NEGATE: Negation by Affirmation

    From The Encyclopedia of Arabic Rhetoric

    نفي الشيء بإيجابه

    NEGATE: Negation by Affirmation
    CategoryLinguistic Embellishments
    (‘ilm al-badī‘)
    SubcategoryPersuasive Tricks
      
    Balaghascore.com
    CodeCA-5
      
    BalaghaBase.org
    CodeQ275
      
    OpenAlex.org
    IDW4415405282
      
    Cite this page
    🔗 DOI10.64393/balagha.Q275
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    Taxonomy
    ARDTv0.1.0, v0.1.1
      
    Provenance
    Sources3

    Definition

    Negation by Affirmation (nafy al-shayʾ bi-ījābihi) is an Arabic rhetorical device where the communicator apparently affirms something while negating something connected with it, although the thing apparently affirmed is itself what is actually negated in the underlying meaning.[1][2][3]

    Linguistic Operations

    • The communicator negates something connected with a thing rather than directly negating the thing itself.[1][2][3]
    • This restricted negation can create the impression that the underlying thing itself is affirmed.[3]
    • The thing apparently affirmed in the outward wording is, however, itself negated in the underlying meaning.[1][2]

    In this encyclopedia, the linguistic operation may be represented as:

    • Step 1 — a qualification or correlate of X is explicitly negated.
    • Step 2 — because only that qualification is negated, the surface wording appears to affirm X itself.
    • Step 3 — the intended meaning nevertheless negates X itself.

    Recognition

    Negation by Affirmation may be present when:

    • the wording explicitly negates a qualification or correlate of something rather than directly negating the thing itself;
    • the restricted negation appears, on the surface, to leave the thing itself affirmed; and
    • the intended meaning nevertheless requires the thing itself to be understood as negated.

    The following diagnostic test aids identification:

    • Ask whether the expression can be paraphrased as: "not X-with-a-particular-qualification", while the intended meaning is actually "no X at all". If so, Negation by Affirmation may be present.

    Examples

    Source Example

    ﴿مَا لِلظَّالِمِينَ مِنْ حَمِيمٍ وَلَا شَفِيعٍ يُطَاعُ﴾ (سورة غافر، الآية ١٨)

    "The evildoers have no true friend, nor any intercessor who is obeyed." (Qur'an 40:18)

    Explanation
    The apparent wording negates an intercessor who is "obeyed" (yuṭāʿ), which on its surface can appear to leave open the existence of other intercessors. The intended meaning, however, is the negation of an intercessor muṭlaqan ("altogether").[4][2][5]
    Source Example

    ﴿لَا تُلْهِيهِمْ تِجَارَةٌ وَلَا بَيْعٌ عَنْ ذِكْرِ اللَّهِ﴾ (سورة النور، الآية ٣٧)

    "[Men] whom neither trade nor sale distracts from the remembrance of God." (Qur'an 24:37)

    Explanation
    Al-Hāshimī explains that negating the distracting effect of trade creates the impression that trade itself is affirmed for them, while the intended meaning also negates the trade itself.[6]
    Source Example

    أَفْدِي ظِباءَ فَلاةٍ ما عَرَفْنَ بها ... مَضْغَ الكَلامِ ولا صَبْغَ الحَواجِبِ
    وَلا بَرَزْنَ مِنَ الحَمّامِ مائِلَةً ... أَوْراكُهُنَّ صَقيلاتُ العَراقِبِ

    "[With my life] I would ransom the desert gazelles who know nothing there of mincing speech or staining eyebrows, nor emerge from the bathhouse swaying, their thighs full and their ankles smooth."

    Explanation
    Cachia explains that the outward wording denies their emerging from the bathhouse in the condition described, whereas the underlying meaning is that there is no bathhouse there at all.[7]
    Constructed Example

    لَيْسَ فِي هَذِهِ الْقَرْيَةِ طَبِيبٌ يُعَالِجُ الْفُقَرَاءَ

    "There is no doctor in this village who treats the poor."

