10 original couplets, 25 bilingual teaching slides and 30 explanatory questions Read the bilingual lesson for Zuhayr ibn Abī Sulmā: Age, Mortality, Honor, and Keeping Promises (Verses 43–52) and test your understanding with a focused quiz.
Lesson
1. From peacemaking to the lessons of life
After the peacemaking, war’s devastation, and Ḥuṣayn ibn Ḍamḍam’s revenge episode, Zuhayr turns toward the wisdom of life. The first verses still describe compensation for the dead and communal protection; the later verses address age, death, experience and social conduct.
Notice the movement from historical narrative to conditional maxims. Repeated constructions beginning with man (“whoever”) connect a type of behavior to its consequence and make each observation memorable.
2. Verse 43: Camels as blood compensation
فَكُلًّا أَرَاهُمْ أَصْبَحُوا يَعْقِلُونَهُ ۞ صَحِيحَاتِ مَالٍ طَالِعَاتٍ بِمَخْرِمِ
I see them paying compensation for each slain person with healthy she-camels, climbing over the mountain passes.
Yaʿqilūnahu refers to paying blood compensation, not to intellectual understanding. “Ṣaḥīḥāt māl” describes sound, valuable animals; “ṭāliʿāt bi-makhrim” pictures them climbing a mountain passage. The imagery makes reconciliation material: the peacemakers incur a real economic obligation.
3. Verse 44: Protection by a clan
لِحَيٍّ حِلَالٍ يَعْصِمُ النَّاسُ أَمْرَهُمْ ۞ إِذَا طَرَقَتْ إِحْدَى اللَّيَالِي بِمُعْظَمِ
This is for a settled, honorable clan whose affairs people safeguard when a grave calamity unexpectedly strikes by night.
Ḥayy ḥilāl describes an established community. The verb ṭaraqat evokes a visitation at night, while muʿẓam indicates something grave. The verse describes how communal bonds and protection matter especially when a major threat arrives without warning.
4. Verse 45: Grudge and communal shelter
كِرَامٍ فَلَا ذُو الضِّغْنِ يُدْرِكُ تَبْلَهُ ۞ وَلَا الْجَارِمُ الْجَانِي عَلَيْهِمْ بِمُسْلَمِ
They are noble people: the resentful avenger cannot simply achieve his revenge, nor is a person accused of wrongdoing among them simply surrendered.
Ḍighn is deep resentment and tabl the revenge sought. “Muslam” concerns being handed over or surrendered, a notion embedded in the tribal setting of mutual protection and reprisals. The verse depicts tribal solidarity; it does not establish a moral requirement to shield every offender from accountability.
5. Verse 46: Life’s burdens and old age
سَئِمْتُ تَكَالِيفَ الْحَيَاةِ وَمَنْ يَعِشْ ۞ ثَمَانِينَ حَوْلًا لَا أَبَا لَكَ يَسْأَمِ
I have grown weary of life’s burdens; whoever lives eighty years will, as I tell you, become weary.
Saʾimtu denotes weariness; takālīf are burdens and difficulties. The phrase lā abā laka is a conventional expression of emphatic address rather than a literal statement about the listener’s father. The man–yaʿish–yasʾam construction generalizes the experience of advanced age.
6. Verse 47: Knowing the past, not tomorrow
وَأَعْلَمُ مَا فِي الْيَوْمِ وَالْأَمْسِ قَبْلَهُ ۞ وَلَكِنَّنِي عَنْ عِلْمِ مَا فِي غَدٍ عَمِ
I know what belongs to today and yesterday before it, but I am blind to knowledge of what tomorrow holds.
Al-ams is yesterday; ghad is tomorrow. ʿAmi literally describes blindness but here figuratively means ignorance of future events. Zuhayr distinguishes learning from what is present or past from claiming complete knowledge of what has not yet happened.
7. The transition across verses 43–47
Verses 43–45 concern collective settlement—compensation, protection and the containment of revenge. In verse 46 the speaker becomes explicitly personal through “saʾimtu,” describing exhaustion over a long life. Verse 47 turns experience into a statement about the limits of knowledge.
The movement is deliberate: social experience becomes a broader reflection on the human condition without erasing the historical setting of the preceding lines.
8. Verse 48: Death and the blind she-camel
رَأَيْتُ الْمَنَايَا خَبْطَ عَشْوَاءَ مَنْ تُصِبْ ۞ تُمِتْهُ وَمَنْ تُخْطِئْ يُعَمَّرْ فَيَهْرَمِ
I have seen the strikes of death like the blundering blows of a night-blind she-camel: whom they hit, they kill; whom they miss, lives on and grows old.
