Qur’anic Root J R F
Removing and undermining: from an eroded bank to the collapse of a building without sound support
Qur’anic and lexical forms
جُرُف / جُرْف
(juruf / jurf)
Noun for an eroded bank; one occurrence with reading variation
جَرَفَ / جَرْف
(jarafa / jarf)
Form I verb and verbal noun; removing material
جَرَّفَ / تَجْرِيف
(jarrafa / tajrīf)
Form II verb and verbal noun; lexical forms
اجْتَرَفَ
(ijtarafa)
Form VIII; taking and removing; not Qur’anic
تَجَرَّفَ
(tajarrafa)
Form V; lexical form, not Qur’anic
جَارِف / جَارُوف
(jārif / jārūf)
Sweeping removal in lexical usages
جُرَاف
(jurāf)
A sweeping flood or voracious eater, according to usage
مُجَرَّف
(mujarraf)
An impoverished person or lost property; not Qur’anic
مَجْرُوف
(majrūf)
Passive participle; a marked camel in one usage
مِجْرَف / مِجْرَفَة
(mijraf / mijrafah)
Tool for removing soil or mud; not Qur’anic
جَرْفَة / جُرْفَة
(jarfah / jurfah)
Recorded vocalizations in animal marking; not Qur’anic
أَجْرَاف / جُرُوف / جِرَفَة
(ajrāf / jurūf / jirafah)
Lexical plurals of jurf; not Qur’anic
Arabic jarafa (جَرَفَ) means removing or sweeping something away, particularly a large amount of soil or other material. Floodwater passing a riverbank or valley side can wash away soil beneath it. Ground remains above, but its support weakens and may collapse. Arabic calls such a bank juruf (جُرُف).
The family has further usages: jarafa al-ṭīna means clearing mud; saylun jurāfun describes a flood sweeping away what lies in its path; rajulun mujarrafun describes a person whose wealth has been lost.
The root occurs only in Al-Tawbah 9:109 in the Qur’an. A building founded upon mindfulness of The God and His approval is compared with one on the edge of an eroded, crumbling bank.
The comparison uses a familiar natural condition to evaluate two kinds of foundation. A building needs sound support, and a religious structure’s value cannot be established by its name and appearance alone. That conclusion follows from the whole verse and context; juruf itself means the eroded bank.
1. Forms and semantic core
J R F is a sound triliteral Arabic root. Its familiar verb is jarafa, with imperfect yajrufu.
Recorded family members include jarf, jarafa, jurf, juruf, jarrafa, tajrīf, ijtarafa, tajarrafa, jārif, jurāf, majrūf, mujarraf, mijraf, mijrafah, jarfah, jurfah, and ajrāf.
Their related uses include removing material, eroded ground edges, loss of property, consuming large amounts, and cutting skin to mark an animal.
Only jurufin occurs in the Qur’an. It is a singular noun in the genitive after shafā.
Quranic Arabic Corpus: the sole occurrence of juruf
Arabic sources record both jurf and juruf. Both also occur in transmitted Qur’anic readings, with rāʾ either unvowelled or bearing ḍammah. The vocalic variation does not change the basic meaning.
Abū Ḥayyān, Al-Baḥr al-Muḥīṭ: jurf and juruf readings
Ajrāf, jurūf, and jirafah are also recorded plurals, but none occurs in the Qur’an.
The root’s semantic core
Ibn Fāris identifies one principle for J R F in Maqāyīs al-Lughah, explaining it through taking something comprehensively:
«أَخْذُ الشَّيْءِ كُلِّهِ هَبْشًا»
akhdhu al-shayʾi kullihi habshan
That is: “Taking the whole of something, gathering it up.”
He then uses jaraftu al-shayʾa for carrying something away completely, and sayfun jurāfun for a sword that leaves nothing in its cutting path.
Lisān al-ʿArab likewise explains jarf as taking away all or much of something.
Quantity and the extent of removal are prominent in important usages.
That should not become an absolute rule requiring every instance to destroy every component. Some usages involve the whole object; others involve a large portion.
A defensible core is removing and carrying away a substantial quantity, particularly by digging, washing, or drawing it from its place. Brief root meaning: Removing and sweeping away a large quantity of something, especially soil eroded and carried off by flowing water.
Ibn Fāris, Maqāyīs: comprehensive removal
The noun juruf names a bank whose support has partly been removed through water erosion.
