وَتَنْقَسِمُ بِاعْتِبَارِ الْمَكْنِيِّ عَنْهُ إِلَى ثَلَاثَةِ أَقْسَامٍ
By what is indirectly indicated, kinayah divides into three kinds.
1. Kinayah of an attribute: the target is a quality.
2. Kinayah of attribution: the target is ascribing a quality to someone or something.
3. Kinayah of the referent: the target is an entity identified by an indirect description.
This classification concerns the nature of the intended meaning. A separate classification concerns how many steps of inference lead to it.