شَعُوبُ
Root: شعب
Full Definition
شَعُوبُ
, without the article ال, and imperfectly decl., and الشَّعُوبُ, with the article, and perfectly decl., but several authors disallow this latter, accounting it wrong; a name for Death; so called because it separates men: the former is a proper name: J says [in the S] that it is determinate, and does not admit the article ال: in the L, it is said that شَعُوبُ and الشَّعُوبُ both signify as above; and that in either case it may be originally an epithet, being like the epithets قَتُول and ضَرُوب; and if so, the article in this case is as in العَبَّاسُ and الحَسَنُ and الحٰرِثُ: and this opinion is confirmed by what is said of its derivation: but he who says شَعُوب, without the article, makes the word a pure substantive, and deprives it literally of the character of an epithet; wherefore the article is not necessarily attached to it, as it is not to عَبَّاس and حٰرِث; yet the essence of an epithet is in it still, as in the instance of جَابِرُ بْنُ حَبَّةَ, a name for “ bread, ” so called because it reinvigorates the hungry; and as in وَاسِط, [a certain town] so called, accord. to Sb, because midway between El-'Irák [' Irák el-'Ajam] and El-Basrah: thus in the L. One says of a person when he has been at the point of death and then escaped, أَقَصَّتْهُ شَعُوبُ [Death became near to him]. And it is said in a trad., فَمَا زِلْتُ وَاضِعًا رِجْلِى
عَلَى خَدِّهِ حَتَّى أَزَرْتُهُ شَعُوبَ, i. e. [And I ceased not putting my foot upon his cheek until] I made death to visit him.
Lane's Lexicon
+
Hans Wehr
+
Mawrid
Three dictionaries. One search.
"The product of over thirty years of unrelenting labor — to this day supreme in the field of Arabic lexicography."
47,000+ classical entries
Root-based navigation
Full text search
Hyperlinked definitions
Search →
Trusted by researchers at University of Michigan, Duke, Alberta & more