Al-manāyā denotes deaths or fates of death. Khabṭ ʿashwāʾ portrays the errant striking of a she-camel unable to see clearly. The powerful comparison concerns mortality’s unpredictability from the human viewpoint; it is poetic imagery, not a systematic doctrinal account of death’s ultimate causes.
9. Man tuṣib tumithu: conditional structure
Man introduces a jussive condition; tuṣib is its verb and tumithu the consequence, with -hu as object. The contrast is “man tukhṭiʾ yuʿammar fa-yahram”: the one missed is granted more years and ultimately ages.
Yuʿammar is passive, meaning “is granted a long life,” whereas yahram describes becoming old. The paired clauses show different human encounters with mortality.
10. Verse 49: The need for prudent dealing
وَمَنْ لَمْ يُصَانِعْ فِي أُمُورٍ كَثِيرَةٍ ۞ يُضَرَّسْ بِأَنْيَابٍ وَيُوطَأْ بِمَنْسِمِ
Whoever fails to deal tactfully in many affairs will be bitten by fangs and trampled beneath a hoof.
Yuṣāniʿ is from form III and in this context means handling people with tact and prudent accommodation, not necessarily deceiving them. Anyāb are fangs and mansim is the hardened part of a camel’s foot. The paired images represent severe consequences of rigid or imprudent dealings.
11. Verse 50: Good conduct protects honor
وَمَنْ يَجْعَلِ الْمَعْرُوفَ مِنْ دُونِ عِرْضِهِ ۞ يَفِرْهُ وَمَنْ لَا يَتَّقِ الشَّتْمَ يُشْتَمِ
Whoever places acts of goodness as a shield before his honor preserves it; whoever does not guard against reproach will be reproached.
Al-maʿrūf is kindness or recognized good conduct, ʿirḍ reputation and honor, and yafirhu indicates safeguarding it. The verse links generous behavior to social standing. Yushtam is passive: the person becomes the target of blame or abuse.
12. Verse 51: The duty attached to abundance
وَمَنْ يَكُ ذَا فَضْلٍ فَيَبْخَلْ بِفَضْلِهِ ۞ عَلَى قَوْمِهِ يُسْتَغْنَ عَنْهُ وَيُذْمَمِ
Whoever possesses abundance or distinction yet withholds its benefit from his own people will find that they dispense with him, and he is censured.
Dhā faḍlin includes dhā, one of the five special nouns; faḍl may mean wealth, abundance or distinction. Fa-yabkhal adds a refusal to share, producing the outcome yustaghnā ʿanhu—others can do without him. The moral force lies in the failure to use capacity for communal benefit.
13. Verse 52: Keeping promises and inner resolve
وَمَنْ يُوفِ لَا يُذْمَمْ وَمَنْ يَهْدِ قَلْبَهُ ۞ إِلَى مُطْمَئِنِّ الْبِرِّ لَا يَتَجَمْجَمِ
Whoever fulfills his pledge is not reproached; whoever guides his heart toward settled righteousness does not waver.
Yūfi concerns fulfilling a pledge, and “lā yudhmam” states the social consequence: no blame attaches to the faithful. Muṭmaʾinn al-birr describes a settled conviction in goodness, while lā yatajamjam means not hesitating or faltering. The verse joins trustworthy outward action to inner resolve.
14. The special sense of ʿaql in blood compensation
Arabic roots often develop multiple meanings. ʿAqala may relate to reasoning, but yaʿqilūnahu in verse 43 concerns paying blood compensation. The reference to sound she-camels confirms this legal-social sense: the animals form a concrete payment, not an intellectual act.
Makhrim is a mountain passage. Ṭāliʿāt, a feminine plural active participle, describes the female camels climbing upward. Movement, number and cost make the settlement visible.
15. The social setting of tribal reconciliation
Compensation and a protected settlement did more than express private sympathy: they helped rebuild trust between groups after killing. Ḥayy ḥilāl evokes the settled community, while dhū al-ḍighn introduces the person determined on revenge.
Distinguish describing a tribal practice from endorsing it as a universal ethical law. Zuhayr’s lines show both the necessity of protection and the danger of renewed hostility within the social world of his poem.
16. The number eighty and emphatic address
In verse 46, thamānīna ḥawlan gives the fatigue of old age a concrete duration: eighty years. Ḥawl means a year. The line is a poetic generalization about long life, not a biological prediction about every person who reaches that age.
Lā abā laka functions as forceful traditional address. The first-person “saʾimtu” grounds the observation in the poet’s experience, while “man yaʿish” broadens it into a proverbial statement.
17. Today, yesterday and tomorrow
TermTimeKind of knowledge
الْيَوْمPresentCurrent observation
الْأَمْسPastRecalled experience
غَدٍFutureUnknown outcome
Wa-lākinnanī introduces a qualification to the preceding claim. The figurative adjective ʿami, “blind,” sharply expresses the limit of prediction. Zuhayr separates accumulated experience from certainty about tomorrow.
