a study of a versified treatise on arabic grammar

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A STUDY OF A VERSIFIED TREATISE ONARABIC GRAMMAR: RA'IYYATU 'LCRAB

Zakariyau I. Ose iIntroductionArabic grammar is a well-developed branch of ArabicStudies. Right from the time of Prophet Muhammed,attention has been paid to the grammar of the language as ameans of understanding the Glorious Qur an. !his is

because a small mista"e in Arabic ma# change the meaningof a te$t radicall#. As time progressed, leading muslimfigures such as cAli ibn Abi A!alib, Abu %-Aswad al-&u ali, 'i#ad idn Abihi and others contributed immensel#to the stud# and codification of Arabic grammar. %

(asic grammatical rules were e$plained, standardised,illustrated and studied. !wo ma)or schools of grammar,

(asran and *ufan emerged. As more and more peoplerecognised the central role of grammar in the proficienc# ofArabic, more grammarians devised new methods ofimparting the "nowledge of the sub)ect to learners. +ne ofthe new methods devised probabl# during the post-cAbbasid period was versification. Some grammarianswrote mneomotechnic verse on grammatical rules. +nce averse or a couple of verses is read, the relevant rule would

become manifest. Some of such authors are bn Mali" andAbu Qasim ibn cAli al- ariri. n /igeria, cAbdullah ibnMuhammad ibn 0udi wrote another one specificall# onmorpholog# 1Sarf2 3&, and of course, we have also thetreatise under stud# among others.

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Ra ##atu %-% crab is a shori treatise on grammar b# a /igerian author, cAbdullah ibn Muhammad, a relativel#

new scholar.5

!his paper e$amines this grammar wor"which is popular among some old generation scholars ofArabic and slamic Studies scattered all over /igeria.Stud#ing this treatise is important in man# wa#s. 0irst, itwill familiarise more scholars, especiall# those e$posed toa s#stematic mode of education of the 6estern t#pe, withthe wor" which is at present "nown onl# to a selected fewof the old crop of scholars. Secondl#, the present stud# wille$plain to the reader the scope of the treatise and themethod emplo#ed b# the author in imparting the "nowledgeof grammar to students b# versification.

!his paper illustrates the wor" in its Arabic original as wellas in the 7nglish translation of it. n addition, the basiccopies covered in the wor" are e$plained. !he aim of theauthor e$pressed in the. opening verse is criticall#e$amined vis a-vis the content of the wor". +ne would li"eto "now how central the topics treated are in Arabicgrammar. !he ade8uac# or otherwise of the illustrationsgiven in the wor" is also loo"ed into.

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The English Translation of Ra'iyyatu '1-lcrab

t is an R-rh#med poem on &esinental nflection.%. + #ou who see" to "now about dcsinental inflection,

before #ou is a s#nopsis of its particles which have composed in verse.

. t teaches #ou dcsinental inflection and it is eas# tounderstand, well arranged inverse and have thoroughl#simplified it for #ou.

3. 1the# are2 thirt#-eight verses in all which #ou shouldta"e care of for the# will teach #ou in a da# what #ouwould 1otherwise2 be taught for a month.

5. Min and ila are two prepositions as in;


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:. So also are mbba as well as the waw and la' of oathand the kaf which is also a particle for lashbih 1simile2.

4. >ou should as" for the remaining prepositions, for have shortened m# speech based on the resolution to he

brief.

=. An is one of the particles that put the verb in theaccusative as far as we are concerned, e.g. < hope lo

prosper at the sage s presence.

a study of a versified treatise on arabic grammar

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