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[English edition] يعني تعبير الرؤيا «تأويل الأحلام». وإضافة إلى هذه العبارة تستخدم لفظة  «تعبير»، التي تعني «العبور من شيء إلى آخر، ومن معنى إلى آخر»، ومن ثمّ، «الشرح» والتفسير، وتعني حرفيّا «التفسير أو التعليق»، وهي منحدرة من جذور موجودة في لغات سامية أخرى، وتستخدم إلى جانب المصدرين اللذين نعثر على كلّ منهما مرة واحدة في القرآن، في سورة يوسف، الآية 43، وفي سورة الفرقان، الآية 33، وإلى جانب كلمة «تأويل» [انظره] الواردة أيضاً في سورة يوسف، الآيتان 44–5. وفي الاستخدام الراهن، ترتبط كلمة تعبير بمعنى «تأويل الأحلام»، في حين ترتبط كلمة تفسير [انظر المقال] بشروح الكتاب المقدّس والقرآن على س…

, name of one of the most ancient deities ofthe Semitic pantheon, who appears in the Pre-Sargonic period in the form Menūtum and constitutes one ofthe names of Ishtar (J. Bottéro, Les divinités sémitiques anciennes en Mésopotamie , in S. Moscati (ed.), Le antiche divinité semitiche, 30; Tallqvist, Götterepitheta , 373-4); the Ḳurʾānic scriptio of her name preserves the primitive w, which also appears in the Nabatean mnwtw (Lidzbarski, Handbuch , 313; Wellhausen, Reste 2, 28). The w changes to i in the Bible (Isa. lxv, 11), as in the Sallier IV papyrus, verso , i, 5-6 (in J.B. Pritchard, Ancien…

(a.), active participle from nad̲j̲d̲j̲ama “to observe the stars and deduce from them the state of the world”. The munad̲j̲d̲j̲im claims to know the lot of humans and their destiny from the positions of the stars. He is the astrologer. For a long time this noun designated both astrologer and astronomer, so close were the functions of the two. Often the court astrologer used to observe the stars scientifically and to interpret their movements for the benefit of his master. This is borne out ¶ by the fact that, according to D̲j̲ābir b. Ḥayyān, “the astrologer must be a mathematician ( riyāḍi …

, the name of a Safaitic deity, unknown however in the pantheon of Central and South Arabia. In Safaitic inscriptions he appears as šyʿhḳwm , i.e. S̲h̲ayʿ ha-Ḳawm, and it is only in the Nabataean and Palmyrene inscriptions (see G. Ryckmans, Les religions arabes préislamiques 2, Louvain 1953 = Quillet, Hist . gen . des religions 2, Paris 1960, ii, 199-228) that we have the form with the regular Arabic definite article, S̲h̲ayʿ al-Ḳawm. The name may refer to a tribal deity in the form of a lion or lion cub, so that S̲h̲ayʿ Allāh (this theophoric name, probably a depagan…

, the name of one of the five gods dating from the time of Noah mentioned in the Ḳurʾān (LXX, 23), together with Wadd, Yag̲h̲ūt̲h̲, Yaʿūk and Nasr [ q.vv.]. Suwāʿ was worshipped by the Hud̲h̲ayl [ q.v.] at Ruhāt in the region of Yanbuʿ (Ibn al-Kalbī, 6) in one of the valleys running from the Red Sea towards Medina (Yāḳūt, Buldān , iv, 1038). The tribe assiduously frequented his shrine, made pilgrimages to it and constantly offered sacrifices of their best smaller beasts to it (Ibn al-Kalbī, 6, 35, citing two verses attributed to a Yem…

(a.), the casting of stones. R-d̲j̲-m is a Semitic root, derivatives from which are found in the Old Testament with the meaning of “to stone, to drive away or kill by throwing stones” an abominable creature; rad̲j̲ma is “a heap of stones, an assembly of men, cries, tumult”. In Arabic, the root means “to stone, to curse”; rad̲j̲m , “heap of stones”, also means simply the stones placed upon tombs either as flagstones or in a heap, a custom which ḥadīt̲h̲ condemns, recommending rather that a grave should be level with the surface of the ground. On the ḥadīt̲h̲ of ʿAbd Allāh b. Mug̲h̲fal, it is …

