Analysis of the methodology for reading Sībawayh’s Kitāb
Dʳ Abderrahmane Boudraa, February 27ᵗʰ, 2025
Session report
Introduction
The scientific study of the Kitāb must first place it within its original context before exploring its connections with modern linguistics. This approach relies on two levels of analysis: a historical reading that seeks to understand the Kitāb as conceived by Sībawayh, and a dynamic reading that highlights latent concepts applicable to contemporary linguistics. This dual perspective allows for the extraction of modern fields of study such as syntax, phonetics, morphology, semantics, pragmatics, and rhetoric.
Three Fundamental Pillars
The Kitāb structures language around three fundamental pillars: the speaker (al-mutakallim), who uses the language established by the linguistic legislator (al-wāḍiʿ) in daily discourse; the legislator (al-wāḍiʿ), the collective authority that preserves the language, safeguards it, and enables those who wish to extract its structures and formulate its rules; and the observer (al-nāẓir), the grammarian-linguist who studies the language, explains it, and formalizes its rules. This observer acts as an intermediary between the legislator and the speaker, facilitating the transmission of the language. These three pillars interact around key questions: semantic reference, exemplification, argumentation, and the use of examples in grammatical reasoning. The Kitāb contains a vast corpus of carefully selected Arabic utterances collected from eloquent Arabs, forming the foundation for rigorous grammatical argumentation.
The speaker is not merely an enunciator but a central figure who structures language and contributes to its evolution. They coin sentences and texts according to an intrinsic cognitive system and are predisposed to speech even before learning the language, according to an innate capacity —an idea that resonates with Kant’s theories on the innate understanding of time and Ibn Ḥazm al-Andalusī’s reflections on the innate dimension of knowledge acquisition. Furthermore, the speaker expresses their will through language, a fundamental aspect in Sībawayh’s linguistic theoretical thought, demonstrating that linguistic constructions are never entirely neutral choices.
The linguistic legislator establishes the rules of language, which the speaker applies, whether consciously or unconsciously, in everyday use. However, language is not static: the observer acts as both an intermediary interpreter and analyst of linguistic phenomena. They examine syntactic and semantic structures through three main axes: analyzing linguistic material (testimonies, examples, usages); organizing secondary rules based on fundamental principles; and studying the correspondences between attested forms and hypothetical forms.
The Importance of Discursive Context
Discursive context plays a central role in linguistic analysis. Sībawayh demonstrates that context directly influences the interpretation of utterances. Some examples only make sense when understood within their pragmatic framework. Thus, an utterance that may seem incorrect in isolation can become acceptable within a specific context. For instance, in a sales context, one might simply say ubāyiʿuka (“I sell to you”), even though this is not a complete sentence. However, this utterance is still considered correct due to the shared discursive context between the interlocutors.
Another example provided by Sībawayh concerns the expression of a real estate transaction. He states: “When you sell a house, you say: ḥaddun minhā kaḏā, wa-ḥaddun minhā kaḏā” (“its boundary is here, and its boundary is there”). This example is significant because it attests the use of an indefinite noun at the beginning of a sentence, despite grammatical norms that would otherwise prohibit it.
In some cases, an utterance that appears incorrect can thus be validated through implicit knowledge shared by the interlocutors. For example, one might interpret biʿtu dārī ḏirāʿan literally as “I sold my house by a cubit.” However, it is clear to both interlocutors that this refers to the price (“one dirham per cubit”) rather than the size of the house, which, of course, is not just a single cubit in length.
The Role of Proverbs
Proverbs represent another essential category in the Kitāb because they preserve language as it is spoken, even when their structure does not conform to standard grammatical rules. For example, the proverb tasmaʿu bi-l-Muʿaydī lā an tarāhu (“You hear of al-Muʿaydī but never see him”) illustrates a cultural preference for listening over seeing. Here, common usage has retained the diminutive al-Muʿaydī instead of the grammatically correct form al-Muʿayddī, which would have been expected for al-Maʿaddī.
A Grammar in Dialogue
Sībawayh also employs interrogation as a structural tool in his analyses, demonstrating that the construction of meaning often relies on an exchange between speaker and interlocutor. For instance, in the following dialogue: kam ḍarbatan ḍuriba bihi? (“How many blows did he receive?”) —ḍuriba bihi ḍarbatān (“He was struck twice”), the interlocutor emphasizes the number of blows received by assigning it the role of grammatical subject. This approach by Sībawayh could be described as “textual syntax” (naḥw al-naṣṣ), as it does not merely analyze isolated utterances but instead considers the interaction between interlocutors.
Grammatical Judgments
The Kitāb is filled with grammatical judgments that evaluate linguistic usage, classifying utterances as “regular” (muḍṭarid), “strong” (qawī), “weak” (ḍaʿīf), “common” (ǧārin), and so on. These classifications illustrate how grammatical analysis differentiates between what is possible and what is impossible within the Arabic language. Sībawayh maintains that any linguistic study relies on partial induction: he acknowledges that all examined structures conform to Arabic usage, while also recognizing that some are more widespread than others.
The Role of the Subject
A distinctive aspect of Sībawayh’s methodology is his subject-centered approach, in contrast to later grammarians who structured grammar around verbs. For example, he titles a chapter: “Chapter on the Subject whose Verb is Transitive”, rather than “Chapter on the Transitive Verb”, marking a significant departure from later grammatical treatises. This point has not received sufficient attention from researchers.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the reading of the Kitāb must respect its analytical categories and historical framework while also exploring its interactions with modern linguistics. Sībawayh structures his analysis around the speaker, the linguistic legislator, and the analyst, highlighting the importance of discursive context and the logic of linguistic reasoning. His work remains unquestionably relevant to contemporary linguistic research.
Watch the video of this session in Arabic with French subtitles…