The Qur’anic root B Q ʿ

1. The lexical core in early Arabic

In Maqāyīs al-Lughah, Ibn Fāris identifies one underlying sense:

«مُخَالَفَةُ الْأَلْوَانِ بَعْضِهَا بَعْضًا»

mukhālafatu al-alwāni baʿḍihā baʿḍan

That is, colors differing from one another.

He illustrates this with a crow and a dog whose bodies contain areas of different colors.

Kitāb al-ʿAyn likewise explains baqaʿ through differing colors. A black crow with white on its breast, for example, is called غُرَابٌ أَبْقَعُ.

The point is not merely the existence of two colors, but the difference between a part of a surface and the surrounding parts.

An entirely black animal is not called abqaʿ simply because it is black. When one area is white and another black, however, that contrast becomes an identifying feature.

Al-Khalīl ibn Aḥmad says of buqʿah:

«قِطْعَةٌ مِنْ أَرْضٍ عَلَى غَيْرِ هَيْئَةِ الَّتِي عَلَى جَنْبِهَا»

qiṭʿatun min arḍin ʿalā ghayri hayʾati allatī ʿalā janbihā

A piece of ground whose condition or appearance differs from the ground beside it.

Al-ʿAyn, Maqāyīs, Al-Miṣbāḥ, and Lisān: color differences and pieces of ground

This connects the color-related sense with the spatial one. Just as part of an animal’s body may differ in color from the remainder, part of the ground may differ from the surrounding land.

Al-Khalīl speaks of hayʾah, condition or appearance, rather than color alone. The distinction may therefore concern the ground’s form, condition, or outward characteristics.

This matters for Qur’anic usage. Defining buqʿah only as “two-colored ground” would narrow its semantic range without justification.

Its spatial sense is a distinct piece of land, identifiable within its surroundings.

2. Important forms and uses outside the Qur’an

Buqʿah: a piece of land

بُقْعَة is the principal form for Qur’anic study.

Arabic records the plurals بِقَاع and بُقَع. Lexical sources also record بَقْعَة, with fatḥah on the initial consonant, although the Qur’anic reading studied here has buqʿah.

The word may denote a piece of land distinguished by location or characteristics.

A part of a plain, for example, may be recognizable through different soil or vegetation. That part can be called a buqʿah.

This does not mean every use must describe visibly different-colored ground. A name associated with a perceptible feature may develop a broader application over time.

In a sentence concerned simply with location, buqʿah can accordingly mean a “piece of land” or “particular spot.”

Abqaʿ: patched or differently colored

أَبْقَع describes a creature or object with areas of different colors.

غُرَابٌ أَبْقَعُ describes a crow with a white area on its black body.

كَلْبٌ أَبْقَعُ similarly describes a dog whose coat is not uniform, containing patches or areas of different color.

The feminine form is بَقْعَاء.

Early usage sometimes applies the description to other animals. Nevertheless, Arabic distinctions between color terms for different species should be respected; other words also describe patchiness or contrasting colors.

The underlying idea here is a difference in color between parts of a surface.

Baqʿāʾ: land with contrasting conditions

بَقْعَاء also appears in descriptions of land.

Abū Ḥanīfah al-Dīnawarī describes land where rain has fallen on one part but not another.

Vegetation may consequently grow in one area while another remains dry or sparsely covered.

This shows how contrasting conditions can arise through natural circumstances.

Some lexical reports use أَرْضٌ بَقِعَةٌ for land where vegetation occurs in separate patches rather than continuously.

Other reports record baqʿāʾ for dry, rain-poor, or stony ground.

Its uses therefore cannot all be restricted to one fixed soil type or climatic condition.

The clear connection with the root is the contrast between parts of the land, whether involving rain, vegetation, stones, or another characteristic.

Maqāyīs and Tāj: uneven rain, patchy vegetation, and stony ground

Baqīʿ: an area of ground

بَقِيع belongs to the same family.

Al-Khalīl describes it as ground containing roots or bases of various kinds of trees.

Abū Zayd records a broader use for a part or region of land.

The word was therefore not confined to a single, uniform type of place.

Baqīʿ al-Gharqad in Medina belongs to this family. Lexical accounts associate the name with the gharqad trees that once grew there.

A familiar place name should not determine every use of the common noun. Baqīʿ in Arabic is not exclusive to Medina’s well-known cemetery.

