Qur’anic Root J R H
Wounds, acquiring deeds, and hunting: from bodily injury to human action and responsibility
Qur’anic and lexical forms
الْجَوَارِحِ
(al-jawāriḥi)
Plural noun; one Qur’anic occurrence concerning hunting
الْجُرُوحَ
(al-jurūḥa)
Plural of wound; one Qur’anic occurrence
جَرَحْتُمْ
(jaraḥtum)
Form I verb; one Qur’anic occurrence
اجْتَرَحُوا
(ijtaraḥū)
Form VIII verb; one Qur’anic occurrence
جَرَحَ / جَرْح
(jaraḥa / jarḥ)
Verb and verbal noun; wounding or acquiring by context
جُرْح / جِرَاحَة
(jurḥ / jirāḥah)
Wound and injury nouns; lexical forms
جَرِيح / مَجْرُوح
(jarīḥ / majrūḥ)
Describing someone wounded; not Qur’anic
جَارِحَة
(jāriḥah)
Working bodily member or hunting animal; lexical singular
جَارِح
(jāriḥ)
Acquirer or one who wounds, according to usage
جَرَّحَ / تَجْرِيح
(jarraḥa / tajrīḥ)
Form II and verbal noun; not Qur’anic
اجْتِرَاح
(ijtirāḥ)
Form VIII verbal noun; not Qur’anic
اسْتَجْرَحَ
(istajraḥa)
Lexical form in the field of injury and adverse assessment
Arabic uses jaraḥa (جَرَحَ) both for wounding a body and for acquiring or doing something. Someone who wounds another with a sharp implement has performed jarḥ, but another usage describes what people do and acquire in life.
Within this family, jurḥ (جُرْح) denotes a wound; jarīḥ (جَرِيح), someone wounded; jāriḥah (جَارِحَة), a working bodily member or an animal that catches prey; and ijtirāḥ (اجْتِرَاح), acquiring or performing an act.
The Qur’an uses these semantic fields in four settings: wounds subject to justice and equivalent retribution; hunting animals trained by people; daytime deeds known to The God; and evil deeds relevant to judgment concerning those who commit them.
Understanding the family requires distinguishing wounding, leaving an effect, acquiring, and acting. They are related, but cannot all be reduced to the same meaning in every occurrence.
1. Forms and semantic cores
Recorded forms include jaraḥa (جَرَحَ), jarḥ (جَرْح), jurḥ (جُرْح), jirāḥah (جِرَاحَة), jurūḥ (جُرُوح), jirāḥ (جِرَاح), jarīḥ (جَرِيح), majrūḥ (مَجْرُوح), jāriḥ (جَارِح), jāriḥah (جَارِحَة), jawāriḥ (جَوَارِح), jarraḥa (جَرَّحَ), tajrīḥ (تَجْرِيح), ijtaraḥa (اجْتَرَحَ), ijtirāḥ (اجْتِرَاح), and istajraḥa (اسْتَجْرَحَ).
They occur in several branches. One concerns wounds and bodily injury; another, acquiring or performing an act. Further usages concern hunting, working bodily members, and injury to another person’s credibility or statement.
Ibn Fāris’s Maqāyīs al-Lughah distinguishes two principles: acquisition and splitting the skin.
Ibn Fāris, Maqāyīs: acquisition and splitting the skin
Al-Rāghib’s Al-Mufradāt instead begins with bodily injury and connects certain acquiring-deeds usages with the imagery of wounding and leaving an effect.
These explanations differ. Ibn Fāris separates two semantic branches; Al-Rāghib proposes an image linking them.
Both branches are attested in Arabic. Which came first historically, and how one developed from the other, cannot be established through similar imagery alone.
Quranic Arabic Corpus: four forms and four occurrences
Qur’anic jaraḥtum cannot be restricted to bodily wounding, nor can al-jurūḥ be translated as acquiring. Brief root meaning: Wounding and producing an injury on the body; in another branch, acquiring and performing an act.
2. Injury: wounds and bodily effects
Wounds on the body
Jaraḥahu describes causing a wound on another’s body.
