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What They Said About the Arabs and Arabic

What Arab and Muslim scholars have said about their language, and what scholars from outside the Arab world have said about it, and about the Arabs and their civilisation. Nothing is published until it was read in its author's own book or in a named, reliable witness; the Western sayings appear in their original languages beside a translation, each with a link to the page of the book.

105 sayings — 52 by Arab and Muslim scholars, 53 by others; 48 read in the original language of their author.

How these sayings were documented

Most sayings of Western scholars about Arabic circulate in Arabic translations taken from secondary sources, and many turned out to add to or cut from the original. We went back to the authors' own books, in scans of their pages, and publish the original text with a faithful translation, noting under each saying where the circulated version departs from it. Sayings whose original we have not yet found are not published.

Read in the original Read in its author's own language (French, German, Latin…) in a scan of the book; the original is printed beside any translation. From the author's own Arabic The author's own Arabic words, read in his book by edition, volume and page; the English is our translation. Narrated with its chain The speaker wrote no book of his own; this is read in a work that narrates it from him with its chain of transmission, by edition, volume and page. Via a reliable witness Reported by a named scholar without a chain, or not found in the author's own work.

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From the author's own Arabic
“The tongue of the Arabs is the widest of tongues in its ways and the richest in words; we know of no one but a prophet who encompasses all of it, yet none of it is lost to the Arabs as a whole, so that there is always someone among them who knows it.”
وَلِسانُ العَرَبِ أَوْسَعُ الأَلْسِنَةِ مَذْهَباً وَأَكْثَرُها أَلْفاظاً، وَلا نَعْلَمُهُ يُحِيطُ بِجَمِيعِ عِلْمِهِ إِنْسانٌ غَيْرُ نَبِيٍّ، وَلَكِنَّهُ لا يَذْهَبُ مِنْهُ شَئٌ عَلَى عامَّتِها حَتَّى لا يَكُونَ مَوْجُوداً فِيها مَنْ يَعْرِفُهُ
al-Shafi'i
d. 204 AH / 820 CE
 From the author's own Arabic
“Whoever is ignorant of the breadth of the Arabic tongue, the abundance of its words and its many ways of expression is ignorant of the substance of the knowledge of the Book; and whoever knows it, grasps its ways and understands how the commentators interpreted it, is freed of the doubts that befall those of the people of whims and innovations who are ignorant of its tongue.”
فَإِنَّ مَنْ جَهِلَ سَعَةَ لِسانِ العَرَبِ وَكَثْرَةَ أَلْفاظِها، وَافْتِنانَها فِي مَذاهِبِها، جَهِلَ جُمَلَ عِلْمِ الكِتابِ، وَمَنْ عَلِمَها وَوَقَفَ عَلَى مَذاهِبِها، وَفَهِمَ ما تَأَوَّلَهُ أَهْلُ التَّفْسِيرِ فِيها، زالَتْ عَنْهُ الشُّبَهُ الدّاخِلَةُ عَلَى مَنْ جَهِلَ لِسانَها مِنْ ذَوِي الأَهْواءِ وَالبِدَعِ
Abu Mansur al-Azhari
d. 370 AH / 980 CE
 From the author's own Arabic
“Since God singled out the Arabic tongue for clear expression, it is known that all other languages fall short of it and rank below it، And where do other languages have the breadth that the language of the Arabs has?”
فَلَمّا خَصَّ جَلَّ ثَناؤُهُ اللِّسانَ العَرَبِيَّ بِالبَيانِ عُلِمَ أَنَّ سائِرَ اللُّغاتِ قاصِرَةٌ عَنْهُ وَواقِعَةٌ دُونَهُ، وَأَيْنَ لِسائِرِ اللُّغاتِ مِنَ السَّعَةِ ما لِلُغَةِ العَرَبِ
Ibn Faris
d. 395 AH / 1004 CE
 Read in the original
“I mean the Arabic language, which I may not undeservedly call an Ocean, since it takes the other Oriental languages into itself, just as the Ocean swallows the rivers.”
Linguam intelligo Arabicam, quam non immerito Oceanum dixerim, quippe quæ alias Linguas Orientales in se recipit, non secus ac fluvios absorbet Oceanus.
Simon Ockley
1678–1720
 Read in the original
“The Arabians are full of the commendations of their language, and not altogether without reason; for it claims the preference of most others in many respects, as being very harmonious and expressive, and withal so copious, that they say no man, without inspiration, can be perfect master of it in its utmost extent.”
والعربُ يُكثرون من الثناءِ على لغتهم، وليسوا في ذلك بغير حُجّةٍ تَماماً؛ فإنّها تستحقُّ التقديمَ على أكثر اللغات من وجوهٍ كثيرة، لأنَّها شديدةُ الانْسِجَامِ، بَلِيغةُ الإبانةِ، وهي مع ذلك من السَّعَةِ بحيث يقولون: إنَّه لا يُحيط بها في أقصى مَدَاها إنسانٌ إلّا بِوَحْيٍ.
George Sale
c. 1697–1736
 Read in the original
“The Arabick language, therefore, is almost wholly in our power; and, as it is unquestionably one of the most ancient in the world, so it yields to none ever spoken by mortals in the number of its words and the precision of its phrases.”