Early poetry also helps illustrate this point.

3. An early Arabic poetic witness

A verse attributed to al-Aʿshā reads:

وَرُبَّ بَقِيعٍ لَوْ هَتَفْتُ بِجَوِّهِ
أَتَانِي كَرِيمٌ يَنْفُضُ الرَّأْسَ مُغْضَبَا

wa-rubba baqīʿin law hataftu bi-jawwihi / atānī karīmun yanfuḍu al-raʾsa mughḍabā

“Many a tract of land, had I called out within it, would have brought me a noble man, shaking his head in anger, to my aid.”

Baqīʿ here identifies a place or area of ground.

The poet describes a place where a noble helper would answer a call. However, the annotations to Al-Kashshāf also read the scene, in light of the preceding line, as a cemetery and an image of departed helpers rising. The scene’s interpretation should not be settled from this line alone.

Thus baqīʿ is not lexically restricted to a cemetery, and this line does not establish the specific reference Baqīʿ al-Gharqad. Yet a cemetery reference within this poem cannot be categorically excluded. Even on that reading, inherent sacredness does not follow from the word itself.

Al-Kashshāf and annotations: al-Aʿshā’s witness and a possible cemetery reading

The verse attests the form’s presence in poetry and its application to an area of ground.

Al-Aʿshā is a celebrated pre-Islamic poet. Dating each poem requires separate examination of attribution and circumstances. The line appears in the Dīwān attributed to him and is useful evidence for early baqīʿ. The Maqāyīs version differs at the line’s end; the text and translation here follow yanfuḍu al-raʾsa mughḍaban, also transmitted in Al-Kashshāf.

Maqāyīs: a different ending of the baqīʿ witness

This usage connects with al-Khalīl’s definition of buqʿah without making the two forms completely identical.

Buqʿah denotes a particular piece of land, while baqīʿ can denote a wider tract or area and sometimes highlights its tree cover.

Baqīʿ therefore helps explain the family’s range, but the direct meaning of Qur’anic buqʿah must be established from its own form and construction.

4. Other uses and semantic extensions

Dictionaries record further forms within this family.

بَاقِعَة can denote a grievous event or calamity befalling someone.

رَجُلٌ بَاقِعَةٌ can also describe a very shrewd, experienced, or resourceful person.

Lisān al-ʿArab records several explanations of this designation, including that such a person has travelled through different regions, acquired experience, and learned about varied affairs.

This suggests a connection between wide experience and travel through different buqʿahs. It remains a proposed explanation of semantic development, rather than an independently established historical core meaning.

اُبْتُقِعَ لَوْنُهُ is recorded for someone’s complexion changing, particularly through fear or grief.

It relates to the field of color change, but its connection with the similar اُمْتُقِعَ has also been debated. Similar-looking forms should not be merged without derivational examination.

The expression بُقِعَ فُلَانٌ بِكَلَامِ سَوْءٍ describes someone being assailed with offensive speech or an improper accusation. The verb is passive, and the person receives the harmful words.

Maqāyīs and Tāj: passive forms for complexion change and abusive speech

These branches show the family’s varied development in Arabic. They should not be combined into a vast, vague definition of the Qur’anic occurrence.

The Qur’anic verse concerns neither a spotted animal, a person’s shrewdness, a calamity, nor a changing complexion.

Its buqʿah names a particular area of ground, and this spatial use should remain central to the study.

5. The sole Qur’anic occurrence: Al-Qaṣaṣ 28:30

Verse text:

فَلَمَّا أَتَاهَا نُودِيَ مِنْ شَاطِئِ الْوَادِ الْأَيْمَنِ فِي الْبُقْعَةِ الْمُبَارَكَةِ مِنَ الشَّجَرَةِ أَنْ يَا مُوسَىٰ إِنِّي أَنَا اللَّهُ رَبُّ الْعَالَمِينَ

fa-lammā atāhā nūdiya min shāṭiʾi al-wādi al-aymani fī al-buqʿati al-mubārakati mina al-shajarati an yā Mūsā innī anā Allāhu rabbu al-ʿālamīna

Translation:

“When he reached it, he was called from the right-hand bank of the valley, in that blessed tract of ground, from the direction of the tree: ‘O Moses, I am The God, Lord of the worlds.’”