2. Jarf in nature and early Arab life
Erosion of a riverbank
A clear use concerns riverbanks, valley sides, and flood channels.
Kitāb al-ʿAyn describes water entering a bank’s lower part and removing the soil beneath it, leaving the upper part projecting and unsupported.
The condition is observable in nature.
Moving water may wash away the lower bank. Continued erosion leaves the upper ground without its former support.
From outside, the upper surface may look intact while a cavity or eroded space has developed beneath it.
Such an edge may collapse under weight, vibration, rain, or further erosion.
Lexicographers use this condition to explain juruf. It is more specific than an ordinary riverbank or valley edge: erosion and soil carried off by water are prominent.
Ibn Sīdah explains juruf as a river or valley bank eroded from below.
He distinguishes it from the ordinary bank, shāṭiʾ.
Not every shore or bank is therefore necessarily juruf. In this usage, erosion contributes to its shape.
Lisān: the undercut bank and shāṭiʾ
Juruf on the verge of collapse
After describing erosion below a valley side, Kitāb al-ʿAyn and Tahdhīb al-Lughah describe the remaining upper ground cracking and becoming liable to collapse.
They explain this condition with hār.
Two stages are distinguishable: erosion and loss of support below, then weakening or cracking of what remains above.
The distinction matters for the Qur’anic image, since Al-Tawbah 9:109 qualifies juruf with hār.
Juruf identifies the eroded bank; hār emphasizes its crumbling condition.
Jurufin hārin is thus more expressive than an ordinary precipice: a bank with undermined support, on the verge of collapse.
Al-ʿAyn: undermining the bank and its hār condition
Clearing mud and the tools of jarf
Jaraftu al-ṭīna means clearing or removing mud.
Mijraf and mijrafah name tools used to remove earth, mud, or similar material.
Unlike natural river erosion, the usage can describe a deliberate human action.
Someone may clear accumulated mud from a watercourse with a tool to reopen it.
Jarf then describes material being removed, without judging the action as good or bad.
Clearing mud may improve use of land; excessive removal from a riverbank can instead make it unstable.
The root does not inherently mean wrongful destruction. Evaluation depends on circumstances, purpose, and consequences.
Al-Ṣiḥāḥ and Lisān: clearing mud and its tools
Saylun jurāfun: a flood carrying material away
Sources record saylun jurāfun and saylun jārūfun for a powerful flood.
It can detach soil, plants, gravel, and other objects and carry them along.
The designation concerns the power to remove and sweep away.
Jurāf may sweep away all or much of what lies in its path.
That does not make every water flow, including a small, gentle stream, jurāf.
The intensity and extent of its effect matter.
Nor does the example establish an active flood at the moment described in Al-Tawbah 9:109. Jurufin hārin names an eroded, crumbling bank. Water can explain its formation without the verse reporting a flood during construction.
3. Extended meanings: from removing soil to losing wealth and strength
Jarrafa al-dahru mālahu: lost property
Jarrafa al-dahru mālahu describes someone losing property through the vicissitudes of time.
Time is compared with a flood sweeping away wealth.
Rajulun mujarrafun describes someone impoverished by time’s destruction of his property. The attested form in this meaning is mujarraf (مُجَرَّف), with doubled rāʾ. Majrūf (مَجْرُوف) occurs elsewhere for a marked camel.
Al-Muḥīṭ, Lisān, and Tāj: mujarraf for the impoverished person
Nothing is literally being dug from the ground; the person’s property and resources disappear.
The flood image is clear: flowing water carries away much material, while harsh events can likewise strip a person of wealth.
The figurative use should not replace Qur’anic juruf with poverty or bankruptcy. The verse uses an eroded bank within a comparison.
A witness from early poetry
Al-Jawharī’s Al-Ṣiḥāḥ and Lisān al-ʿArab transmit a verse attributed to a man of Ṭayyiʾ:
«فَإِنْ تَكُنِ الْحَوَادِثُ جَرَّفَتْنِي
فَلَمْ أَرَ هَالِكًا كَابْنَيْ زِيَادِ»
fa-in takuni al-ḥawādithu jarrafatnī / fa-lam ara hālikan ka-ibnay Ziyādi
That is: “If life’s events have swept me away and brought me low, I have seen no one perish like the two sons of Ziyād.”