Lisān al-ʿArab explains the verb through producing an effect with a weapon. Al-Rāghib likewise relates jarḥ to an injury affecting the skin; this should not be expanded into any lasting mark on the skin.
Jirāḥah can denote a particular wound, such as an injury from a blow or thrust. Lisān al-ʿArab also records a disagreement: Al-Layth treats it as one wound, whereas Al-Azharī objects to restricting it to a singular injury. It is therefore not uniformly defined as the name of one individual wound.
Lisān and Al-Mufradāt: wounds and differing accounts of jirāḥah
Jarīḥ and majrūḥ both describe someone or something wounded.
Here, a wound is the result of an action on the body. The word alone does not consistently specify its size, the amount of bleeding, or the injury’s severity.
A superficial wound and a deep injury can both be called jirāḥah; their difference requires further description.
Jarḥ and jurḥ
Lexical sources record a distinction between these vocalizations.
Jarḥ with fatḥah can denote the act of wounding, while jurḥ with ḍammah names the wound or resulting injury.
Actual usage does not always separate the fields completely, but the distinction between action and result matters.
Saying that someone wounded another describes an action; speaking of a wound on a hand or face identifies its result.
Jurūḥ in Al-Māʾidah 5:45 is a plural noun meaning wounds.
Repeated or extensive wounding
Arabic also records jarraḥahu, from Form II, for wounding.
Lisān al-ʿArab emphasizes multiplicity when explaining jarraḥahu. Repetition or extensive wounding is therefore specifically supported in this account.
This does not justify assuming that every Form II usage necessarily means several wounds or more severe injury than the basic verb.
A morphological pattern has expressive capacities, but does not alone quantify the injury.
A witness from early poetry
Al-Ḥuṭayʾah says:
«مَلُّوا قِرَاهُ وَهَرَّتْهُ كِلَابُهُمُ
وَجَرَّحُوهُ بِأَنْيَابٍ وَأَضْرَاسِ»
mallū qirāhu wa-harrat-hu kilābuhumu / wa-jarraḥūhu bi-anyābin wa-aḍrāsi
That is: “They tired of feeding him, their dogs growled at him, and they wounded him with fangs and teeth.”
The image uses teeth and fangs to convey injury.
In Al-Ḥuṭayʾah’s satirical setting, it can also be examined as an image of verbal abuse and hostile treatment. Wounding describes an injurious encounter.
Lisān al-ʿArab transmits the verse. Al-Ḥuṭayʾah lived across the pre-Islamic and Islamic periods, but this verse’s date is not independently established here. It should not be presented as certainly preceding the Qur’an.
Lisān al-ʿArab: extensive wounding and Al-Ḥuṭayʾah’s witness
3. From bodily wounds to verbal injury
Jaraḥahu bi-lisānihi (جَرَحَهُ بِلِسَانِهِ) is recorded for verbally abusing, disparaging, or finding fault with someone.
The instrument of injury is speech rather than a sword or sharp implement.
Insults, accusations, and humiliation may harm someone without producing a bodily wound.
The figurative image is understandable: just as a wound affects the body, harmful speech can damage reputation, credibility, or a person’s emotional condition.
Lexical study must nevertheless distinguish physical wounds from injury through speech.
In Al-Māʾidah 5:45, the eyes, nose, ears, and teeth accompanying al-jurūḥa qiṣāṣun establish the bodily setting.
The existence of figurative verbal jarḥ does not establish that the verse directly prescribes bodily retribution for every kind of verbal harm.
Challenging credibility and testimony
Jaraḥa al-shāhida (جَرَحَ الشَّاهِدَ) concerns challenging a witness’s credibility or identifying a defect that leads to rejection of the testimony.
This usage is recognized in juridical language and later technical discussions assessing transmitters.
Documenting a real defect differs from discrediting someone without evidence.
The term jarḥ does not guarantee that an accusation is true. Rejecting credibility requires evidence and appropriate criteria.
Jarḥ wa-taʿdīl is also a specialized Islamic-era term. It shows a further development of usage, but should not be substituted for the direct meaning of Qur’anic jurūḥ or ijtaraḥū.
