LessonsSupplementary Practice 5: Textual Analysis, Scope of Meaning and Rhetorical JudgmentQuiz

جَاءَنِي خَالِدٌ. رَحِمَهُ اللَّهُ.
Khalid came to me. May God have mercy on him.

The first is a report; the second, in the intended reading, is a supplication. Keeping them separate protects their different speech functions. With a coordinating wāw in a narrative context, a listener may instead read the second verb as another reported event: God had mercy on him.

Therefore the choice of faṣl cannot be decided merely by thematic relatedness. One must also test whether coordination creates an unintended attribution or interpretation.

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Misleading coordination and the risk of wrong attribution

Supplementary Practice 5: Textual Analysis, Scope of Meaning and Rhetorical Judgment

جَاءَنِي خَالِدٌ. رَحِمَهُ اللَّهُ.
Khalid came to me. May God have mercy on him.

The first is a report; the second, in the intended reading, is a supplication. Keeping them separate protects their different speech functions. With a coordinating wāw in a narrative context, a listener may instead read the second verb as another reported event: God had mercy on him.

Therefore the choice of faṣl cannot be decided merely by thematic relatedness. One must also test whether coordination creates an unintended attribution or interpretation.