Speaking in Formal Arabic in the Company of the Common People and Its Relation to Affectation
Machine translationRead the Arabic original
The questioner:
I say, Honorable Shaykh, may Allah grant you success, if a person is in the company of common people and begins to speak in formal Arabic, is this considered affectation, or should he speak in the colloquial dialect?
The Shaykh:
Yes, we will understand this. Address the common people in the Arabic they understand; address them in their language, unless you know that you have taught them Arabic, or taught them grammar, at least. But if you are addressing them in formal Arabic and they do not understand it, this is not right, if they do not understand it. Yes.
The questioner:
And the Shaykh, and before him.
The Shaykh:
In some of the Shaykh’s (may Allah have mercy on him) letters, there are colloquial terms, because he sends them to common people, and they are read to common people, so he addresses them without anything that would make them feel superior. Yes.
I say, Honorable Shaykh, may Allah grant you success, if a person is in the company of common people and begins to speak in formal Arabic, is this considered affectation, or should he speak in the colloquial dialect?
The Shaykh:
Yes, we will understand this. Address the common people in the Arabic they understand; address them in their language, unless you know that you have taught them Arabic, or taught them grammar, at least. But if you are addressing them in formal Arabic and they do not understand it, this is not right, if they do not understand it. Yes.
The questioner:
And the Shaykh, and before him.
The Shaykh:
In some of the Shaykh’s (may Allah have mercy on him) letters, there are colloquial terms, because he sends them to common people, and they are read to common people, so he addresses them without anything that would make them feel superior. Yes.
Source
شرح قرة عيون الموحدين في تحقيق دعوة الأنبياء والمرسلين، باب ما جاء أن سبب كفر بني آدم وتركهم دينهم هو الغلو في الصالحين — islamhouse.com (1:04:06)
The Arabic text is a machine transcription of the audio recording.