وكَمَا أَنَّها بلا رَيبٍ من أقدمِ لُغاتِ العَالَم، فإنّها لا تَتَأخَّر عن لُغَةٍ نطَق بها البشرُ قطُّ في كثرةِ ألفاظِها ودِقَّةِ عِبَاراتِهَا.
Sir William Jones
1746–1794
 Read in the original
“That language is not only the richest of all, but has also produced almost innumerable writers.”
Ea enim lingua non solum ditissima est omnium, sed scriptores etiam protulit paene innumerabiles.
Georg Wilhelm Freytag
1788–1861
 Read in the original
“The Arab mind, on the other hand, is clear and positive, and the Arabic language nervous, virile and rich both actually and potentially. The old Arabs were an acute and observant people, and for all natural objects which fell under their notice they had appropriate and finely differentiated words.”
وَاللُّغَةُ العَرَبِيَّةُ قَوِيَّةٌ جَزْلَةٌ غَنِيَّةٌ بِمَا فِيهَا فِعْلاً وَبِمَا تَقْدِرُ عَلَيْهِ.
Edward Granville Browne
1862–1926
 Read in the original
On the vocabulary of the Arabs within their narrow desert world:
“Within this range, the slightest modification is expressed by a particular word. Classical Arabic is rich not only in words but in grammatical forms.”
Innerhalb dieses Kreises bezeichnen sie aber die kleinste Modification durch ein eignes Wort. […] Das classische Arabisch ist nicht bloss an Wörtern, sondern auch an grammatischen Formen reich.
Theodor Nöldeke
1836–1930
 Read in the original
“The Arabic language is of very great richness, and this richness has only kept growing through the addition of new expressions borrowed from the languages with which it came into contact. The dictionary of Ibn Sīda already ran to twenty volumes.”
La langue arabe est d'une richesse très grande, et cette richesse n'a fait que s'accroître constamment par l'adjonction d'expressions nouvelles empruntées aux idiomes avec lesquels elle s'est trouvée en contact. Le dictionnaire d'Ibhn Seid, mort en 1065, comprenait déjà vingt volumes.
Gustave Le Bon
1841–1931
 Via a reliable witness
“I encompassed the Book of God in word and purpose, and was not too narrow for its verses and admonitions; how then should I be too narrow today to describe a machine or to arrange names for inventions? I am the sea, in whose depths pearls lie hidden; did they ask the diver about my shells?”
وَسِعْتُ كِتابَ اللَّهِ لَفْظاً وَغايَةً، وَما ضِقْتُ عَنْ آيٍ بِهِ وَعِظاتِ / فَكَيْفَ أَضِيقُ اليَوْمَ عَنْ وَصْفِ آلَةٍ، وَتَنْسِيقِ أَسْمَاءٍ لِمُخْتَرَعَاتِ / أَنَا البَحْرُ فِي أَحْشَائِهِ الدُّرُّ كامِنٌ، فَهَلْ سَأَلُوا الغَوَّاصَ عَنْ صَدَفَاتِي
Hafiz Ibrahim
d. 1351 AH / 1932 CE
 Read in the original
“The Arabic language is rich in expressive forms and syntactic subtleties. Richer still is its vocabulary in synonyms expressing the finest nuances within the monotonous surroundings of the Bedouin.”
Die arabische Sprache ist reich an ausdrucksvollen Formen und syntaktischen Feinheiten. Noch reicher ist ihr Wortschatz an Synonymen zum Ausdruck der feinsten Nüancen in der eintönigen Umgebung der Beduinen.
Carl Brockelmann
1868–1956
 Read in the original
“No language can match the dignity of Arabic, the chosen vehicle of God's ultimate message. But it is not only its spiritual rank which transcends the potentialities of the other tongues; its pre-eminence is rooted equally firmly in its objective features — above all, in the unparalleled vastness of its vocabulary. Where Greek frequently has but one word to denote many objects, Arabic offers many words to denote one. Phonetic beauty is added to its staggering richness in synonyms. Precision and concision of expression adorn Arabic speech. […] Arabic is distinguished by its unrivaled possibilities in the use of figurative speech. Its innuendoes, tropes, and figures of speech lift it far above any other human language.”
وَمَا مِنْ لُغَةٍ تَسْتَطِيعُ أَنْ تُطَاوِلَ العَرَبِيَّةَ فِي شَرَفِهَا، فَهْيَ الوَسِيلَةُ الَّتِي اخْتِيرَتْ لِتَحْمِلَ رِسَالَةَ اللهِ الأَخِيرَةَ… وَيُضَافُ جَمَالُ الصَّوْتِ إِلَى ثَرْوَتِهَا المُدْهِشَةِ فِي المُتَرَادِفَات.
Gustave E. von Grunebaum
1909–1972

Some well-known sayings attributed to Western scholars have not been traced to an original and are not published: one credited to Krachkovsky (we searched the whole of his history of Arabic geographical literature), one credited to Germanus (not in any of his articles in al-Risāla), others credited to Marçais and Berque, and one credited to Brockelmann ("through the Qur’an Arabic reached an extent…"). The saying credited to al-Asma‘i is one he transmits from al-Khalil from Ayyub al-Sakhtiyani, whose saying is in this section. The saying credited to "William Work" has no such author: the name is a corruption of William H. Worrell, director of the American School of Oriental Research in Jerusalem, and its source has not been found. The claim that Chomsky was influenced by Sībawayh was denied by Chomsky himself in two published e-mails.