“It is well known that learning and teaching Arabic is a communal obligation. The forebears used to discipline their children for grammatical mistakes. We are commanded, by way of obligation or recommendation, to preserve the Arabic rule and to correct tongues that stray from it, so that our way of understanding the Book and the Sunna, and of following the Arabs in their speech, is preserved. Were people left to their mistakes, it would be a deficiency and a fault.”

Ibn Taymiyya

d. 728 AH / 1328 CE

Taqi al-Din Ahmad ibn Taymiyya, Hanbali jurist and theologian

The Arabic original

وَمَعْلُومٌ أَنَّ تَعَلُّمَ الْعَرَبِيَّةِ وَتَعْلِيمَ الْعَرَبِيَّةِ فَرْضٌ عَلَى الْكِفَايَةِ، وَكَانَ السَّلَفُ يُؤَدِّبُونَ أَوْلَادَهُمْ عَلَى اللَّحْنِ؛ فَنَحْنُ مَأْمُورُونَ — أَمْرَ إيجَابٍ أَوْ أَمْرَ اسْتِحْبَابٍ — أَنْ نَحْفَظَ الْقَانُونَ الْعَرَبِيَّ، وَنُصْلِحَ الْأَلْسُنَ الْمَائِلَةَ عَنْهُ، فَيَحْفَظُ لَنَا طَرِيقَةَ فَهْمِ الْكِتَابِ وَالسُّنَّةِ، وَالِاقْتِدَاءِ بِالْعَرَبِ فِي خِطَابِهَا؛ فَلَوْ تُرِكَ النَّاسُ عَلَى لَحْنِهِمْ كَانَ نَقْصاً وَعَيْباً.