Classical Arabic - English Dictionary

فَدَاهُ, (T, Ṣ, M, &c.,) aor. يَفْدِيهِ, (Mṣb, Ḳ,) inf. n. فِدَآءٌ (T, Ṣ, M, Mgh, Ḳ, [omitted in my copy of the Mṣb, probably by inadvertence,]) and فَدًى, (Mgh,) or فِدًى, (so in the M, accord. to the TT,) or also both of these, (Fr, T, Ṣ, Mṣb, Ḳ,) the latter of them said by Fr, on one occasion, to be the more common, (T, TA,) [which is the case when it is a subst., like فِدْيَةٌ,] but ʼAlee Ibn-Suleymán El-Akhfash [i. e. El-Akhfash El-Asghar] is related to have said that this is not allowable except by poetic license, and El-Ḳálee says that الفِدَى was used by the Arabs in conjunction with الحِمَى, [see حِمَآءُ, in art. حمى,] but other forms were used in other cases [among which he seems to mention فَدَآء, with fet-ḥ and the lengthened alif, but the words in which I find this expressed are somewhat ambiguous, and are also rendered doubtful by an erasure and an alteration]; (TA;) andافتداهُ↓, (M,) [whence an ex. in a verse which will be found in what follows,] orافتدى↓ بِهِ (Ḳ, TA) and مِنْهُ, (TA,) [but I do not know افتدى in either of these phrases as having any other than the well-known meaning of فَدَى نَفْسَهُ, which is strangely omitted in the Ḳ;] and know فادِاهُ↓, (Ṣ, Mgh, Mṣb, Ḳ, TA,) inf. n. مُفَادَاةٌ and فِدَآءٌ; (Mṣb, TA;) but some explain this differently [as will be shown in what follows]; (T, Mgh, Mṣb, TA;) He gave his ransom; (Ṣ;) he gave a thing, (Ḳ, TA, [اَعْطاهُ in the CK being a mistake for أَعْطَى, without the affixed pronoun,]) or a captive, for him, (TA,) and so liberated him; (Ḳ, TA;) [i. e. he ransomed him;] or he liberated him, or ransomed him, مِنَ الأَسْرِ [from captivity]: (Mgh, Mṣb:) orفاداهُ↓ signifies he loosed him, or set him free, and took his ransom: (Mgh, Mṣb, TA:) or مُفَادَاةٌ signifies the giving a man and taking a man [in exchange]: and فِدَآءٌ, [as inf. n. of فَدَاهُ,] the purchasing him [from captivity or the like]: (Mbr, T, Mgh, Mṣb, TA:) or the preserving a man from misfortune by what one gives by way of compensation for him; as also فَدًى: (Er-Rághib, TA:) you say, فَدَيْتُهُ بِمَالِى I purchased [i. e. ransomed] him with my property, and بِنَفْسِى with myself: (T:) or, accord. to Nuseyr Er-Rázee, the Arabs say, فَادَيْتُ↓ الأَسِيرَ [I ransomed the captive], and فَدَيْتُهُ بِأَبِى وَأُمِى [I ransomed him in a tropical sense with my father and my mother], and بِمَالٍ [with property], as though thou purchasedst him and freedst him therewith, when he was not a captive; and you may say, فَدَيْتُ الأَسيرَ meaning I freed the captive from the state in which he was, though فَادَيْتُ↓ is better in this sense: as to the reading تَفْدُوهُمْ [in the Ḳur ii. 79], Aboo-Mo'ádh says, it means Ye purchase them from the enemy and liberate them; but the reading تُفَادُوهُمْ↓, he says, means ye contend with them who are in your hands respecting the price and they so contend with you: (T, TA:) [that افتداهُ↓ is syn. with فَدَاهُ is shown by what here follows:] a poet says,

* يُفْتَدَى لَفَدَيْتُهُ فَلَوْ كَانَ مَيتٌ *

* بِمَا لَمْ تَكُنْ عَنْهُ النُّفُوسُ تَطِيبُ *

[And if a person dead were to be ransomed, assuredly I would ransom him with what minds would not be willing to relinquish]. (M, TA.)