Al-Qaṣaṣ 28:30

The verse continues the account of Moses’ journey with his family.

In Al-Qaṣaṣ 28:29, Moses sees a fire on the side of the Mount and asks his family to remain, hoping to bring news or a burning brand with which they may warm themselves.

He then approaches what he has seen.

Al-Qaṣaṣ 28:30 begins as he reaches that place and hears a call.

The Qur’an supplies several spatial indications: the valley’s bank, its right-hand side, the blessed tract of ground, and the tree.

They describe an event in a location, rather than merely an abstract account of Moses’ inward state.

The meaning of al-buqʿah

الْبُقْعَةِ here denotes a particular patch or place on the ground.

The definite article al- identifies a specific location within the narrative.

The sentence further identifies it through the right-hand bank of the valley and its connection with the tree. Al-Ṭabarī explains “right-hand” relative to Moses’ position; the expression alone supplies no fixed compass direction such as east or west.

Al-Ṭabarī: right-hand relative to Moses and the call’s location

Buqʿah should therefore not be dissolved into the very general “place” in a way that erases its reference to a particular part of the ground.

Conversely, the root’s lexical background does not prove that this ground differed from its surroundings in soil color or vegetation.

Al-Khalīl’s definition concerns contrasting condition or appearance, but the verse does not describe the tract’s color, soil, size, or outward shape.

“A particular piece of ground” preserves the central sense without adding an unestablished characteristic.

The meaning of al-mubārakah

الْمُبَارَكَةِ belongs to the separate root B R K.

The adjective describes the same buqʿah as blessed.

The place’s name should be distinguished from the quality attributed to it.

Buqʿah itself means a piece of ground; it does not inherently mean blessed, sacred, or blameworthy.

In this verse, however, The God describes that ground as mubārakah.

Its blessedness is established by the verse’s explicit adjective, rather than by changing B Q ʿ into a word for blessing or sanctity.

This also prevents every patch of ground from being deemed blessed simply because it is called a buqʿah.

One particular place is being described here.

Why is the ground called blessed?

The context places Moses’ encounter with the divine call at that location.

The God identifies Himself to Moses, and signs are subsequently shown to him.

The connection between the place’s blessedness and this divine event is therefore clear and significant.

It does not follow that the verse explains every reason, characteristic, or boundary of the land’s blessing.

It does not specify whether the location had previously been known by the same description or whether its blessing is being emphasized in this particular event.

Nor does “blessed ground” itself establish a particular form of pilgrimage, construction, or ritual there.

The verse identifies a real and blessed place. Any proposed rulings or rituals would require independent grounds.

6. The blessed ground and the sacred valley

Other Qur’anic passages describe the same encounter with the divine call.

In Ṭā Hā 20:12, Moses is told that he is in الْوَادِ الْمُقَدَّسِ طُوًى and must remove his sandals.

Al-Nāziʿāt 79:16 also mentions his Lord’s call in الْوَادِ الْمُقَدَّسِ طُوًى.

These passages help locate the blessed ground within a valley that the Qur’an calls sacred.

Buqʿah and wādī nevertheless do not have identical spatial meanings.

Wādī denotes a valley or a geographically identifiable expanse, while buqʿah can denote a particular part within it.

Al-Qaṣaṣ mentioning blessed ground and Ṭā Hā mentioning a sacred valley therefore need not introduce two separate locations.

A valley can supply the wider setting and a particular portion of it the event’s specific location.

This does not prove that the buqʿah was small or allow its area to be calculated. The word identifies a particular place within a broader setting.

Blessed and sacred: distinct descriptions

Mubārak and muqaddas also belong to separate roots.

Barakah in Qur’anic usage concerns goodness and its increase or continuance.

Quds concerns purity and being free of defilement; applied to a place, it can indicate a location accorded particular sanctity.

Moses’ story uses both descriptions: blessed ground and a sacred valley.

Their pairing connects the place with its divine significance without erasing the difference between the words.

Buqʿah mubārakah may be rendered “blessed tract of ground,” and al-wādī al-muqaddas “the sacred valley.”

Rendering both as “sacred place” obscures both the nouns’ difference and the distinction between blessed and sacred.

Conversely, the two adjectives do not prove that the verses prescribe two wholly separate kinds of spatial sanctity.