Jarrafatnī in the witness is attributed to events.
They resemble a flood dislodging someone from his former position and stripping away strength or standing.
It shows the extension from removing earth and material to sweeping losses in human life.
The poet’s precise identity and composition date remain uncertain. Preservation in authoritative dictionaries does not alone establish a pre-Islamic date.
Lisān: the unnamed Ṭayyiʾ poetic witness
Jurāf: eating much and leaving nothing
Rajulun jurāfun is also recorded for a voracious eater.
He consumes a large quantity and leaves nothing behind.
Ibn Al-Aʿrābī transmits the following rajaz:
«أَعْدَدْتُ لِلَّقْمِ بَنَانًا مِجْرَفَا
وَمِعْدَةً تَغْلِي وَبَطْنًا أَجْوَفَا»
aʿdadtu li-al-laqmi banānan mijrafā / wa-miʿdatan taghlī wa-baṭnan ajwafā
That is: “For taking morsels I have readied fingers that scoop copiously, a seething stomach, and an empty belly.”
Lisān: rajaz transmitted by Ibn Al-Aʿrābī
Mijraf describes a hand or fingers taking large quantities of food.
Eating and gathering food are compared with jarf.
The usage shows how quantity taken or consumed can matter in J R F.
It does not make Qur’anic juruf mean greed, gluttony, or acquisitiveness.
These remain distinct branches and usages. The Qur’anic meaning requires the noun and its context.
Cutting skin to mark an animal
Jarfah is recorded for a kind of camel marking.
One account describes cutting skin on the thigh without completely detaching it, then gathering it into a mark. Other accounts concern skin below the ear or near the nose and twisting it. The practice should not be restricted to fully removing skin and then replacing it.
Tāj and Lisān: cutting skin without fully detaching it
It connects with lifting or separating part of a surface.
The action nevertheless differs from soil erosion, clearing mud, or eating copiously.
It shows that the family is not confined to water and land.
Pain intensity, the precise purpose of a particular mark, and its eventual shape should not be inserted into every root usage. They require the specific practice and its independent descriptions.
A limited pasture use of jarf
Ibn Al-Aʿrābī explains jarf through al-khiṣb wa-al-kalaʾ al-multaff, abundant growth and dense herbage. Ajrafa al-rajulu in this usage concerns someone grazing camels in such pasture.
Ibn Al-Aʿrābī in Lisān: abundant growth and dense herbage
It initially appears different from the eroded-bank meaning.
The account concerns a grazing area and the vegetation animals use.
The evidence examined does not establish the historical path connecting this branch to removal and erosion.
It should remain a limited attested usage without inventing a certain link between green pasture and an undermined bank merely to unify the family.
Al-Tawbah 9:109 gives no indication of pasture. Shafā and hār specify the crumbling-bank field.
4. The Qur’anic occurrence: building on a crumbling bank’s edge
Al-Tawbah, verse 109
أَفَمَنْ أَسَّسَ بُنْيَانَهُ عَلَىٰ تَقْوَىٰ مِنَ اللَّهِ وَرِضْوَانٍ خَيْرٌ أَمْ مَنْ أَسَّسَ بُنْيَانَهُ عَلَىٰ شَفَا جُرُفٍ هَارٍ فَانْهَارَ بِهِ فِي نَارِ جَهَنَّمَ وَاللَّهُ لَا يَهْدِي الْقَوْمَ الظَّالِمِينَ
a-fa-man assasa bunyānahu ʿalā taqwā mina Allāhi wa-riḍwānin khayrun am man assasa bunyānahu ʿalā shafā jurufin hārin fa-inhāra bihi fī nāri jahannama wa-Allāhu lā yahdī al-qawma al-ẓālimīn
“Is one who founded his building upon mindfulness of The God and His approval better, or one who founded his building on the edge of a crumbling bank, which collapsed with him into the fire of Hell? The God does not guide the unjust people.”
The verse compares two foundations.
On one side is a building founded on mindfulness of The God and His approval.
The other is founded on shafā jurufin hārin, the edge of an eroded, crumbling bank.
Both concern founding a building, while the foundations differ.
The word’s meaning requires this construction and the verse’s wider context.
ʿAlā shafā jurufin hārin: elements of an image
Three distinct words occur together:
Shafā means an edge or brink.