, a personage associated with the legendary town of Iram D̲h̲āt al-ʿImād, to whom is attributed its foundation. For information on him, see ʿād and iram. (T. Fahd)

or Nabīṭ (coll.), Nabaṭī (sing.), Anbāṭ (pl.), the name given by the Arabs to the Nabataeans , amongst whom they distinguished the Nabaṭ al-Sham (i.e. of Syria), installed at Petra towards the end of the Hellenistic imperial era and at the beginning of the Roman one, and the Nabaṭ al-ʿIrāḳ (i.e. of ʿIrāḳ). [The Editors of the EI have decided to retain unchanged the following two articles, despite the inevitable overlappings in their present forms.] 1. The Nabaṭ al-S̲h̲ām. The Arabic term, occuring in Aramaic inscriptions, nbṭ / nbṭw , appears very often in the …

or hemerologies and menologies (Gr. χαταρχαί, Lat. electiones ) means an ¶ astrological procedure whose aim is to ascertain the auspicious ( saʿd ) or inauspicious ( naḥs ) character of the future. It deals with years, months, days and hours. This task, which was the duty of the official astrologer of the court as early as the Umayyad period, became increasingly important under the ʿAbbāsids as a result of the adoption of Iranian customs and Sāsānid calendars which established precisely how the prince’s time should be spent during all the days of the week (cf. for example the Ps.-D̲j̲āḥiẓ, Bāb…

, a pair of gods worshipped at ¶ Mecca before Islam. Several orientalists of the last century, such as Rudolph Krehl and François Lenormant, saw in them, not unreasonably, replicas of Baʿl and Baʿla. Indeed Isāf and Nāʾila do display the essential characteristics distinguishing this pair of gods from the many avatars known in the various Semitic religions: physical représentation by two sacred stones erected close to each other, or by two parallel hills; symbolic représentation of…

(a.), derived from the Semitic root r-ʾ-y which gives rise to formations expressing “sight” ( ruʾya ( t)) and “vision” ( ruʾyā ), one of the aspects of vision being nocturnal vision, the dream. 1. In the meaning of dream. On relations between “seer” ( rōʾe - Aram, ḥōzē = Ar. ḥāzī ), “soothsayer” ( kāhin , ʿarrāf , etc.) and “prophet” ( nabī ), see the articles kāhin, kihāna , nubuwwa. The Semitic terminology of the dream and of the vision evolves in two fundamentally different semantic zones: (1)The first is situated in the space extending between sleep and waking and is consequentl…

(a.), in a technical sense designates rhapsodomancy. It is an Islamic divinatory procedure, analogous to bibliomancy; but in current usage the term refers to the drawing of lots, whatever form this may take, and this has been used following the Ḳurʾānic prohibition of istiḳsām [ q.v.] and of maysir [ q.v.], the two principal cleromantic techniques of pagan Arabia. I. In the usual sense of “the drawing of lots”, the term ḳurʿa , originally applied to “a wineskin with broad base and narrow neck” ( TA, v, 453, l. 23) which probably served as a receptacle for the shaking of the lots…

(a.) or Zāʾirad̲j̲a , a divinatory technique which, in the same manner as geomancy [see k̲h̲aṭṭ ] and d̲j̲afr [ q.v.], and under various outside influences, had a wide diffusion in the mediaeval Islamic lands. It involved a mechanical means of calculating portents, strongly imbued with magic and astrology, in which were strongly mingled the talismanic sciences, based on the ʿilm al-k̲h̲awāṣṣ “knowledge of secret properties”, the ʿilm al-awfāḳ “knowledge of conjunctions”, ʿilm al-ṭilasmāt “knowledge of talismans” and ʿilm al-ḥurūf “knowledge of letters” [see ḥurūf ]. D̲j̲afr and ḥur…

, an Arabian god whose worship was fostered in Mecca by the K̲h̲uzāʿī ʿAmr b. Luḥayy [ q.v.] in the first half of the 3rd century A.D. Represented at first by a baetyl, like most of the Arab deities, it was later personified, with human features, by a statue made of cornelian, with the right arm truncated (cf. Judges III, 15, XX, 16) and which the ¶ Ḳurays̲h̲īs are said to have replaced by a golden arm (al-Azraḳī, Ak̲h̲bār Makka , ed. Wüstenfeld, Leipzig 1858, 74). It was from a town with thermal springs ( ḥamma ) that it was apparently brought to the Ḥid̲j̲āz. Having…

