Tadmeen: Difference between revisions

Tadmeen (تضمين, literally "insertion") is a hypothesis which tries to explain away why the Quran sometimes uses wrong prepositions. The explanation is that if a word is used with a wrong preposition, then it's because a different word which can be used with that preposition, was invisibly inserted into the original word.

In English we can say "believe in god" and "pray to god". If the Quran was in English and contained "believe '''to''' god", it would be an error, because it should be "believe '''in''' god". And one way apologists could try to explain it away would be to say that the word "pray" was invisibly inserted into the word "believe" and since "pray" can be used as "pray '''to'''", then "believe to" is also correct.

Most people read only the translation of the Quran and translators usually "solve" (thus hide) the linguistic problems in the Arabic original. And even Arabs if they notice the problem they might blame their own judgement rather than the Quran. So the only people who really have to deal with this are translators and grammarians and so the issue is not known much.

And the apologist explanation is:

The word ''bihaa'' actually means "with it". It's strange in Arabic to say "drink with a spring". The correct preposition is "from" (من), "drink from it". Ibn Kathir explained it as a case of tadmeen:

So the Quran said يشرب ("drink"), but uses a wrong preposition and that is supposedly caused by the word يروى being invisibly inserted into the word يشرب and since يروى can be used with "with", then "drink with" is also correct.

The word إلى actually means "to". The word "with" would be مع or ب. And it's not correct in Arabic to say الرفث إلى ("sexual intercourse to [someone]") as the Quran says it. ِAnd the apologetic explanation is that it's a case of ''tadmeen'' (insertion) <ref>https://amshehri.com/articles/146/%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%AA%D8%B6%D9%85%D9%8A%D9%86-%D9%81%D9%8A-%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%82%D8%B1%D8%A2%D9%86-%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%83%D8%B1%D9%8A%D9%85</ref> and that the word الإفضاء (to go) was inserted into the word الرفث ("sexual intercourse") and since it's correct to say الإفضاء إلى ("go '''to'''"), then الرفث إلى ("sexual intercourse '''to'''") is also correct.

The translation Sahih International even translates it as "go to" and puts "for sexual relations" in brackets, although in Arabic the verb "go" is not present at all and the word "sexual intercourse" is:

Some scholars also say that not even verbs can me ''tadmeened'', but even the prepositions themselves.

The preposition "over" supposedly tadmeened the preposition "in" (في), so it's "in the fire".

Or another example:

The word من actually means "from". And the explanation is that the correct preposition في was invisibly inserted into it.

* [[Iltifat]]