[The inf. ns. of the first of these verbs are much used in precative phrases:] they said, فَدًى لَكَ [for فَدَاكَ فَدًى, and therefore virtually meaning فُدِيتَ Mayest thou be ransomed; the ل being لِلتَّبْيِينِ i. e. “for the purpose of notifying” the person addressed]: (TA:) and بِى أَ فَدًى لَكَ [for فَدَاكَ أَبِى بِنَفْسِهِ فَدًى, and therefore virtually meaning simply فَدَاكَ أَبِى بِنَفْسِهِ May my father ransom thee with himself; so that it may be well rendered may my father be a ransom for thee]: (Ṣ:) and فِدَآء, with tenween, some of the Arabs pronounce with kesr [to the ء, i. e. they pronounce فِدَآء with the tenween of kesr], peculiarly when it is next to [meaning immediately followed by] the preposition ل, saying فِدَآءٍ لَكَ, because it is indeterminate; they intending thereby the meaning of a prayer; and Aṣ has cited [as an ex. thereof] the saying of En-Nábighah [Edh-Dhubyánee],

* مَهْلًا فِدَآءٍ لَكَ الأَقْوَامُ كُلُّهُمُ *

* وَمَا أُثَمِرُ مِنْ مَالٍ وَمِنْ وَلَدِ *

[Act gently: may the peoples, all of them, and what I make to be abundant of wealth and of offspring, give themselves as a ransom, or be a ransom, for thee: فِدَآءٍ being app. assimilated to an indeterminate imperative verbal noun such as صَهٍ in the phrase صَهٍ يَا رَجُلُ, which is as though one said اُسْكُتْ سُكُوتًا يَا رَجُلُ; thus meaning here لِيَفْدِكَ: but De Sacy mentions, in his “Chrest. Arabe,” see. ed., vol. ii., p. 460, three allowable readings (not the foregoing reading) in this verse, namely, فدآءٌ and فدآءً and فدآءٍ; and adds that what here follows is said by a commentator to be, of several explanations, that which is the right: والقول الآخر وهو الصحيح ان فدآءِ بمعنى ليُفدِكَ فبناه كما بنى الامر وكذلك تَراكِ و دَراكِ لانه بمعنى اترك و ادرك: this, it will be observed, is similar to the explanation which I have offered of فِدَآءٍ لك; for ليُفدِك is app. a typographical mistake for ليَفدِك: and I incline to think that فدآءِ, though supposed to be correct and therefore likened to تَراكِ and دَراكِ, is a mistake of a copyist for فدآءٍ; and the more so because I find in Ahlwardt's “Divans of the Six Ancient Arabic Poets” the three readings فِداءٌ and فِداءً and فِداءٍ, but not فِداءِ]. (Ṣ, TA.)

وَفَدَيْنَاهُ بِذِبْحٍ [in the Ḳur xxxvii. 107] means And we made an animal prepared for sacrifice to be a ransom for him, and freed him from slaughter. (T, TA.)

فَدَتْ نَفْسَهَا مِنْ زَوْجِهَا andافتدت↓ [alone] mean She gave property to her husband so that she became free from him by divorce. (Mṣb, TA.)

See also what next follows {2}.

فدّاهُ, (Ṣ,* Ḳ,) or فدّاهُ بِنَفْسِهِ, (Ṣ,* TA,) [or both, for both are correct,] inf. n. تَفْدِيَةٌ; (Ṣ, Ḳ;) andفَدَاهُ↓ بنفسه, (Ṣ, TA,*) aor. يَفْدِيهِ, inf. n. فِدَآءٌ; (TA;) He said to him فِدَاكَ جُعِلْتُ↓ [May I be made thy ransom, i. e. a ransom for thee]. (Ṣ, Ḳ, TA.)

see 1, former half, in five places.

In the saying respecting bloodwits, وَإِنْ أَحَبُّوا فَادَوْا, the meaning is, [And if they like,] they free the slayer, or his next of kin who is answerable for him, and accept the bloodwit; because this is a substitute for the blood, like as the ransom is a substitute for the captive. (Mgh.)

افداهُ الأَسِيرَ [in the CK (erroneously) الاسيرُ] He accepted from him the ransom of the captive. (M, Ḳ.) Hence the saying of the Prophet to Kureysh, when ʼOthmán Ibn-ʼAbd-Allah and El-Hakam Ibn-Keysán had been made captives, لَا نُفْدِيكُمُو هُمَا حتَّى يَقْدَمَ صَاحِبَانَا [We will not accept from you the ransom of them two until our two companions shall come], meaning [by the two companions] Saạd Ibn-Abee-Wakkás and 'Otbeh Ibn-Ghazwán. (M.)

