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

وَمِنْ عَجَبٍ ... شَمْسٌ تُظَلِّلُنِي مِنَ الشَّمْسِ
“And strangely, a sun shades me from the sun.”

The poem is used to show how metaphorical identification supports wonder and hyperbole. The beautiful person is not a literal sun, yet the poetic image treats her as one and then finds the resulting shade paradoxical.

A critical question remains: must every kind of metaphorical surprise depend on exactly the same theory of class-membership? Other figures can also create striking associations. The poem illustrates the proposed effect well; using it as universal proof of one theoretical account requires further argument.

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Argument from wonder and the limits of the inference

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

وَمِنْ عَجَبٍ ... شَمْسٌ تُظَلِّلُنِي مِنَ الشَّمْسِ
“And strangely, a sun shades me from the sun.”

The poem is used to show how metaphorical identification supports wonder and hyperbole. The beautiful person is not a literal sun, yet the poetic image treats her as one and then finds the resulting shade paradoxical.

A critical question remains: must every kind of metaphorical surprise depend on exactly the same theory of class-membership? Other figures can also create striking associations. The poem illustrates the proposed effect well; using it as universal proof of one theoretical account requires further argument.