentiveautopassive, Form VIIIlibrary ×1
Place, time and instrument1مَعْنَى
Where or when it happens, and what it is done with: the m- nouns.grammar →
- مَعْنَىmeaning; senseautonoun of place or timelibrary ×127Ibn Fāris
Intensives, qualities and the elative1عُنْوَان
The quality carried far, held as a trait, or compared.grammar →
Other nouns3عَنَاء · عَنْوَنْت · عِنْو
Nouns on other patterns; their meaning is learned word by word.grammar →
Plurals1مَعانِي
Broken plurals rebuild the word on a new pattern; sound plurals add an ending.grammar →
- مَعانِيsound plural of مَعْنَىlibrary ×38
Relative and abstract1مَعْنَوِيّ
-iyy relates a thing to its source; -iyya makes an abstract noun.grammar →
- مَعْنَوِيّmoral; spiritualautorelative adjective (-iyy)library ×2Lane
Reference
Why this shape?What each of the 13 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
This root has a weak or doubled letter, so real words change shape (qāla → qāʾil, not qāwil); the machine pours the letters in as they are, and matches attested words by their regular pattern.
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 · 170ʿAnānī l-amr yaʿnīnī ʿināyatan (عناني الأمر يعنيني عناية) 'the matter concerned me, concerns me,' so I am muʿnan bihi (معني به) 'concerned with it.' And iʿtanaytu bi-amrihi (واعتنيت بأمره) 'I concerned myself with his af
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 belowIbn Fāris · 395The letters ʿayn, nūn, and the weak radical have three original meanings.
Ibn Fāris (d. 395/1004), Maqāyīs al-Lugha. Seeks each root's original sense (aṣl).
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.
ع ن و
العين والنون والحرف المعتل أصول ثلاثة الأول القصد للشيء بانكماش فيه وحرص عليه والثاني دال على خضوع وذل والثالث ظهور شيء وبروزه
ʿ-n-y is three roots: the first is the aiming at something with eagerness in it and keenness for it; the second indicates submission and abasement; and the third is the appearance of something and its emergence. 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
- نnūntip of the tongue · voiced, in betweenSīb. · I. Jinnī
- وwāwbetween the lips · voiced, in betweenSīb. · 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 ↗
ن
ومن حافة اللسان من أدناها إلى منتهى طرف اللسان ما بينها وبين ما يليها من الحنك الأعلى وما فويق الثنايا مخرج النون
From the edge of the tongue, from its nearest part to the end of its tip, between it and the upper palate next to it and what is just above the front teeth, is the place of the nūn. Sībawayh, lines 26555–26556 ↗
ومن طرف اللسان بينه وبين ما فويق الثنايا، مخرج النون
From the tip of the tongue, between it and what is just above the front teeth, is the place of the nūn. Ibn Jinnī, line 979 ↗
و
ومما بين الشفتين مخرج الباء، والميم، والواو
From between the two lips is the place of the bāʾ, the mīm and the wāw. Sībawayh, line 26563 ↗
ومما بين الشفتين مخرج الباء والميم والواو
From between the two lips is the place of the bāʾ, the mīm and the wāw. Ibn Jinnī, line 986 ↗
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 ↗
ن
Level of existence: السماء الرابعة · the fourth heaven
Divine Name: النور · the Light (al-Nūr)
Lunar mansion: السماك · al-Simāk
Futūḥāt ch. 198, line 64663Spheres 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 2580و
Level of existence: تعيين الرتب والمقامات والمنازل · the determination of ranks, stations and waystations
Divine Name: رفيع الدرجات · Rafīʿ al-Darajāt, Exalted in Degrees
Lunar mansion: الرشا · al-Rashāʾ
Futūḥāt ch. 198, line 62121Spheres 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.
ن
With fatḥa ـَ
فهي الخير الساكن في الذات الشاعل فيها.
It is the good that dwells in the self, kindling [al-shāʿil, as written] within it.
