Lane's Arabic-English Lexicon

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بَشَرٌ

Root: بشر

Full Definition

بَشَرٌ : see بَشَرَةٌ
2 [Hence,] البَشَرُ Mankind: and the human being: applied to the male and to the female; and used alike as sing. and pl. and dual: so that you say, هُوَ بَشَرٌ He is a human being, and هِىَ بَشَرٌ She is a human being, and هُمْ بَشَرٌ They are human beings, and هُمَا بَشَرٌ They two are human beings: but sometimes it has the dual form; as in the Kur xxiii. 49; though the Arabs may have used the dual form in the sense of the sing.: and sometimes it has a pl., namely, أَبْشَارٌ. This is a secondary application of the word: i. e., this signification is tropical; or, as some say, the word is so much used in this sense as to be, so used, conventionally regarded as proper; the sense not depending upon its having another word connected with it: but in the S and K, and by the generality of authors, this signification is given as proper. Some say that a human being is thus called because his بَشَرَة is bare of hair and of wool. [Hence,] أَبُو البَشَرِ [The father of mankind; meaning] Adam.
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