Al-Miṣbāḥ and Maqāyīs: challenging witnesses and technical uses
4. Acquiring and performing an act
Jaraḥa as acquisition
Kitāb al-ʿAyn records ijtaraḥa ʿamalan (اجْتَرَحَ عَمَلًا) for acquiring or performing an act.
Lisān al-ʿArab likewise explains that jaraḥa al-shayʾa and ijtaraḥahu can mean acquiring it.
Jaraḥa li-ʿiyālihi (جَرَحَ لِعِيَالِهِ), for instance, describes working and earning provision for one’s family.
Neither a bodily wound nor necessarily a bad action is involved.
Someone may earn an income through beneficial work.
This matters: treating every usage in the family as inherently negative would fail to explain earning for one’s family.
A witness concerning human action
Kitāb al-ʿAyn quotes:
«وَكُلُّ فَتًى بِمَا عَمِلَتْ يَدَاهُ
وَمَا اجْتَرَحَتْ عَوَامِلُهُ رَهِينُ»
wa-kullu fatan bi-mā ʿamilat yadāhu / wa-mā ijtaraḥat ʿawāmiluhu rahīnu
That is: “Each person is held to what his hands have done and what his working members have acquired.”
Ijtaraḥat is associated here with the activity of bodily members.
ʿAwāmil denotes the members or instruments that perform work.
The witness illustrates the connection between ijtirāḥ and deeds. People act through their members, and their deeds are attributed to them.
The verse does not restrict ijtirāḥ to a particular sin. The act’s kind and value depend on the statement and its setting.
The poet’s name and the verse’s date are not specified in the account reviewed here, so it cannot securely be presented as pre-Qur’anic evidence.
Kitāb al-ʿAyn: ijtaraḥa ʿamalan and the bodily-action witness
Does ijtaraḥa always mean committing a sin?
Some lexical explanations associate ijtirāḥ with committing sin; Al-Rāghib particularly emphasizes this use.
The evidence as a whole does not establish that the verb means sinning in every construction.
Al-Jāthiyah 45:21 says ijtaraḥū al-sayyiʾāti (اجْتَرَحُوا السَّيِّئَاتِ).
Al-sayyiʾāt explicitly identifies the object: evil deeds.
The action’s negative value therefore does not depend on the root alone. Its object also shapes the meaning.
The poetic expression ijtaraḥat ʿawāmiluhu concerns human deeds without identifying a particular sin in the phrase itself.
Translation should accordingly use acquiring or doing, or committing in an adverse context, taking the ethical evaluation from the object and context.
5. Jawāriḥ: working bodily members and hunting animals
Jāriḥah has two significant Arabic uses.
One concerns members such as hands and feet through which people act.
The other concerns hunting animals that obtain food for themselves or their keepers by catching prey.
Its plural is jawāriḥ.
Human jawāriḥ
Working bodily members are called jawāriḥ because people perform deeds through them.
A hand can build, write, give, or cause harm. Feet take people toward actions, while other members also participate in conduct.
A jāriḥah in this usage need not be a member that wounds.
Calling the hand a jāriḥah does not make wounding its principal function. It can serve good or bad action.
Acquiring and acting therefore explain this usage better than restricting it to bodily injury.
Other verses concerning the responsibility of human members provide comparisons.
Yā Sīn 36:65 describes hands speaking and feet testifying about deeds. Fuṣṣilat 41:20, Fuṣṣilat 41:21, and Fuṣṣilat 41:22 describe testimony involving hearing, sight, and skin.
These verses do not use jawāriḥ itself, but clarify the members’ role in action and accountability.
Hunting animals
Arabic calls certain predatory beasts and hunting birds jawāriḥ.
Lexical sources include hunting dogs, hawks, falcons, eagles, and other predatory animals.
Two explanations of the designation are offered.
Some lexicographers connect it with wounding prey through claws or teeth.
Others emphasize acquisition: the animal obtains prey.
Both may apply to one animal, but wounding prey and obtaining it are distinct actions.
An animal may catch and hold prey, with the extent and kind of injury varying.
“Hunting animals” therefore serves the hunting verse better than “wounding animals.”