That would require studying the full network of passages concerning blessing and sanctity.

7. Mina al-shajarah and the call’s location

In Al-Qaṣaṣ 28:30, مِنَ الشَّجَرَةِ follows فِي الْبُقْعَةِ الْمُبَارَكَةِ.

Syntactically, the phrase contributes to identifying the call’s location.

مِنْ شَاطِئِ الْوَادِ gives the direction or place from which it was heard; فِي الْبُقْعَةِ الْمُبَارَكَةِ further identifies the setting; and مِنَ الشَّجَرَةِ specifies its relationship to the tree.

Grammatical explanations sometimes treat mina al-shajarah as a more precise specification of the call’s location.

Al-Ṭabarī also transmits the explanation “from near the tree.”

“From the direction of the tree” can preserve the spatial relationship without making claims about how the call occurred beyond the wording.

The tree itself is not identical to the buqʿah.

Buqʿah denotes the tract of ground, while the tree supplies another spatial indication associated with the event.

Some historical reports identify a kind of tree, including ʿawsaj or ʿullayq.

The Qur’anic verse itself says only al-shajarah and does not identify a species.

Adding a botanical name to the basic translation is therefore unnecessary; establishing one requires independent evidence.

Al-Ṭabarī: from near the tree and differing reports of its species

Nor should a call coming from the tree’s direction be taken to mean that The God was a body located inside it.

The verse identifies the speaker, but the location where the call was heard should not be equated with a bodily definition of The God’s essence.

For B Q ʿ, the important point is that buqʿah is a real, identifiable place associated with the event.

8. Morphology and syntax

Buqʿah is a feminine singular noun.

Al-Qaṣaṣ 28:30 has الْبُقْعَةِ, with the definite article al- and the genitive case governed by fī.

الْمُبَارَكَةِ is its adjective, agreeing in definiteness, grammatical gender, and genitive case.

Mubārakah therefore describes the buqʿah; it is not an independent word that can be transferred without grounds to the tree or valley.

فِي الْبُقْعَةِ الْمُبَارَكَةِ means “in the blessed tract of ground.”

Fī expresses a spatial relationship suited to an event located within a particular area.

The phrase helps establish the call’s setting. Some grammarians attach it to nūdiya, while others analyze it in relation to the location of shāṭiʾ al-wādī.

These syntactic differences do not change buqʿah’s basic spatial meaning.

Al-Durr al-Maṣūn: syntactic attachment of the spatial phrase

Nor should buqʿah be equated with any other place noun merely because it is formed from a similar root. It is an established noun for a piece or area of ground.

Lexical sources also report baqʿah with initial fatḥah. This pronunciation appears in some accounts of Arabic usage and readings.

The vowel difference does not create an independent new meaning. Forqan’s standard text here remains الْبُقْعَةِ.

9. Distinctions from related words

B Q ʿ (buqʿah) and ʾ R Ḍ (arḍ)

Study of ʾ R Ḍ

Arḍ is a broad word for earth or land, used in the Qur’an for the earth as opposed to the sky and for a particular territory or expanse.

Buqʿah instead focuses on a piece of land identified within a wider area.

Every buqʿah is ground, but not every use of arḍ denotes a delimited buqʿah.

In Al-Qaṣaṣ 28:30, buqʿah suits the identification of the call’s particular location. Translating it simply as “land” makes that aspect less clear.

B Q ʿ (buqʿah) and M K N (makān)

Study of M K N (Not yet published)

Makān denotes a place or the position of something.

Buqʿah in the use under discussion denotes a piece or area of ground.

“Place” is consequently broader and applies to varied locations, while buqʿah preserves a more specific image of a part of the ground.

“Blessed place” conveys the broad sense, but “blessed tract of ground” is closer to buqʿah’s wording.

This does not establish that a buqʿah must be very small. The noun specifies no exact area.

B Q ʿ (buqʿah) and W D Y (wādin)

Study of W D Y (Not yet published)

Wādī denotes a valley or expanse characterized by an extended depression in the terrain.

Buqʿah denotes a particular piece of ground and need not have the shape of a valley.

In Moses’ story, the two words appear together and can identify the setting at different levels.

The valley establishes the geographic setting, while the buqʿah identifies the event’s particular location within it.

B Q ʿ (buqʿah) and R Q ʿ (ruqʿah)

Ruqʿah can denote a piece of cloth or material used to cover or repair another part.