, the Arabic term for the rainbow, formed from ḳaws “bow” ( Ḳws in the inscriptions of Jordan; Ḳaws̲h̲ in the inscriptions of Tiglath-Pileser, Esarhaddon and Assurbanipal; Ḳūsu in Babylonian inscriptions of the time of Darius and Artaxerxes I; Ḳūsu, Ḳūs̲h̲u , Ḳīs̲h̲i , Ḳūs̲h̲i , in the Old Testament; Kos / Kōs /Κοξε, amongst the Nabataeans; Ḳaws , Ḳays , in Arabia), an Edomite deity known during the first millennium and later venerated by the Nabataeans (cf. Vriezen, The Edomitic deity Qaus , 330 ff.). He was a war-god, symbolised by the bow, just as Adad…

(a., pl. s̲h̲āmāt ) “naevus, skin blemish, mole”. This term seems originally to have denoted the coloured marks on a horse’s body, above all, where they are disapproved of ( TʿA , viii, 362 ll. 12-13). It is applied to all marks of a colour different from the main body which they mark, and to all black marks on the body or on the ground ( ibid., ll. 304). But from what we know at present in our texts, there is no difference between s̲h̲āmāt and k̲h̲īlān (sing, k̲h̲āl ) (the two terms are attested in Akkadian: cf. ḫālu , Bezold, Babylonisch-Assyrisches Glossar , Heidelberg 1926, 120, and sāmūti , Labat, T…

, ṭīra and zad̲j̲r are terms which merge into one another and together correspond to and express adequately the concept of “omen” and of οι̉ωνóς. Faʾl , a term peculiar to Arabic and equivalent to the Hebrew neḥas̲h̲īm and the Syriac neḥshē , originally meant natural omen, cledonism. It appears in very varied forms, ranging from simple sneezing (al-Ibs̲h̲īhī, Mustaṭraf , trans. Rat, ii 182), certain peculiarities of persons and things that one encounters (al-Nuwayrī, Nihāya , 133 ff., trans, in Arabica , viii/1 (1961), 34-7), to the interpretation of the…

The particular veneration which, among the S̲h̲īʿas, the members of the Prophet’s family enjoy, is at the base of the belief that the descendants of Fāṭima have inherited certain privileges inherent in Prophethood; prediction of the future and of the destinies of nations and dynasties is one of these privileges. The S̲h̲īʿī conception of prophecy, closely connected with that of the ancient gnosis (cf. Tor Andrae, Die Person Muhammeds in Lehre und Glauben seiner Gemeinde , Stockholm 1918, ch. vi) made the prophetic afflatus pass from Adam to Muḥamm…

(a., pl. tamāʾim , synonyms taʿwīd̲h̲ , ʿūd̲h̲a ), amulet, talisman (for a wider consideration of this last, see ṭilsam ). In origin, it means a stone with white speckles on a black field or vice-versa, threaded on a thong or cord and worn round the neck to avert danger. The Arabs placed such stones on their children, believing that it would protect them from the evil eye, ill fate, sickness and death, having thereby recourse to someone other than God, Who alone is capable of preventing evil a…

(a.), lord, God, master of a slave. Pre-Islamic Arabia probably applied this term to its gods or to some of them. In this sense the word corresponds to the terms like Baʿal, Adonis, etc. in the Northwestern Semitic languages, where rabb means “much, great” (see A. Jeffery, The foreign vocabulary of the Qurʾān , Baroda 1938, 136-7). In one of the oldest sūras (CVI, 3) Allāh is called the “lord of the temple”. Similarly, al-Lāt bore the epithet al-Rabba , especially at Ṭāʾif where she was worshipped in the image of a stone or of a rock. In the Ḳurʾān, rabb (especially with the possessive suffix)…

, the art of drawing prognostications from verses of the Ḳurʾān to which beneficial effects are attributed. The sacred text is used here in the same spirit as in rhapsodomancy ( ʿilm al-ḳurʿa ) and onomatomancy [see d̲j̲afr and ḥurūf. ] But it is here more particularly a case of the “natural properties” (φυσικά) which certain formulae of a magical and superstitious nature can have, based upon suitable Ḳurʾānic verses, letters drawn from these verse, words, names of angels, prophets or God, prayers bearing celebrated names and poems ( e.g. the Burda ). Hence these …