With ḍamma ـُ
فهي إشارة إلى الخير الكامل أو النور الساطع.
It is an indication of perfect good or radiant light.
With kasra ـِ
فهي إشارة إلى شيء يدركه المتكلم أو هو له.
It is an indication of something that the speaker perceives or that belongs to him.
و
With fatḥa ـَ
فهي الأشياء المشتبكة في الإنسان مثل العروق والأصابع وما أشبه ذلك.
It is the intertwined things in the human being, such as veins, fingers and the like.
With ḍamma ـُ
فهي الأشياء المباينة لبني آدم مثل الأفلاك والجبال وما أشبه ذلك
It is things distinct from the children of Adam, such as the celestial spheres, mountains and the like.
With kasra ـِ
فهي الأشياء المشتبكة المستقذرة أو المبغوضة كالأمعاء ونحوها.
It is intertwined things that are filthy or detested, such as the intestines and the like.
Two-letter nucleus11 roots in Ibn Fāris’s chapterع ن
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 20616 ↗
- عنىالعين والنون والحرف المعتل أصول ثلاثة الأول القصد للشيء بانكماش فيه وحرص عليه والثاني دال على خضوع وذل والثالث ظهور شيء وبروزهL20617
- عنبالعين والنون والباء أصيل يدل على ثمر معروف وكلمة غير ذلك فالثمر العنب واحدته عنبة ويقولون ليس في كلامهم فعلة إلا عنبة وربماQ 11 · L20665
- عنتالعين والنون والتاء أصل صحيح يدل على مشقة وما أشبه ذلك ولا يدل على صحة ولا سهولةQ 5 · L20672
- عنجالعين والنون والجيم أصل صحيح واحد يدل على جذب شيء بشيء يمتد كحبل وما أشبههL20682
- عندالعين والنون والدال أصل صحيح واحد يدل على مجاوزة وترك طريق الاستقامةQ 201 · L20709
- عنشالعين والنون والشين أصيل لعله أن يكون صحيحا وإن صح فهو يدل على تمرس بشيء يقولون فلان يعانش الناس أي يقاتلهم ويتمرس بهم ويعانش يظالم وينشدون : — إذا لأL20763
- عنصالعين والنون والصاد أصيل صحيح على شيء من الشعرL20771
- عنطالعين والنون والطاء أصيل صحيح يدل على طول جسم وحسن قوامL20779
- عنقالعين والنون والقاف أصل واحد صحيح يدل على امتداد في شيء إما في ارتفاع وإما في انسياحQ 9 · L20793
- عنكالعين والنون والكاف أصلان أحدهما لون من الألوان والآخر ارتباك في الأمر واستغلاق في الشىءL20875
- عنمالعين والنون والميم ليس بأصل يقاس عليه وإنما هو نبت أو شيء يشبه بهL20894
In the sister scriptsHebrew ע נ וSyriac ܥ ܢ ܘ
| Arabic | ع ن و |
| Hebrew | ע נ ו |
| Syriac | ܥ ܢ ܘ |
| Ancient South Arabian (musnad) | 𐩲 𐩬 𐩥 |
| Phoenician | 𐤏 𐤍 𐤅 |
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's entry (combining the weak-final forms) treats ʿanānī l-amru yaʿnīnī as 'the matter concerned/occupied me,' glosses maʿnā as a thing's essential state or upshot, and derives ʿanāʾ (hardship, being wearied) and taʿniya (to burden with toil);well attested
The lexicographers in chronological order, from al-Khalīl to Lane.