A buqʿah may also appear as a patch or distinct area on a surface.

B Q ʿ and R Q ʿ nevertheless remain separate roots.

One highlights a contrasting, identifiable part of a surface; the other also includes fragments, patches, and repair.

Resemblance between a colored patch and a cloth patch does not itself prove a derivational relationship.

B Q ʿ (buqʿah) and B L Q (balaq)

Balaq concerns contrasting or mixed colors, particularly in descriptions of certain quadrupeds.

Abqaʿ likewise describes a creature whose body contains areas of different colors.

The families can overlap in color descriptions, but their uses are not always identical.

Some lexical classifications associate abqaʿ more often with birds and dogs and ablaq with quadrupeds such as horses.

This is not an absolute boundary across all Arabic usage, but it cautions against merging the roots solely through semantic proximity.

B Q ʿ (buqʿah) and B R K (barakah)

Study of B R K

These roots differ in their basic meanings, but occur together in the sole Qur’anic use of B Q ʿ.

Buqʿah specifies the place; mubārakah describes its quality.

Buqʿah therefore does not itself mean blessing, and mubārakah does not mean a piece of ground.

This distinction should be preserved in both translation and explanation.

10. Translation proposals for Forqan

Suitable equivalents for buqʿah include “piece of land,” “particular patch of ground,” and, in some sentences, “area of ground.”

Where context emphasizes contrast with the surroundings, that feature may be explained. “Differently colored” need not be inserted into every translation.

Biqāʿ may be rendered “pieces of land” or “particular areas.”

Abqaʿ may be “spotted,” “variegated,” or “having differently colored areas,” depending on its subject.

Baqʿāʾ describing land requires identifying whether the difference concerns vegetation, rainfall, or another feature. One fixed equivalent cannot capture all recorded uses.

For baqīʿ, “tract of land” or, where appropriate, “area containing trees” may fit. When it is a proper place name, that name should be retained.

Bāqiʿah can mean “calamity” or “grievous event.” Describing a person, it may be “highly resourceful” or “shrewd and experienced,” according to context.

Proposed rendering of the Qur’anic phrase

For فِي الْبُقْعَةِ الْمُبَارَكَةِ in Al-Qaṣaṣ 28:30, the principal proposal is:

“In that blessed tract of ground.”

This preserves a real location, a particular tract, and its blessedness.

“In the sacred place” conveys part of the broad sense but obscures both buqʿah versus makān and mubārakah versus muqaddasah.

Conversely, “in differently colored, sacred ground” is unwarranted: the Qur’anic phrase does not state a difference of color.

The complete translation should retain the other spatial indications too. The right-hand bank of the valley, blessed ground, and tree should not be reduced to a general expression such as “in a sacred place near the mountain.”

The basic translation should remain close to the verse’s construction. Geographic or historical explanation can be supplied separately where needed and adequately supported.

11. Conclusion

B Q ʿ concerns contrasts of color or appearance between parts of something, as in spotted animals or land with differing conditions.

Buqʿah in spatial use denotes a particular piece of ground. It may differ in color, vegetation, form, or another characteristic, but such outward contrast need not be expressly stated in each use.

Forms such as abqaʿ, baqʿāʾ, and baqīʿ illustrate related branches concerning color contrasts, ground conditions, and particular areas. Other uses, such as bāqiʿah, should not be transferred uncritically into the Qur’anic sense.

The root occurs only once in the Qur’an, as al-buqʿah.

Al-Qaṣaṣ 28:30 identifies the location of the divine call to Moses: blessed ground by the valley’s right-hand bank, associated with a tree.

Other passages concerning the same event call the valley sacred. The connection identifies a real setting with divine significance, but buqʿah itself does not establish its area, soil type, color, or exact geographic coordinates.

The ground’s blessedness likewise comes from mubārakah, rather than from B Q ʿ itself.

Final root definition: B Q ʿ in its lexical core concerns differences of color or appearance between parts of something. Buqʿah in spatial usage denotes a particular piece or area of ground identified within a wider expanse.

The family’s distinctive feature is an identifiable part among other parts. In the Qur’anic use, however, buqʿah directly means a particular tract of ground. Blessedness is a separate quality the Qur’an attributes to the location of the divine call to Moses.