(a.), a term having various significations. The root s̲h̲-ʿ-r involves, inter alia, the ideas of knowing something; being aware of something; being a poet; being hairy; notifying, making aware of something; marking something; etc. S̲h̲iʿār stems from the latter semantic field. It denotes: 1. The rallying signal for war or for a travel expedition, war cry, standard, mark indicating the place of standing ( wuḳūf ) of ¶ soldiers in battle or pilgrims in the Pilgrimage (ʿArafa: the idea of “recognising” this mark). The warcry of the Prophet’s Companions was “Amit , amit! O victorious ones,…

(a.), derived from nas̲h̲ada “to search (especially for a stray camel), designates a set form of oath, at the beginning of a prayer of petition, sometimes involving a threat or coercion, directed at God. A certain Abū Sammāl of Banū Asad set out once in search of his camel; after a long, vain search, he turned to God, entreating him in these words: aymunuka laʾin lam taruddahā ilayya lā aʿbudka , “I swear if you do not return it to me, I will not worship you”; and he found it. The man was not a saint, so that his success could be attributed t…

(A.), deriving from a root k̲h̲-y-r which expresses the idea of option or choice, consists of entrusting God with the choice between two or more possible options, either through piety and submission to His will, or else through inability to decide oneself, on account of not knowing which choice is the most advantageous one. To the first category belong the ak̲h̲yār or “chosen”, who regulate their lives according to the model inspired by God in the Ḳurʾān and the Law; to the second belong the mustak̲h̲īrūn , those who seek to escape from indecision with the h…

, apparently the name of an idol of the pre-Islamic Arabs. In a marginal addition to Ibn al-Kalbī’s K. al-Aṣnām (ed. Klinke-Rosenberger, 2), the following ḥadīt̲h̲ is given: “Fulfill your legal alms obligations, for God has freed you from al-Sud̲j̲d̲j̲a and al-Bad̲j̲d̲j̲a” (missing from the Concordance ). The commentator says that al-Sud̲j̲d̲j̲a was an idol. As for al-Bad̲j̲d̲j̲a, This is the blood drawn from an incision ( faṣīd ) of a camel’s vein, on which the Arabs used to feed in times of dearth. But according to TʿA , ii, 6, al-Bad̲j̲d̲j̲a was an idol too…

, spontaneous pulsations, tremblings or convulsions which occur in all parts of the body, in particular in the limbs, the eyelids and the eyebrows and which provide omens the interpretation of which as a divinatory sign is known as the ʿilm al-ik̲h̲tilād̲j̲ or “palmoscopy”. Palmoscopy forms part of physiognomy and, like it, formed part of medical diagnosis by the physicians of classical antiquity, among them Galen, who established a distinction between “palpitation” and “trembling, shudder, convulsion”. As a divinatory practice, Islamic palmoscopy seems to have as its s…

(A.), 10th form of the root ḳ-s-m which embraces two groups of meanings, the one of a magical nature and the other divinatory. The first is applied to formulae and methods for conjuring up demons, for adjuration and exorcism; this latter is the meaning acquired by the 2nd and 4th forms, ḳassama and aḳsama , particularly in the Christian Arab world, clearly influenced by the Hebrew ḳesem ( e.g., Deut. xxiii, 23), which has the same meaning. This usage is late, colloquial, and most frequently found among Christian Arabs, who also employ ḳisām , “adjuration, exorcism …

(or K̲h̲ulaṣa ). D̲h̲u ’l-K̲h̲alaṣa refers to the sacred stone (and the holy place where it was to be found) which was worshipped by the tribes of Daws, K̲h̲at̲h̲ʿam, Bad̲j̲īla, the Azd of the Sarāt mountains and the Arabs of Tabāla. “It was a white quartziferous rock, bearing the sculpture of something like a crown. It was in Tabāla at the place called al-ʿAblāʾ, i.e., White Rock ( TʿA , viii, 3) between Mecca and the Yemen and seven nights’ march from the former ( i.e., approximately 192 kilometres or 119 miles). The guardians of the sanctuary were the Banū Umāma of the Bāhila…

(a.), in early Arabia, the guardian of a shrine (abstract noun, sidāna ). The root s - d - n contains the sense of "veil, curtain", which puts sādin on a level with ḥād̲j̲ib , the first term denoting the guardian of a shrine, and the second, the "door-keeper" of a palace, hence "chamberlain". The ḥād̲j̲ib acts under the orders of someone else, whereas the sādin acts on his own initiative ( LʿA , xvii, 69, citing Ibn Barrī). However, the two terms may be found juxtaposed, e.g. in Ibn His̲h̲ām, who says, "The Arabs possessed, as well as the Kaʿba, tawāg̲h̲īṭ which were shrines ( buyūt : cf. Fahd, La divin…