    Explanation
    The wording explicitly negates only a doctor who treats the poor, which on its surface can appear to leave open the existence of doctors who do not treat the poor. The intended meaning, however, is that there is no doctor in the village at all. This follows the same operation illustrated by the source examples.

    Notes

    Historical

    • ʿAkkāwī records a formulation attributed to Ibn Rashīq al-Qayrawānī in which the device is described more generally as speech whose inner meaning is negation while its outer meaning is affirmation (bāṭinuhu nafyan wa-ẓāhiruhu ījāban).[1]
    • An unnamed group of rhetoricians cited by ʿAkkāwī gives a similarly general formulation.[1]
    • ʿAkkāwī reports that the formulation attributed to Ibn Ḥajjah al-Ḥamawī was also reproduced in closely similar terms by ʿAbd al-Ghanī al-Nābulsī, Ibn Maʿṣūm al-Madanī, Ibn Abī al-Iṣbaʿ al-Miṣrī, Ibn al-Athīr al-Ḥalabī, al-Nuwayrī, and Jarmānūs Farḥāt.[1]
    • Cachia records a historical classification disagreement involving a verse by ʿIzz al-Dīn al-Mawṣilī. Because the supplied sources do not provide a sufficiently clear account of the other device involved to establish a structural distinction, this material is retained as a historical note rather than treated as a "Different From" comparison.[2][5]

    Technical

    • Cachia translates the device as "Deceptive Affirmation".[5] The English label "Negation by Affirmation" is used in this encyclopedia as a closer rendering of nafy al-shayʾ bi-ījābihi and to foreground the negating operation represented by the device.
    • No distinct rhetorical effects are explicitly identified in the reviewed sources.
    • No subtypes are attested in the reviewed sources.

    References

    1. ↑ a b c d e f Inʿām Fawwāl ʿAkkāwī, Al-Muʿjam al-Mufaṣṣal fī ʿUlūm al-Balāgha: Al-Badīʿ wa-al-Bayān wa-al-Maʿānī (Beirut: Dār al-Kutub al-ʿIlmiyya, 1996), 666–667.
    2. ↑ a b c d e Pierre Cachia, The Arch Rhetorician: Or The Schemer’s Skimmer: A Handbook of Late Arabic Badīʻ Drawn from ʻAbd al-Ghanī an-Nābulsī’s Nafaḥāt al-Azhār ʻala Nasamāt al-Asḥār, Studies in Arabic Language and Literature 3 (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1998); §112, ISBN 9783447040327.
    3. ↑ a b c Aḥmad al-Hāshimī, Jawāhir al-Balāgha fī al-Maʿānī wa-al-Bayān wa-al-Badīʿ (Windsor: Hindāwī Foundation, 2019), 380, ISBN 9781527316386.
    4. ↑ Inʿām Fawwāl ʿAkkāwī, Al-Muʿjam al-Mufaṣṣal fī ʿUlūm al-Balāgha: Al-Badīʿ wa-al-Bayān wa-al-Maʿānī (Beirut: Dār al-Kutub al-ʿIlmiyya, 1996), 666.
    5. ↑ a b c Pierre Cachia, The Arch Rhetorician: Or The Schemer’s Skimmer: A Handbook of Late Arabic Badīʻ Drawn from ʻAbd al-Ghanī an-Nābulsī’s Nafaḥāt al-Azhār ʻala Nasamāt al-Asḥār, Studies in Arabic Language and Literature 3 (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1998), p. 77, ISBN 9783447040327.
    6. ↑ Aḥmad al-Hāshimī, Jawāhir al-Balāgha fī al-Maʿānī wa-al-Bayān wa-al-Badīʿ (Windsor: Hindāwī Foundation, 2019), 380, ISBN 9781527316386.
    7. ↑ Pierre Cachia, The Arch Rhetorician: Or The Schemer’s Skimmer: A Handbook of Late Arabic Badīʻ Drawn from ʻAbd al-Ghanī an-Nābulsī’s Nafaḥāt al-Azhār ʻala Nasamāt al-Asḥār, Studies in Arabic Language and Literature 3 (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1998), p. 77, ISBN 9783447040327.



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