6. Al-Māʾidah 5:4: hunting with trained animals
يَسْأَلُونَكَ مَاذَا أُحِلَّ لَهُمْ قُلْ أُحِلَّ لَكُمُ الطَّيِّبَاتُ وَمَا عَلَّمْتُمْ مِنَ الْجَوَارِحِ مُكَلِّبِينَ تُعَلِّمُونَهُنَّ مِمَّا عَلَّمَكُمُ اللَّهُ فَكُلُوا مِمَّا أَمْسَكْنَ عَلَيْكُمْ وَاذْكُرُوا اسْمَ اللَّهِ عَلَيْهِ وَاتَّقُوا اللَّهَ إِنَّ اللَّهَ سَرِيعُ الْحِسَابِ
yasʾalūnaka mādhā uḥilla lahum qul uḥilla lakumu al-ṭayyibātu wa-mā ʿallamtum mina al-jawāriḥi mukallibīna tuʿallimūnahunna mimmā ʿallamakumu Allāhu fa-kulū mimmā amsakna ʿalaykum wa-udhkurū isma Allāhi ʿalayhi wa-ittaqū Allāha inna Allāha sarīʿu al-ḥisābi
“They ask you what is lawful for them. Say, “Good things are lawful for you, and what you have trained of hunting animals, as trainers, teaching them from what The God has taught you. Eat from what they catch for you, and mention The God’s name over it. Be mindful of The God; indeed, The God is swift in reckoning.””
The verse answers a question about lawful food.
It first mentions al-ṭayyibāt, then hunting animals trained by people. Al-Ṭabarī explains an understood “the game caught by what you have trained” in wa-mā ʿallamtum. The food under discussion is the animals’ catch, rather than eating the hunting animals themselves.
Al-Ṭabarī: jawāriḥ and the understood catch of trained animals
Al-jawāriḥ here lexically denotes hunting animals, rather than human bodily members.
ʿAllamtum, mukallibīn, and tuʿallimūnahunna support this reading.
People train these animals to catch prey.
Are jawāriḥ only hunting dogs?
Mukallibīn belongs to K L B and concerns dogs and training for hunting.
Study of K L B (Not yet published)
Jawāriḥ itself is not restricted to dogs in Arabic.
Lexicographers also include predatory beasts and hunting birds.
Mukallibīn alone therefore does not change the lexical meaning of jawāriḥ into dogs. Al-Ṭabarī transmits both a dogs-only interpretation and the general interpretation, preferring the latter. The lexical explanation does not imply that no exegetical disagreement exists.
Al-Basīṭ: the general account and the dogs-only interpretation
Mukallibīn nevertheless matters: it concerns the knowledge and practice of training for hunting and further specifies the setting.
The hunting animals’ designation must therefore be distinguished from the description of their trainers.
Catching prey and wounding it
The verse continues:
«فَكُلُوا مِمَّا أَمْسَكْنَ عَلَيْكُمْ»
fa-kulū mimmā amsakna ʿalaykum
That is: “Eat from what they catch for you.”
Amsakna (أَمْسَكْنَ), from M S K, concerns catching and holding.
Study of M S K (Not yet published)
The choice matters.
The clause does not say to eat what they wound. It speaks of what the animals catch and hold for people.
The designation jawāriḥ therefore does not establish wounding as the sole criterion stated by the verse.
Hunting animals may in practice wound prey with teeth or claws.
That is one aspect of hunting, but the Qur’anic provision must be considered through the verse’s full wording.
Training, remembering The God’s name, and responsibility
The verse emphasizes training:
«تُعَلِّمُونَهُنَّ مِمَّا عَلَّمَكُمُ اللَّهُ»
tuʿallimūnahunna mimmā ʿallamakumu Allāhu
People use knowledge The God has taught them to train the animals.
They are then instructed to eat from what the animals catch for them and mention The God’s name over it.
Hunting here thus involves more than animal instinct: human action, training, catching prey, and remembering The God’s name are present.
Later juridical details concerning the number of training sessions, animal categories, or every possible hunting situation should not be inserted into the lexical definition of jawāriḥ without evidence.
