If one starts to read the Qur'an at the beginning almost the first
thing one encounters is "This Book, there is no doubt in it, is a
guide to those who keep their duty" (2.2). In Arabic this is DhLK
ALKTB LA RYB FYE EDY ALMTQYN, literally "this the-book no doubt in-it
guide the-pious". If one then stops and thinks it occurs to one that
"no doubt" is, as it stands, too strong. Doubt was expressed in the
days of Rasul Allah and it is still being expressed. What then is the
real im****t of RYB (actually of the entire phrase LA RYB FYE)?
The root RYB occurs (as a form 8 verb) 9 times in the Qur'an in
contexts that seem to insure that something like "doubt" is what is
meant (of course the nuances are not identical to those in English).
But it is interesting to observe that Ibn Ishaq in his exegesis of the
second surat felt it necessary to explicitly define the word RYB as
"doubt". This implies that the very first exegesis we possess of the
Qur'an was concerned that RYB might be misunderstood. That is, Ibn
Ishaq felt it was not obvious that the word RYB, which he perceived as
unusual, was related to the verb forms mentioned above that everybody
knew meant "doubt".
The noun RYB occurs 17 times in Qur'an plus once with suffix -EM
(9.45) and once as a feminine RYBEh (9.110). In 14 of these case it is
in the phrase LA RYB FYE. In two cases the construction is AN KNTM FY
RYB MN which is translated as "if you are in doubt about ...". In the
remaining case (52.30) NTRBC BE RYB ALMNWN the translation I am using
says "we wait for him the evil accidents of time" which appears
arbitrary to me. I will punt on 52.30 and simply state that I cannot
parse it at this time.
It is LA RYB FYE "no doubt in-it" that interests me. Obviously it is a
stereotyped phrase. It is applied 6 times to a day (3 times the day of
gathering and 3 times the day of resurrection), 4 times to ALShAOEh
"the hour" (which surely also means Judgment Day), 3 times to ALKTB
"the book" and once to GLA (17.99) where it refers to how long the
heavens and the earth will endure. That is, what there is "no doubt"
about is the coming judgment. This implies that KTB does not mean
"book" but rather "decree" with Allah understood. I believe this
reading is the one that holds throughout the Qur'an. The Qur'an, as
some people maintain, is not (or at least was not) a book - it was an
oral proclamation.
The phrase is used more or less in parenthetically as a complete
sentence that appears to be being read as an absolute prohibition, as
it would be in classical Arabic. The vocalization proves this because
RYB is vocalized as a unnunated accusative. The normative translation
of LA RYB FYE would be "There is no doubt about it." But "there is no
doubt about it" is not an adequate exegesis or translation. It is an
empirical fact that there was and is doubt. Hence we are
misunderstanding the Qur'an. I suggest we read as though it were
jussive - "Let there be no doubt about it". There was so much doubt
that this admonition became stereotyped.
A st*****yped expression can be very old. It might predate the Qur'an
by centuries. The fact that it is used in the Qur'an only in
connection with eschatologic material suggests that it is part of a
set of old eschatological technical terms that predates the Qur'an -
possibly by several centuries. If it is old it need not obey the
explict rules of classical Arabic grammar. Thus a free-standing
"jussive" verbless sentence is possible even though, so far as I
known, such sentences are not part of classical Arabic. If there were
a verb (in the jussive) this would be the standard form of a
prohibition. Of course it is possible that the RYB in LA RYB FYE is a
verb - but that seems to stretch things too far.
One of the places where AN KNTM FY RYB MN occurs (22.5) is also
eschatologic. The other place (2.23) involves the revelation to "our
slave". The context is not explicitly eschatologic - but does refer
to Allah and his powers, especially his creative powers. I believe
that these usages of RYB can be taken as new constructions made on the
basis of the stereotyped phrase.
Unless some steps such as I have indicated are made we have identified
another place where the Qur'an appears to contradict reality. That is,
it says there is no doubt, but we know there is doubt aplenty.
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