The Disagreement Regarding the Division of Speech into Reality and Metaphor in the Arabic Language

The Shaykh : Regarding what is termed by linguists as "haqiqah" (reality) and "majaz" (metaphor), we mentioned that the one who adopts what is called linguistic majaz is using a term among the later technical terms. I say now that there is no dispute over terminology, provided that this term or another does not lead to contradicting the Shari'ah in a specific instance. We gave as an example the saying of the Exalted: . The linguists who adopted the division of sentence meanings into haqiqah and majaz said this is an example of majaz, and they called it "majaz al-qasam" (metaphor of oath), because they assume a word here: the people of the village the people of the caravan. They call this majaz. But this is the terminology of Ibn Taymiyyah, who opposed them and said there is no majaz here, only haqiqah, because the majaz they agreed upon only occurs in a sentence where a meaning appears that is not intended, while another meaning is intended. Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyyah says that in this noble verse, it is not possible for the listener or reciter to conceive of anything other than the meaning they call majaz. Therefore, this meaning is the haqiqah. And peace be upon you, and Allah's mercy and blessings. We also mentioned some examples in Arabic usage. A man says: "I traveled and the moon." This is also called majaz. But Ibn Taymiyyah says this is not majaz; it is real, because no one understands the apparent meaning in other expressions like "I traveled and the man" or "I traveled and the one standing," meaning his companion was with him. Here, no one understands "I traveled and the moon" to mean the moon was with me and its hand in my hand. The moon is in the sky and I am on the earth. This meaning that comes to mind from this sentence is what those linguists call majaz. Ibn Taymiyyah says no, this is not majaz; it is haqiqah, because it is not possible to understand anything from it other than this apparent meaning, which is the meaning that comes to mind, and that is haqiqah, not majaz. Similarly, among what they call majaz: "The gutter flowed." The apparent meaning is that it melted from intense heat, for example, the metal melted. No one understands this speech. The meaning that comes to mind for every speaker of Arabic is "The water of the gutter flowed," exactly like the previous verse. So you call it majaz, no problem, but it is haqiqah. However, in opposition to their statement that the listener does not move from haqiqah to majaz unless there are two meanings: the first, real meaning cannot be intended. So we move from it to the meaning that is not currently coming to mind, and we call it majaz. In all these examples, there is only one meaning, by the agreement of those who speak the letter "dha" and those who agree on what is called haqiqah and majaz. In these examples, there is only one meaning. This single meaning that they call majaz is the haqiqah itself.