Study of SH F W (Not yet published)
Juruf names a bank or portion of ground undercut by water, weakening its support.
Hār describes something weakening and crumbling, or liable to collapse.
Together they picture a building on unstable ground’s edge.
All three meanings should not be attributed to juruf alone.
The brink comes from shafā, and liability to collapse is expressed by hār.
Juruf supplies the material basis of the danger: a bank whose former support has been removed with its soil.
Grammatically, jurufin is the genitive complement of shafā, and hārin is its genitive adjective.
The phrase therefore concerns the edge of a crumbling juruf.
Juruf and hār
Juruf belongs to J R F, while hār does not.
Morphological and lexical accounts associate hār with hāra, to collapse. They differ concerning an underlying wāw or yāʾ and changes in formation.
For this verse, the relevant point is hār’s expression of weakness and collapse.
Juruf names the location and hār describes its condition.
An “eroded, crumbling bank” therefore suits the combination, while juruf alone should not mean the act of collapsing.
Al-Wāḥidī, Al-Basīṭ: shafā, juruf, and hār
Why is a building on such ground unstable?
A building needs more than walls and a roof: its support must bear its weight.
A structure on a bank undercut by water may remain outwardly standing for a time.
Its weight nevertheless rests on ground that has lost part of its support.
Outward appearance does not then guarantee actual stability.
The difference makes the image’s force clear.
A building may appear complete while lacking a sound foundation.
The Qur’an is not giving a technical engineering report here. It uses a comprehensible natural condition to compare mindfulness, hypocrisy, and the consequences of human conduct.
Fa-inhāra bi-hi: collapse and the building’s end
After describing the building on the bank’s edge, the verse says:
«فَانْهَارَ بِهِ فِي نَارِ جَهَنَّمَ»
fa-inhāra bihi fī nāri jahannama
Inhāra belongs to the family of hāra and collapse, rather than J R F.
Three meanings should remain distinct: removal and erosion in J R F, the crumbling condition in hār, and collapse occurring in inhāra.
Their connection completes the image.
The bank is eroded, a building rests on its edge, and it eventually collapses.
Commentators discuss bi-hi in relation to the building or its founder. Either way, the founder or building is implicated in the collapse’s consequence.
The verse also names the fire of Hell, connecting the natural image with the condemned conduct’s consequence in the hereafter.
The whole phrase should not be reduced to a report of a real bank falling or a historical building physically dropping into an earthly hole.
Conversely, recognizing the comparison does not justify disregarding the Qur’an’s report about wrongdoing’s consequences.
The natural image makes a false foundation’s collapse intelligible; the fire of Hell states the conduct’s consequence in divine judgment.
5. A building’s foundation and conduct in Al-Tawbah
A mosque built to cause harm
Al-Tawbah 9:107 describes people who established a mosque for specified purposes.
It names four: harm, rejection, division among believers, and providing a position for someone who had previously fought The God and His messenger.
It then reports their oath that they intended only good, while The God testifies that they lie.
The context is fundamental to the juruf comparison.
The building outwardly bears the name mosque, but the Qur’an criticizes its motivation and function.
Its name or building material is not the central issue; its purpose and the activity it was built to serve are.
Al-Tawbah 9:108 forbids standing in it and gives greater claim to a mosque founded upon mindfulness from the first day.
Verse 109 presents the contrast through two kinds of foundation.
Outward appearance and foundation
Assasa bunyānahu occurs on both sides of the comparison in verse 109.
Both groups have buildings, but their foundations differ.
One rests on mindfulness of The God and His approval; the other resembles a building on a crumbling bank’s edge.
Constructing a religious building alone therefore does not prove the founder’s purpose is sound.
The example also does not make physical buildings or worship places irrelevant. It concerns a real building and distinguishes two places.
A building’s name and appearance do not substitute for mindfulness and a sound purpose; this does not eliminate every value of its physical form.
Mindfulness contrasted with juruf
One side presents taqwā and riḍwān; the other, an unstable, crumbling bank.
The visual contrast is clear.
Sound ground supports a building, whereas an eroded bank offers no such assurance.
Ethically, founding something upon mindfulness and The God’s approval contrasts with an undertaking whose harmful aims the preceding verses identify.
J R F itself nevertheless does not mean hypocrisy, rejection, or division.
Those referents follow from Al-Tawbah 9:107.