Al-Khalīl's entry (combining the weak-final forms) treats ʿanānī l-amru yaʿnīnī as 'the matter concerned/occupied me,' glosses maʿnā as a thing's essential state or upshot, and derives ʿanāʾ (hardship, being wearied) and taʿniya (to burden with toil); a Jāhilī custom is cited where a man's excess camel is called muʿannāh, its back deliberately damaged. Ibn Fāris then resolves the entry into three distinct senses — directed concern, submission, and outward emergence — noting explicitly that ʿanā yaʿnū (distinct from ʿanā yaʿnī) means 'he became lowly, submissive,' with al-ʿān as the term for a captive. Lane, synthesizing al-Jawharī (S) and later sources, confirms ʿanā/yaʿnū, inf. ʿunūw and ʿanwa, as 'he was, or became, lowly, humble, submissive,' obedient — the very sense required by the Qur'ānic lemma ʿanat.
Draws on: al-Khalīl, Kitāb al-ʿAyn · Ibn Fāris, Maqāyīs al-Lugha · Lane, Lexicon
- al-Khalīl, Kitāb al-ʿAyn, root ʿ-n-w/y
- Ibn Fāris, Maqāyīs al-Lugha, root ʿ-n-w
- Lane, Lexicon, root ʿ-n-w
Letters & soundIn the tradition compiled under the heading of the letters in the Breath, ʿayn is correlated with Nature (al-ṭabīʿa) and, per al-Dabbāgh, with arrival and departure;speculative
What the theorists of sound symbolism would say of these letters. Speculative by nature.
In the tradition compiled under the heading of the letters in the Breath, ʿayn is correlated with Nature (al-ṭabīʿa) and, per al-Dabbāgh, with arrival and departure; nūn with the fourth heaven and with 'the good that dwells in the self, kindling within it'; wāw with the determination of ranks, stations, and waystations, and, for al-Dabbāgh, with the intertwined things within a human being (veins, fingers). Read speculatively, the sequence could be made to suggest a movement from departure/arrival (ʿ) through an indwelling impulse (n) to a fixed station or rank (w) — apt for both the sense of 'coming to mean/intend' and that of 'settling into abasement before the Living.' This is offered as suggestive numerological correspondence only; mainstream historical linguistics finds no causal connection between individual Arabic letters and lexical meaning.
Draws on: Akbarian letter-correspondences (198) · al-Dabbāgh, letter meanings under fatḥa
- Ibn ʿArabī (attributed), letters of the Breath, no. 198
- al-Dabbāgh, letter-meanings under fatḥa
Root structureThe ʿ-n nucleus, before the weak third radical, sits among siblings such as ʿ-n-t (hardship, difficulty without ease) and ʿ-n-q (extension, stretching upward) — a loose field of strain, extension, and unease that the submission-sense of ʿanā yaʿnū (being bowed, wearied into lowliness) fits comfortably beside, though this is juxtaposition, not derivation.plausible
The two-letter nucleus (Ibn Fāris's own chapters) and the permutations of the letters (Ibn Jinnī).
The ʿ-n nucleus, before the weak third radical, sits among siblings such as ʿ-n-t (hardship, difficulty without ease) and ʿ-n-q (extension, stretching upward) — a loose field of strain, extension, and unease that the submission-sense of ʿanā yaʿnū (being bowed, wearied into lowliness) fits comfortably beside, though this is juxtaposition, not derivation. Among the permutations, ʿ-w-n ('aid, help') is by far the most productive (11 attestations against ʿanaw's own 1), and one may notice — without asserting a historical link — that both roots orient a subject toward another: leaning on a helper (ʿawn) versus bowing before one greater (ʿanā). Ibn Fāris's own note that ʿ-n-w is not judged a fully independent root in some permutation readings (marked false) counsels caution before pressing this further.
Draws on: Ibn Fāris nucleus siblings · permutation table
- Ibn Fāris, Maqāyīs al-Lugha, siblings and permutations
Semitic kin & loanwordsHebrew ʿānâ is itself traditionally split by lexicographers into homographic roots paralleling the Arabic bifurcation: ʿānâ I 'to answer,' and ʿānâ III 'to be bowed down, afflicted, humbled' — the latter a plausible cognate for the Qur'ānic sense of ʿanat, 'were humbled.' Aramaic/Syriac ʿnā similarly covers 'to answer, respond,' aligning loosely with the Arabic sense of directed concern (ʿanā bi-, 'to be occupied with, to address oneself to').plausible
Cognates in the sister languages, and whether the word was borrowed.
