LessonsIstiʿārah: Definition, Figurative Identification and the Linguistic–Intellectual DebateQuiz

فَهُوَ لَيْسَ مِنَ الْمَجَازِ فِي شَيْءٍ
In this respect, it is not figurative at all.

Calling Zayd a “human” is literal: the general word is assigned to the human kind and Zayd is a member of it. No additional class-membership needs to be imagined, nor is the word shifted away from its normal domain.

By contrast, a brave man is not literally a member of the zoological class of lions. Calling him “asad” needs a rhetorical account. The intellectual theory claims that the speaker first imagines or asserts his inclusion among lions and then applies the lion-name on the strength of that assertion.

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Why applying a general word to an instance is literal

Istiʿārah: Definition, Figurative Identification and the Linguistic–Intellectual Debate

فَهُوَ لَيْسَ مِنَ الْمَجَازِ فِي شَيْءٍ
In this respect, it is not figurative at all.

Calling Zayd a “human” is literal: the general word is assigned to the human kind and Zayd is a member of it. No additional class-membership needs to be imagined, nor is the word shifted away from its normal domain.

By contrast, a brave man is not literally a member of the zoological class of lions. Calling him “asad” needs a rhetorical account. The intellectual theory claims that the speaker first imagines or asserts his inclusion among lions and then applies the lion-name on the strength of that assertion.