๐๐ก๐ฒ ๐๐ฎ๐ซ๐๐ง ๐ฎ๐ฌ๐๐ฌ ๐ฆ๐๐ฌ๐๐ฎ๐ฅ๐ข๐ง๐ ๐ฉ๐ซ๐จ๐ง๐จ๐ฎ๐ง๐ฌ (๐๐/๐๐ข๐ฆ/๐๐ข๐ฌ) ๐๐จ๐ซ ๐๐ฅ๐ฅ๐๐ก?
Mohamad Mostafa Nassar
Twitter:@NassarMohamadMR
Some people raise the question as to why Muslims refer to Allah with masculine pronouns when they say He has no gender and is not like unto anyone.
In order to understand the whole idea, please consider the following points:
Natural and Grammatical genders:
There are two kinds of gender;ย
1)ย Natural (Haqeeqi), related to oneโs biological bearing andย
2)ย Grammatical (Majazi) considering their usage in the language.
These two kinds of genders are found in many languages but more especially in Arabic. Ibn Sida in his classical Arabic grammar book quotes Al-Farisi as saying:
ูุงูุชุฃููุซู ุนูู ูุฌููู ุชุฃููุซู ุงูู
ุนูู ูุชุฃููุซู ุงูุงุณู
ู
โThere are two kinds of femininity: femininity of meaning and femininity of wording.โ (Al-Mukhassas 4/135)
And obviously the same goes for masculinity.
In Arabic Sun is feminine and Moon is masculine, surely they have no gender but thatโs what their etymological form makes of them.
Even in English states and ships are referred to with feminine pronouns. This fact does not assign them a de facto gender as in humans and animals.
Arabic has no neutral gender:
An important point we need to keep in my mind is that Arabic has no neutral gender so there is nothing like โitโ in Arabic. Everything is referred to using either masculine or feminine pronouns.
‘Allah’ (ุงููู) cannot be feminine according to the rules of Arabic:
In fact the makeup of the wordย ุงูููย (Allah) is such that it cannot be feminine for;
1- A word is feminine in Arabic if it is so by nature like ุฃู i.e. umm but obviously Allah is not feminine by nature.
2- A word is feminine if it ends with the third of the Arabic alphabet i.e.ย taaย likeย ู ุฑูุญุฉ (fan).ย This is not the case with the wordย ุงููู (Allah).
3- A word is feminine if it ends with ุข i.e. Alif Mamduda and indeed this also is not the case with the word ุงููู (Allah).
4- Something can be feminine if it happens to be in pairs like ุนูููู (eyes) or ูุฏูู (hands). Certainly, this is not the case with the wordย ุงูููย (Allah).
These points clarify that the makeup of the word Allah does not allow us to refer to it with feminine pronouns.
๐๐๐ญ ๐ฎ๐ฌ ๐ฐ๐๐ญ๐๐ก ๐ญ๐ก๐ข๐ฌ ๐ฏ๐ข๐๐๐จ: ๐๐ก๐ฒ ๐ข๐ฌ ๐๐ฅ๐ฅ๐๐ก ๐๐ฅ๐ฐ๐๐ฒ๐ฌ ๐ซ๐๐๐๐ซ๐ซ๐๐ ๐ญ๐จ ๐๐ฌ โ๐๐/ ููโ ๐๐ง๐ ๐๐จ๐ญ โ๐ฌ๐ก๐/ ููโ | ๐๐ซ๐๐๐ข๐๐๐๐
Masculinity generally denotes Majesty:
If one asks why to use the masculine pronoun for Allah and not feminine then the answer is that generally masculinity represents Majesty and femininity denotes meekness and softness. And as the primary relation of man with Allah is that of a humble servant to his lord so the masculine pronouns suit more the Divine Majesty.
Last word:
Masculine pronouns used for Allah do not give any anthropomorphic sense because it is normal at least considering the Arabic language convention. And it, we may say, denotes the Divine Majesty.
INDEED ALLAH KNOWS THE BEST!
โฆby Waqar Akbar Cheema