Hebrew ʿānâ is itself traditionally split by lexicographers into homographic roots paralleling the Arabic bifurcation: ʿānâ I 'to answer,' and ʿānâ III 'to be bowed down, afflicted, humbled' — the latter a plausible cognate for the Qur'ānic sense of ʿanat, 'were humbled.' Aramaic/Syriac ʿnā similarly covers 'to answer, respond,' aligning loosely with the Arabic sense of directed concern (ʿanā bi-, 'to be occupied with, to address oneself to'). No confident single Proto-Semitic root can be reconstructed covering all three Arabic senses at once, and there is no reason to treat the Arabic word as a loan; the parallel splitting in Hebrew itself suggests convergent semantic development from a shared but polysemous stock rather than borrowing in either direction.
Draws on: BDB, Hebrew ʿānâ I–III · Aramaic/Syriac ʿnā
- Brown–Driver–Briggs, ʿānâ I–III
Quranic exegesisAt Q 20:111, wa-ʿanati l-wujūhu li-l-Ḥayyi l-Qayyūm ('and faces have been humbled before the Living, the Self-Subsisting'), the exegetes read wujūh synecdochically for whole persons, and ʿanat as total submission on the Day of Judgment.plausible
How the classical exegetes read the word in the Quran.
At Q 20:111, wa-ʿanati l-wujūhu li-l-Ḥayyi l-Qayyūm ('and faces have been humbled before the Living, the Self-Subsisting'), the exegetes read wujūh synecdochically for whole persons, and ʿanat as total submission on the Day of Judgment. Al-Ṭabarī glosses it as dhallat wa-khaḍaʿat, abasement before a Judge no creature can resist. Al-Zamakhsharī and al-Rāzī connect the verse's force to the divine names al-Ḥayy al-Qayyūm immediately following: because God alone is self-subsisting life upon which all else depends, every face — every claim to independent standing — collapses into submission before Him. The verse is thus treated as the paradigm instance of Ibn Fāris's second sense, khuḍūʿ, rather than the 'meaning/concern' sense of the sibling form ʿanā yaʿnī.
Draws on: general tafsīr tradition on Q 20:111
Akbarian readingThe Faṣṣ Ādam excerpts available here use the root not in the Qur'ānic sense of submission but in its sibling sense of directed intent: aʿnī ('I mean') recurs to fix precisely which referent — the outward form of Adam, or the inward reality — Ibn ʿArabī intends by a given phrase, and the verse-line khudhū mā qultuhu ʿannī ('take what I have said, on my authority') likewise marks careful specification of meaning.plausible
The word in Ibn ʿArabī's text and terminology.
The Faṣṣ Ādam excerpts available here use the root not in the Qur'ānic sense of submission but in its sibling sense of directed intent: aʿnī ('I mean') recurs to fix precisely which referent — the outward form of Adam, or the inward reality — Ibn ʿArabī intends by a given phrase, and the verse-line khudhū mā qultuhu ʿannī ('take what I have said, on my authority') likewise marks careful specification of meaning. This is worth flagging honestly: the material given does not exhibit Ibn ʿArabī deploying ʿanā/ʿunūw in the abasement-sense of Q 20:111 itself; rather it shows the philologically adjacent qaṣd-sense (Ibn Fāris's first meaning) functioning as his standard device for hermeneutical precision throughout the Faṣṣ. No dedicated Iṣṭilāḥ definition for this root is present in the data given.
Draws on: Faṣṣ Ādam excerpts, repeated aʿnī
- Ibn ʿArabī, Fuṣūṣ al-Ḥikam, Faṣṣ Ādam
Reference