(a.), from rīf , pl. aryāf , “cultivated and fertile region”, generally designates the lands along a river or the sea and the fertile plains bordering the desert [see further rīf ]. The noun riyāfa , a recent formation on the model of ḳiyāfa (note that al-Ḏj̲āḥiẓ, K. al-Tarbīʿ wa ’l-tadwīr , ed. Pellat, 91-2, § 176, gives for ḳiyāfa [ q.v.] the sense of the detection of paternity, the whereabouts of water, atmospheric phenomena and the earth), designates the water-diviner’s art which estimates the depth of water under the earth through the smell of the ea…

(a.), from the root s-ʿ-y , used 30 times in the Ḳurʾān in such senses as “to work, apply oneself to, denounce, seek to earn one’s living, run after s. th.” etc., but in the sense concerning here denoting the pilgrim’s running between al-Ṣafā and al-Marwa. These are two hills to the south and north-west of the Kaʿba respectively, linked by a masʿā , course, which the pilgrim follows after having made the sevenfold circuit of the Kaʿba, at his or her arrival and his or her departure. This following of the course, the saʿy , is likewise sevenfold; it starts in al-Ṣafā, and goes to al-Marwa, ca. 300 m a…

, preferably to be read as Saʿīr, although the former is more common, an idol of the pre-Islamic Arabian tribe of ʿAnaza (Ibn al-Kalbī, 48-9), coming from ʿw.ṣ , an Aramaean eponym denoting in the Bible (refs. in Gesenius-Buhl, 573) the land of Edom and the group of tribes living there (W. Robertson Smith, Kinship and marriage in early Arabia , 260-1; Nöldeke, in ZDMG, xl [1887], 183). Saʿīr, which followed the same evolution as ʿAwḍ, denotes in the Bible the land of Edom before its occupation by the sons of Esau. Gen. xxxvi.9 speaks of the hill country Seʿir, o…

(a.), the science of physiognomancy and the examination of traces on the ground. In their concern for the purity of race and the ¶ correctness of genealogical lines, the ancient Arabs perfected a technique which permitted them to verify, and, where necessary, to research into, lines of parentage. This technique consisted partly in experience and partly in divinatory intuition. In primitive times, a specialised personnel maintained the practice: but the progressive decline, in pre-Islamic Arabia, of personnel skilled i…

, a rogatory rite still practised at the present day (notably in Jordan and Morocco) and dating back to the earliest Arab times (ʿĀdite according ¶ to Ibn al-At̲h̲īr, i, 61; Abrahaniic according to Ibn Saʿd, i/1, 22) which is a supplication for rain during periods of great drought. The rite must have been both astral and magical in nature. Obliged to retain it because of its great popularity, primitive Islam tried to remove these features. A precise ritual was established—as in the case of istik̲h̲āra [ q.v.], another custom deriving from pagan cultic practices —so that the faithf…

, a term denoting hydromancy, according to Doutté, Magie et religion dans l’Afrique DU Nord (Algiers 1909), 389; but in Ibn Ḵh̲aldūn. Muḳaddima , iii, 137 ff., istinzāl rūḥāniyyāt al-aflāk is a technique belonging to sīmyāʾ [ q.v.], natural or phantasmagoric magic (cf. T. Fahd, Divination, 49, n. 1). The Pseudo-Mad̲j̲rīṭī prefers to use istid̲j̲lāb (cf. Sources Orientales , vii (1966), 170 ff.). Elsewhere, in al-Būnī and Ibn al-Muwaḳḳiʿ, istinzāl al-arwāḥ wa-’ stiḥḍāruhā fī ḳawālib al-as̲h̲bāḥ denotes the techniques of spiritism, although these are generally denoted by the name ʿilm…

(a.) “water”. The present article covers the religio-magical and the Islamic legal aspects of water, together with irrigation techniques, as follows: 1. Hydromancy A a vehicle for the sacred, water has been employed for various techniques of divination, and in particular, for potamonancy (sc. divination by means of the colour of the waters of a river and their ebbing and flowing; cf. FY. Cumont, Études syriennes , Paris 1917, 250 ff., notably on the purification power of the Euphrates, consulted for divinatory reasons); for pegomancy (sc…