18. Why the blind-she-camel image is powerful
Khabṭ means a blow made without accurate direction, and ʿashwāʾ denotes a female camel that does not see properly, especially in dimness. Zuhayr transforms an abstract subject—death—into a vivid scene: a blow strikes one person and misses another.
The main force of the simile is uncertainty of outcome from the observer’s perspective. Paired verbs, “tuṣib / tukhṭiʾ” and “tumithu / yuʿammar,” intensify the contrast.
19. Two animal images: the she-camel and the hoof
The ʿashwāʾ of verse 48 pictures the unpredictability of death. The anyāb (fangs) and mansim (hoof) of verse 49 picture the harsh costs of poor judgment. In each case bodily force makes an otherwise abstract human condition tangible.
Yuḍarras describes being bitten or crushed with teeth; yūṭaʾ describes being trampled. Both are passive, focusing attention on consequences rather than on a named aggressor.
20. Yuṣāniʿ and yabkhal: two contrasting behaviors
Yuṣāniʿ concerns social tact, while yabkhal concerns withholding available benefits. Tact does not necessarily mean abandoning principle; it means recognizing the needs and circumstances of human dealings. In the other line, a person with resources loses regard if they refuse to share them.
The poet therefore censures two distinct failures: inflexible dealing and self-serving stinginess. Both damage relations, but by different routes.
21. Honor, benevolence and social relationships
In verse 50 placing al-maʿrūf before one’s ʿirḍ means making good conduct a protection for honor. Verse 51 sharpens that idea: people may cease relying on a wealthy individual who withholds every benefit.
The lines are more than a technique for gaining fame. They treat trust as the outcome of character and useful action. The following maxim on keeping promises adds another necessary condition of social credibility.
22. A comparison of the repeated conditional maxims
ConditionResult
مَنْ يَعِشْيَسْأَمِ
مَنْ تُصِبْتُمِتْهُ
مَنْ لَمْ يُصَانِعْيُضَرَّسْ
مَنْ يَجْعَلِ الْمَعْرُوفَيَفِرْهُ
مَنْ يُوفِلَا يُذْمَمْ
Man introduces conditional relationships whose imperfect verbs normally take jussive forms. Rhyme and phonetic liaison may affect the audible ending, but the grammatical logic stays condition → outcome.
23. Rhetoric: parallelism, contrast and repetition
Tuṣib / tukhṭiʾ contrast hitting and missing, while tumithu / yuʿammar contrast death and prolonged life. Repeating man makes each verse function as an independent maxim; the shared syntax improves retention.
First-person expressions such as “saʾimtu,” “aʿlamu,” and “raʾaytu” gradually yield to general conditional statements. This formal movement turns the poet’s personal observations into communal wisdom.
24. Key words and their morphological patterns
TermForm/rootMeaning
سَئِمْتُs-ʾ-m; pastI grew weary
يُصَانِعْṣ-n-ʿ; form IIIHandles tactfully
يَفِرْهُw-f-r; imperfectProtects it
يُسْتَغْنَgh-n-y; passiveIs dispensed with
يَتَجَمْجَمِj-m-j-m; form VHesitates
Recognizing the forms reveals a common pattern: verbal actions are linked to their human and social outcomes, rather than presented as isolated vocabulary.
25. Synthesis: experience joined to action
Across verses 43–52 Zuhayr links three concerns: the real cost of peace, the limits imposed by age and unknown mortality, and honorable dealings with others. Compensation makes peace costly, while age and death expose human limits. Benevolence, sharing and promise-keeping remain choices within those limits.
The poet does not suggest that virtue abolishes mortality. He argues instead for responsible conduct within an uncertain life. That combination gives the passage its durable wisdom.
Practice questions
Question 1
What does yaʿqilūnahu mean in verse 43?
- To understand the dead man’s words
- To tie camels at a mountain
- To pay compensation for a killing
- To put a treaty into writing
Question 2
What does ṣaḥīḥāt māl describe?
- Healthy, valuable she-camels
- Unverified business claims
- Swords kept for protection
- An empty grazing ground
Question 3
What scene appears in ṭāliʿāt bi-makhrim?
- An army crossing a river
- The setting of the morning stars
- A farmer harvesting crops
- She-camels climbing a mountain pass
Question 4
What nuance does ṭaraqat add in verse 44?
- A scheduled daytime gathering
- A threatening arrival by night
- The flow of a spring
- A decrease in camel speed
Question 5
What characterizes dhū al-ḍighn?
- A person fulfilling a promise
- Someone harboring resentment
- A completely reassured person
- A healer of war wounds
Question 6
How should tablahu be read here?