The root study’s clearer conclusion is that jawāriḥ names hunting animals able, through training, to obtain prey for people.
7. Jurūḥ: wounds, justice, and equivalent retribution
Al-Māʾidah, verse 45
وَكَتَبْنَا عَلَيْهِمْ فِيهَا أَنَّ النَّفْسَ بِالنَّفْسِ وَالْعَيْنَ بِالْعَيْنِ وَالْأَنْفَ بِالْأَنْفِ وَالْأُذُنَ بِالْأُذُنِ وَالسِّنَّ بِالسِّنِّ وَالْجُرُوحَ قِصَاصٌ فَمَنْ تَصَدَّقَ بِهِ فَهُوَ كَفَّارَةٌ لَهُ وَمَنْ لَمْ يَحْكُمْ بِمَا أَنْزَلَ اللَّهُ فَأُولَٰئِكَ هُمُ الظَّالِمُونَ
wa-katabnā ʿalayhim fīhā anna al-nafsa bi-al-nafsi wa-al-ʿayna bi-al-ʿayni wa-al-anfa bi-al-anfi wa-al-udhuna bi-al-udhuni wa-al-sinna bi-al-sinni wa-al-jurūḥa qiṣāṣun fa-man taṣaddaqa bihi fa-huwa kaffāratun lahu wa-man lam yaḥkum bi-mā anzala Allāhu fa-ulāʾika humu al-ẓālimūna
“We prescribed for them in it: life for life, eye for eye, nose for nose, ear for ear, tooth for tooth, and retribution for wounds. Whoever waives it as charity, it is an expiation for him. Whoever does not judge by what The God has sent down, those are the wrongdoers.”
Al-jurūḥ is the plural of jurḥ and denotes bodily wounds.
It accompanies life, eyes, nose, ears, and teeth.
The setting concerns injuries to the human body.
Unlike Al-Anʿām 6:60 and Al-Jāthiyah 45:21, acquisition of deeds is not the meaning here.
Wounds and responsibility for injury
Wa-al-jurūḥa qiṣāṣun associates wounds with qiṣāṣ.
Qiṣāṣ belongs to Q Ṣ Ṣ and in this juridical usage concerns pursuing an injury and a corresponding response.
The wound is an injury suffered by a person, connected in this setting with the injured party’s right and the perpetrator’s responsibility.
The provision is not restricted to killing: bodily wounds also enter the field of justice and addressing injury.
Jurūḥ itself nevertheless means wounds. Establishing responsibility, examining circumstances, proportionality, and waiver are separate juridical questions.
Proportionality and the response to injury
The association with qiṣāṣ does not establish a right for anyone to answer every perceived injury with arbitrary violence without examination.
Qiṣāṣ concerns pursuing and assessing the injury.
A real case requires determining the injury’s extent, intention or mistake, responsibility, and the conditions of a just response.
The verse also mentions waiver:
«فَمَنْ تَصَدَّقَ بِهِ فَهُوَ كَفَّارَةٌ لَهُ»
fa-man taṣaddaqa bihi fa-huwa kaffāratun lahu
It therefore describes more than responding to injury: it also mentions giving up the claim.
Both aspects belong in a juridical examination.
Al-Qurṭubī: retribution, waiver, and juridical differences
The provision in context
The verse begins with wa-katabnā ʿalayhim fīhā (وَكَتَبْنَا عَلَيْهِمْ فِيهَا).
Fīhā refers to the Torah in the preceding context. The verse first reports a provision prescribed for its addressees in that scripture.
That linguistic fact should be retained.
Its reporting in the Qur’an also matters, bringing forward justice, responsibility for injury, and the possibility of waiver.
Assessing its precise relation to the duties of the Qur’an’s addressees requires other verses, including Al-Baqarah 2:178 and Al-Baqarah 2:179, and judgment in Al-Māʾidah 5:48.
The root J R H alone does not settle this broader juridical question.