(a) in modern times designates an epic [see haṃāsa ] and also corresponds to a usage already in evidence in the Old Testament, where milḥamōt is applied to the wars of Yahweh (I Sam. xviii, 17, xxv, 28), but in the Islamic Middle Ages this word meant a writing of a divinatory character, the Malḥamat Dāniyāl [cf. dāniyāl ]. It is a question of a collection of meteorological signs with their divinatory meanings, derived from the day of the week on which 1 January falls (from the Saturday to the Friday), eclipses of the moon, followi…

(a.), the sun (f). 1. In Pre-Islamic Arab lore. This was a divinity worshipped in the Semitic world, especially in Assyria-Babylonia (cf. its attributes in K. Tallqvist, Akkadische Götterepitheta , Helsinki 1938, 453 ff.) and in South Arabia, where the plurals s̲h̲ums (for s̲h̲umūs ) given by Yāḳūt (ed. Beirut, iii, 362) for this ṣanam or idol, ʾs̲h̲ms and the dual s̲h̲msy (G. Ryckmans, Les noms propres sudsémitiques , Louvain 1934-5, i, 33; A. Jamme, Le panthéon sud-arabe préislamique d’après les sources épigraphiques , in Muséon , lx [1947], 101 ff.) ¶ denote the titulary divinities…

(a.), a term with many meanings, including those of thirst, voice, echo, and screech-owl in the sense of hāma , which denotes a bird charged with taking shape in the skull of someone who has been murdered, etc. (see the lexica). It is this latter sense which interests us here. In effect, the pre-Islamic Arabs believed that after death, above all after a violent death, out of the blood of the skull ( hāma) and parts of the body there arose a bird called hāma (or hām , the male owl; see Yāḳūt, Buldān , iii, 376), which returned to the tomb of the dead man until vengea…

, a term of controversial origin (cf. T. Fahd, Divination arabe , 91 ff.), belonging to Canaanite, Aramaic and Arab traditions. At the earliest stage known to us it appears to have been used by the “Western Semites” to designate the possessor of a single function with related prerogatives, that is to say, the offering of sacrifices in the name of the group, the representing of this group before the deity, the interpretation of the will of the deity, and in addition the anticipation an…

(a.), pl. nīrān , denotes fire, whereas nūr , pl. anwār , denotes light. In Akkadian, Aramaic, Hebrew, Syriac and Arabic, the root n-w-r simply denotes “flash”, “dazzlement”, “florescence”, “tattooing”, anything, in short, which gives light and anything which stands out clearly. The other Arabic term which signifies light, ḍawʾ , is to be associated with the Sanskrit dev/w which appears in Zeus, Dieu, dies , and expresses the notion of the personification of the luminous and calorific phenomena of nature. Nār occurs 129 times in the Ḳurʾān, of which 111…

, name of one of the three most venerated deities of the pre-Islamic pantheon, the two others being Manāt and al-ʿUzzā [ q.vv.]. The deep attachment felt by the T̲h̲aḳīf towards al-Lāt, the Aws and the K̲h̲azrad̲j̲ towards Manāt and the Ḳurays̲h̲ towards al-ʿUzzā, constituted the greatest obstacle in the path of the peaceful implantation of Islam in the regions of the Ḥid̲j̲āz. This obstacle was so difficult to overcome that the Prophet seems, for a brief period, to have consented to the continuation of the cult of these three deities, called al-g̲h̲arānīḳ al-ʿulā (see T. Fahd, Panthéon …

(a.). 1. In pre- and early Islamic usage. The root ṭ -g̲h̲-w yields several forms with the general meaning of "to go beyond the measure, be very lofty, overflow, be tyrannical, rebellious, oppressive, proud, etc.", from which two may be noted here: ṭag̲h̲w , designating a height or mountain summit, and ṭag̲h̲ūt , pl. ṭawāg̲h̲īt , meaning the great pre-Islamic Arabian deities like al-Lāt at Ṭāʾif and al-ʿUzzā at Mecca. The term was then applied to Satan, sorcerer and rebel, and to any power opposed to that of Islam. One may also cite ṭag̲h̲wa "excess of injustice, impiety", as opposed to the s̲h̲…