Detached from context, verse 109 might become a general saying about unstable undertakings. In the Qur’anic passage, its first application is a religious building with specified motives and consequences.
It can prompt reflection on other foundations, but such extension should follow the verse’s clear principle rather than replace its first referent.
A building affecting its founders’ hearts
Al-Tawbah 9:110 returns to the building they constructed.
It says the building continues as a source of doubt in their hearts, unless their hearts are torn apart.
The continuation emphasizes the relation between an external structure and the human inner condition.
A building made to harm and divide is more than an external object: it is connected with its founders’ conduct and moral condition.
That clarifies the preceding bank image. A building can exist outwardly while lacking a foundation in right and justice.
Juruf nevertheless does not mean the human heart or inner doubt. The next verse expresses doubt and the heart through separate words.
Juruf supplies the natural image of an unstable foundation.
The comparison’s limits in judging others
The Qur’an speaks about a particular group and attributes particular motives to them.
Every mosque, institution, or building disagreeing with our views cannot therefore be identified with this condemned mosque without evidence.
Al-Tawbah 9:107 explicitly identifies harm, rejection, division, and support for hostility. It also provides a particular divine report about the founders’ oath and intention.
Other humans have no such direct access to people’s inner motives.
Judging a present institution or undertaking requires actual conduct, evidence, and consequences. Intellectual disagreement alone does not establish hypocrisy or intent to harm.
The usable principle is clear: a building’s foundation and purpose contribute to its value. Attributing hidden motives without valid evidence does not follow from that principle.
7. Translation proposals for Forqan
Qur’anic juruf can be explained as an “eroded bank” or, with shafā and hār, an “unstable precipice.”
The equivalents differ in precision.
A precipice suggests elevated ground or a dangerous edge, but does not necessarily express water undercutting its soil.
“Eroded bank” is lexically closer, though the corresponding Persian wording is more explanatory.
The Persian “edge of an unstable precipice” gives a natural image for the whole phrase, where shafā and hār accompany juruf.
The installed English Forqan translation of Al-Tawbah 9:109 reads:
“Is one who founded his building upon mindfulness of The God and His approval better, or one who founded his building on the edge of a crumbling bank, which collapsed with him into the fire of Hell? The God does not guide the unjust people.”
The rendering conveys the overall image and need not be changed at this stage.
The root article can explain that juruf is more specific than any precipice: erosion and soil carried away are prominent in its attested usage.
Brief root meaning
“J R F: removing and sweeping away a large quantity of something, especially soil eroded and carried off by flowing water.”
The Qur’anic contextual meaning
“Jurufin: a bank undercut by water and deprived of part of its support; here, qualified by hār, an unstable bank liable to collapse.”
The explanation separates the root’s core from its contextual meaning.
It also distinguishes juruf, shafā as the edge, and hār as crumbling.
Hypocrisy, corruption of a religious structure, or moral collapse should not replace juruf’s lexical meaning in the word box. These follow from Al-Tawbah 9:107, Al-Tawbah 9:108, Al-Tawbah 9:109, and Al-Tawbah 9:110 and the verse’s comparison.
Conclusion
Arabic J R F concerns removing, detaching, and sweeping away a substantial quantity.
Clearing mud, floodwater carrying soil and materials, and a bank losing support through water erosion illustrate the meaning clearly.
Nonphysical usages extend the image to loss of property and strength. Certain derivatives concern voracious eating, cutting skin to mark animals, and limited terrain or pasture usages.
Only jurufin in Al-Tawbah 9:109 occurs in the Qur’an. Shafā and hār together picture an eroded, crumbling bank with a building on its edge.
The surrounding verses distinguish two religious foundations: mindfulness of The God and His approval, and the harmful, divisive purposes of the other building’s founders.
The comparison exceeds juruf’s own meaning. Juruf names the eroded bank; other words express instability and collapse; criticism of hypocrisy and harm follows from context.
The direct, defensible Qur’anic meaning of juruf is a bank that erosion has deprived of part of its support. Shafā jurufin hārin presents its edge as unstable and ready to collapse.
The comparison draws its force from appearance and foundation. A building may look upright, but its appearance does not guarantee stability on an undermined bank. The Qur’an uses the natural image to evaluate a structure with a religious name and appearance whose purpose and foundation do not accord with mindfulness of The God and His approval.