- The count of years lived
- The camel’s hind leg
- The rain of spring
- The revenge being sought
Question 7
What does saʾimtu takālīf al-ḥayāh express?
- I have grown weary of life’s burdens
- I know every fact about the world
- I stopped counting the years
- I broke every peace agreement
Question 8
How should lā abā laka be understood here?
- A factual statement about parentage
- A testamentary instruction
- A conventional emphatic address
- The name of an opposing clan
Question 9
What is the rhetorical work of ʿami in the line on tomorrow?
- Reporting a diagnosed eye disease
- Measuring darkness at night
- Describing an exhausted mount
- Representing future ignorance as blindness
Question 10
What does wa-lākinnanī do in verse 47?
- It merely joins two identical facts
- It qualifies the previous claim
- It addresses the reader with an oath
- It changes past tense into future tense
Question 11
What image is used for death in khabṭ ʿashwāʾ?
- The controlled gallop of a fast horse
- The regular rising of the sun
- The erratic strikes of a poorly seeing she-camel
- The two banks of a flowing river
Question 12
What is the grammatical role of tuṣib in man tuṣib tumithu?
- The conditional verb
- An accusative circumstantial
- The predicate of a nominal subject
- An imperative
Question 13
Which grammatical description fits yuʿammar?
- Passive imperfect: one is granted longer life
- Active past: he has died
- Active participle: giver of years
- A prohibitive verb: do not live
Question 14
What literary device arises from tuṣib / tukhṭiʾ?
- Praise of two individuals
- An ordered list of historical names
- A contrast between striking and missing
- Repetition of exact synonyms
Question 15
Which sense of yuṣāniʿ best fits this context?
- To manufacture physical goods only
- To deal tactfully and prudently
- To deceive in all circumstances
- To fight impulsively
Question 16
What is conveyed by being bitten by fangs and trampled by a hoof?
- Technical rules of hunting
- Praise of camel anatomy
- A report about drought
- Vivid consequences of imprudent behavior
Question 17
What role does al-maʿrūf play before ʿirḍ?
- Honor is always purchased with money
- Good conduct protects a person’s honor
- Honor requires breaking promises
- All charity must be secret
Question 18
What is the form and sense of yushtam?
- Passive imperfect: he is verbally abused
- Passive participle: praised
- Active past: he abused someone
- Imperative: remain silent
Question 19
What is dhā in dhā faḍlin?
- A definite noun with the article
- A past-tense verb
- A preposition
- The accusative form of dhū among the five special nouns
Question 20
What failure is criticized in fa-yabkhal bi-faḍlihi ʿalā qawmihi?
- Seeking help when genuinely needy
- Using wealth constructively
- Withholding benefits from one’s people despite having resources
- Requesting the return of entrusted goods
Question 21
What social result does yustaghnā ʿanhu indicate?
- Others increase their respect for him
- All his debts are forgiven
- Others find that they can do without him
- He is appointed commander
Question 22
What moral principle is emphasized by man yūfi lā yudhmam?
- Silence settles every dispute
- Honor comes only from military victory
- Past events must be forgotten
- Fulfilling a pledge protects one from blame
Question 23
What does lā yatajamjam mean here?
- To refrain from wavering in good conduct
- To punish someone silently
- A she-camel separating from the herd
- To halt the passage of time
Question 24
How should muṭmaʾinn al-birr be understood?
- A river flowing beneath a mountain
- Righteousness that inspires settled conviction
- Artificial virtue for publicity
- Silent revenge born from fear
Question 25
What links the reflections on age, knowledge and death in verses 46–48?
- The limits of human knowledge and control
- An identical lifespan for every person
- Guaranteed prosperity throughout life
- Preservation of tribal genealogies
Question 26
What is the main literary effect of Zuhayr’s repeated man-clauses?
- Turning the poem into a list of names
- Enumerating caravan stations
- Turning conduct and consequence into memorable maxims
- Making every verse interrogative
Question 27
How does the claim about tomorrow connect to the death simile?
- Both simply praise the past
- Both display uncertainty about the future
- Both calculate blood compensation
- Both provide tribal genealogies
Question 28
Which idea becomes clearer when verses 50 and 51 are read together?
- Reputation rests only on ancestry
- Spending always causes disgrace
- Stinginess should be preferred to generosity
- Good conduct and useful generosity sustain respect
Question 29
How does the passage move from verse 43 to verse 52?
- From hunting to horse anatomy
- From love lyric to travel narrative only
- From rainfall to drought
- From tribal compensation to personal experience and ethical maxims
Question 30
What combination of conduct emerges from verses 49 and 52?
- Reject tact and intensify disputes
- Deal prudently and honor commitments
- Rely on wealth alone to satisfy others
- Display superiority by breaking pledges
Open the interactive quiz