(a.), image, form, shape, e.g. ṣūrat al-arḍ , “the image of the earth”, ṣūrat ḥimār , “the form of an ass” (Muslim, Ṣalāt , trad. 115), or face, countenance (see below). Taṣāwīr are rather pictures; see for these, taṣwīr . Ṣūra and taṣwīra are therefore in the same relation to one another as the Hebrew demūt and ṣelem . 1. In theological and legal doctrine. The Biblical idea according to which man was created in God’s ṣelem (Gen. i. 27) has most probably passed into Ḥadīt̲h̲. It occurs in three passages in classical Ḥadīt̲h̲; the exegesis is uncertain and in general unwilling to adopt i…

, Abū Ṭāhir Ibrāhīm b. Yaḥyā b. G̲h̲annām al-Ḥarrānī al-Numayrī al-Ḥanbalī al-Maḳdisī (d. 693/1294), is the author of a treatise on oneiromancy that was widely circulated, on account of its alphabetical arrangement which makes it rapid and simple to consult. He was thus the innovator of a system which, after his time, became widely adopted. His treatise, entitled al-Muʿallam ʿalā ḥurūf al-muʿd̲j̲am , led oneiromancy away from the traditional paths by renouncing the plan inspired by that of the Book of Dreams of Artemidorus of Ephesus (ed. T. Fahd, Damascus 1964, PIFD) and sanctioned b…

(a.), literally “that which rises”. 1. Astronomical aspects. Al-ṭāliʿ is that point of the ecliptic which is rising over the horizon at a given moment, called the ascendent or horoscopus (and sometimes, incorrectly, the horoscope); see the diagram in maṭāliʿ . The determination of the ascendent is necessary in mathematical astrology [see nud̲j̲ūm , aḥkām al- ] before one can calculate the instantaneous positions of the 12 astrological houses ( al-buyūt ); with these determined, one can then investigate in which houses the sun, moon and five na…

, name of a deity ofancient Arabia. This IVth form maṣdar from the root n-w-f is connected with the Qatabanite nwfn “the exalted”, an epithet describing ʿAt̲h̲ar-Venus at its zenith, as opposed to s̲h̲rḳn “the eastern” and g̲h̲rbn “the western”. From the same root is derived tanūf “that which climbs high in the firmament”, an epithet of the sun, as opposed to ms̲h̲rḳtym “that which rises”, and tadūn “that which sets” (cf. A. Jamme, Le panthéon sud-arabe préislamique’d’après les sources épigraphiques , in Le Muséon , lx [1947], 88 and n. 225, 102, 106; on th…

, G̲h̲ars al-Dīn K̲h̲alīl , born in Cairo (or Jerusalem) in 813/1410, son of a mamlūk of the Burd̲j̲ī sultan Sayf al-Dīn Tatar, studied in Cairo and achieved a brilliant administrative career under Barsbay and Čaḳmaḳ (cf. Ziriklī, Aʿlām 2, iii, 367). In about 857/1453 he composed a major work, Kas̲h̲f al-mamālik wa-bayān al-uruḳ , wa ’l-masālik , of which only an abridged version, Zubdat Kas̲h̲f al-mamālik ... has survived. This vivid and exact picture of Egypt under the Mamlūks, the interest of which was first emphasized by Volney in the appendix to the Voyage en Egypte et en Syrie 3, ed. Dug…

(a.), “prophecy”, Hebrew nəb̲ūʾa , substantive derived from nabī “prophet”, Hebrew nābī (ʾ), term denoting in the first instance the precognition given by the divinity (Yahweh, the Baʿl, Allāh) to the prophet and the prediction made by the latter of future contingencies. In the second instance, nubuwwa is identified with waḥy , “revelation”, which simultaneously comprises dogmas, cultic regulations, moral education, precepts of social and political order. In fact, for the early Muslims, prophecy was regarded as being the so…

, name of a person to whom are attributed a number of works and whose full name is said to have been Abū Bakr Aḥmad b. ʿAlī b. Ḳays (omitted in Fihrist , 311, which adds: b. al-Muk̲h̲tār b. ʿAbd al-Karīm b. Ḏj̲art̲h̲iya b. Badniyā b. Barṭāniyā b. ʿĀlāṭiyā) al-Kasdānī (omitted in MS Istanbul, Beyazit 4064 [see below]) al-Ṣūfī (added in Fihrist and some manuscripts) al-Ḳussaynī (added in MSS Beyazit 4064 and Leiden, vocalized thus in Beyazit, read al-Ḳasītī or al Ḳusaytī by M. Plessner; cf. Fihrist: min ahl Ḳussīn ), known as Ibn Waḥs̲h̲iyya, but of whose existenc…