8. Jaraḥtum: human deeds by day
Al-Anʿām, verse 60
وَهُوَ الَّذِي يَتَوَفَّاكُمْ بِاللَّيْلِ وَيَعْلَمُ مَا جَرَحْتُمْ بِالنَّهَارِ ثُمَّ يَبْعَثُكُمْ فِيهِ لِيُقْضَىٰ أَجَلٌ مُّسَمًّى ثُمَّ إِلَيْهِ مَرْجِعُكُمْ ثُمَّ يُنَبِّئُكُمْ بِمَا كُنْتُمْ تَعْمَلُونَ
wa-huwa alladhī yatawaffākum bi-al-layli wa-yaʿlamu mā jaraḥtum bi-al-nahāri thumma yabʿathukum fīhi li-yuqḍā ajalun musamman thumma ilayhi marjiʿukum thumma yunabbiʾukum bi-mā kuntum taʿmalūna
“He is the One who takes you at night and knows what you have earned by day; then He raises you in it so that a specified term may be fulfilled. Then to Him is your return; then He will inform you of what you used to do.”
Jaraḥtum is a second-person plural perfect verb in Form I.
Its contextual meaning is acquiring or doing.
The verse describes The God’s knowledge of daytime deeds and subsequently people’s return and being informed about their actions.
Why does jaraḥtum not mean you wounded?
In wa-yaʿlamu mā jaraḥtum bi-al-nahār (وَيَعْلَمُ مَا جَرَحْتُمْ بِالنَّهَارِ), mā expresses the object: what you have done or acquired.
Restricting the verb to bodily wounding would reduce the verse to wounds inflicted by day.
The Arabic acquisition usage and the concluding bi-mā kuntum taʿmalūn show a broader subject.
The God knows what people do in their lives.
Good and bad deeds can both fall within the general field of action.
For a general translation, “what you have done or acquired” fits the context and ending. Alongside his broad explanation in terms of deeds, Al-Ṭabarī also transmits explanations concerning the acquisition of sin. The absence of al-sayyiʾāt as an object does not by itself establish unanimous interpretation.
Al-Ṭabarī: daytime deeds and transmitted sin-specific accounts
Why by day?
Night and day are contrasted.
Yatawaffākum occurs for the night, while daytime action and being raised again are also described.
This contrast relates to the cycle of sleep and waking.
Mentioning daytime deeds does not exclude nighttime actions from divine knowledge.
The verse describes a familiar human cycle rather than limiting The God’s knowledge to daylight hours.
Human action and divine knowledge
The verse ends:
«ثُمَّ يُنَبِّئُكُمْ بِمَا كُنْتُمْ تَعْمَلُونَ»
thumma yunabbiʾukum bi-mā kuntum taʿmalūna
That is, The God informs people of what they used to do.
The phrase links everyday conduct with final accountability.
People may forget some actions or fail to understand their consequences, but the verse describes knowledge from which those deeds are not hidden.
Jaraḥtum itself should not become reckoning or punishment. It describes acquiring and doing; informing people about their deeds and accountability belong to the rest of the verse.
9. Ijtaraḥū al-sayyiʾāt: acquiring evil deeds and judgment
Al-Jāthiyah, verse 21
أَمْ حَسِبَ الَّذِينَ اجْتَرَحُوا السَّيِّئَاتِ أَنْ نَجْعَلَهُمْ كَالَّذِينَ آمَنُوا وَعَمِلُوا الصَّالِحَاتِ سَوَاءً مَحْيَاهُمْ وَمَمَاتُهُمْ سَاءَ مَا يَحْكُمُونَ
am ḥasiba alladhīna ijtaraḥū al-sayyiʾāti an najʿalahum ka-alladhīna āmanū wa-ʿamilū al-ṣāliḥāti sawāʾan maḥyāhum wa-mamātuhum sāʾa mā yaḥkumūna
“Do those who have committed evil deeds think We will make them like those who believe and do good deeds, equal in their life and death? Evil is their judgment.”
Ijtaraḥū is a third-person plural perfect verb in Form VIII.
Its object is al-sayyiʾāt.
The clause thus concerns people who have committed evil deeds.
They are compared with those who believe and do good deeds.
Ijtirāḥ and righteous action
The verse contrasts two groups.
The first is described through ijtaraḥū al-sayyiʾāt.
The second through āmanū wa-ʿamilū al-ṣāliḥāt.
Human conduct matters in judgment concerning the person.
The different verbs do not justify a universal rule that ijtirāḥ always means evil action and ʿamila always means good action.
The Qur’an uses ʿamila for different kinds of conduct. Arabic also records ijtirāḥ for acquiring and performing an act.
Here, evil is specified by al-sayyiʾāt and goodness by al-ṣāliḥāt.
Does ijtirāḥ mean wounding truth?
Figuratively, one could say that bad conduct harms a person or society.
The verse does not directly say that those committing evil deeds have wounded truth.
Such language might occur in literary commentary, but the lexical meaning here is acquiring or performing an act.
Replacing it with “wounding truth” or “injuring the soul” without contextual evidence adds a new meaning.
The two groups’ lives and deaths
The verse goes on to discuss life, death, and judging the two groups alike.
Readings and syntactic analyses differ over sawāʾan and the pronouns in maḥyāhum and mamātuhum.
These differences do not change the verb ijtaraḥū itself.
The verb describes the first group’s conduct; judgment and equality or inequality follow from the sentence as a whole.
Al-Jāthiyah 45:22 then emphasizes creation in truth and each person’s recompense for what they have acquired.
Across the two verses, human action and acquisition are connected with responsibility and recompense.
11. Translation proposals for Forqan
The root has four Qur’anic forms in four distinct settings. They require separate contextual translations.
Al-jawāriḥ in Al-Māʾidah 5:4 can be translated as hunting animals. This fits the vocabulary and training context without restricting it to dogs or animals necessarily causing wounds.
Al-jurūḥ in Al-Māʾidah 5:45 means wounds: bodily injuries associated with qiṣāṣ.
Jaraḥtum in Al-Anʿām 6:60 means what you have done or acquired. The current Persian translation chooses “what you have acquired by day,” and the installed English says “what you have earned by day.” Both fit the acquisition-of-deeds field.
Ijtaraḥū al-sayyiʾāt in Al-Jāthiyah 45:21 can be rendered as committing evil deeds. Committing naturally suits this negative context without restricting every use of ijtirāḥ to sin.
A brief root explanation for Forqan can read:
“J R H: wounding and producing an injury on the body; in another branch, acquiring and performing an act.”
The specific Qur’anic forms can be explained as follows:
Al-jawāriḥ: hunting animals; here, animals people train to catch prey.
Al-jurūḥ: wounds; bodily injuries associated here with equivalent retribution.
Jaraḥtum: what you have done or acquired; here, human daytime deeds.
Ijtaraḥū: they committed or acquired; with al-sayyiʾāt here, committing evil deeds.
These distinctions allow each form to be understood in its context without imposing one meaning everywhere.
Conclusion
Arabic J R H has two principal attested branches: wounding and acquiring.
In the first, jurḥ and jurūḥ denote a wound and wounds. In the second, jaraḥa and ijtaraḥa can describe acquiring or performing an act.
Jawāriḥ connects these fields: in one usage it names working bodily members, in another hunting animals that obtain prey. Such animals may wound prey, but acquiring and catching also figure in explanations of their designation.
The root’s four Qur’anic occurrences illustrate four settings.
Al-Māʾidah 5:4 concerns trained hunting animals. Al-Māʾidah 5:45 associates wounds with justice and equivalent retribution. Al-Anʿām 6:60 places daytime deeds before divine knowledge, while Al-Jāthiyah 45:21 connects committed evil deeds with judgment concerning those responsible.
All J R H usages cannot be reduced to bodily wounds; nor can the bodily sense be discarded and every derivative treated solely as acquisition or action.
The family’s defensible meanings lie in the two attested branches of wounds and acquiring deeds. Their connection through imagery of leaving an effect can be examined, but each form requires its own construction and context.
Bodily wounds, earning provision, catching prey, and committing evil are different usages. The Qur’an employs different forms of the same root in these settings, but ethical value, juridical responsibility, and consequences do not follow from the word alone. The relevant verses express them through other words and constructions.