افدى فُلَانٌ Such a one danced, or dandled, his child: (Ḳ, TA:) because of his [often] saying, فَدِى لَكَ أَبِى وَأُمِى [May my father and my mother be ransoms for thee]. (TA.)

افدى also signifies He made for his dried dates a store-chamber. (Ḳ.)

And † He became large in his body; (IAạr, T, Ḳ, TA;) as though it became like the فَدَآء [q. v.]. (TA.)

And He sold dates. (IAạr, T, Ḳ.)

تفادوا They ransomed one another. (Ṣ, TA.)

And † They guarded themselves, one by another; as though every one of them made his fellow to be his ransom. (Mṣb, TA.)

And تفادى مِنْهُ ‡ He guarded against it, or was cautious of it, and kept aloof from it. (Ṣ, Ḳ,* TA.)

see 1, first quarter, in two places; and again, near the middle of the paragraph.

As intrans., افتدى signifies [He ransomed himself;] he gave a ransom for himself. (Er-Rághib, TA.) You say, افتدى مِنْهُ بِكَذَا [He ransomed himself from him with such a thing]. (Ṣ.) Hence the usage of the verb in the Ḳur ii. 229. (TA.) See 1, last sentence but one.

فَدًى andفِدًى↓ andفِدَآءٌ↓ andفِدْيَةٌ↓ all signify the same, (Ṣ, Ḳ,) i. e. [A ransom;] a thing, (Ḳ, TA,) or a captive, (TA,) that is given for a man, who is therewith liberated: (Ḳ, TA:) [the first three are also inf. ns. (and have been mentioned as such in the first paragraph); therefore when you say فَدًى لَكَ أَبِى and فِدًى لك ابى, the words فَدًى and فِدًى may be either inf. ns. or substs.: as substs., the second and third are more common than the first:] فِدْيَةً [is also sometimes expl. as an inf. n., but accord. to general usage] signifies as above; (Ḳ, TA;) or property given as a substitute [or a ransom] for a captive: (Mgh, Mṣb, TA:) and property by the giving of which one preserves himself from evil in the case of a religious act in which he has fallen short of what was incumbent, like the expiation for the breaking of an oath and of a fast; and thus it is used in the Ḳur ii. 180 and 192: (Er-Rághib, TA:) and its pl. is فِدًى and فِدَيَاتٌ. (Mgh, Mṣb, TA.)

فِدًى: see the next preceding paragraph. [Hence the phrase] جُعِلْتُ فِدَاكَ: see 2. It is also a pl. of its syn. فِدْيَةً. (Mgh, Mṣb, TA.)

فِدْيَةٌ: see فَدًى.

خُذْ عَلَى هِدْيَتِكَ وَفِدْيَتِكَ, accord. to the Ḳ, but in the Ṣ, خُذْ فِى هِدْيَتِكَ وَقِدْيَتِكَ, mentioned in art. قدى, is a saying meaning [Take thou to] that [course] in which thou wast: the author of the Ḳ seems to have followed Ṣgh, who has mentioned it here: (TA in the present art.:) فِدْيَهٌ and قِدْيَهٌ are dial. vars. (TA in art. قدى.)

فَدَآءٌ An أَنْبَار, (Ḳ, TA,) i. e. (TA) a collection, of wheat: (M, Ḳ,* TA:) or it signifies, (Ḳ,) or signifies also, (M,) a collection of food, consisting of barley and dates and the like: (M, Ḳ:) or an أَنْبَار, i. e. a collection, of food, consisting of wheat and dates and barley: (Ṣ:) and it is said to signify a place in which dates are spread and dried, in the dial. of ʼAbd-El-Keys. (M.)

And The حَجْم [or protuberant, or prominent, part, or perhaps the bulk,] of a thing (M, Ḳ) of any kind. (M.)

الفِدَاوِيَّةُ is the appellation of A class, or rect, of the خَوَارِج of the دُرْزِيَّة [or دُرُوز, whom we call the Druses; it is a coll. gen. n., of which the n. un. is فِدَاوِىُّ; the و being a substitute for ء: it is used to signify those who undertake perilous adventures, more particularly for the destruction of enemies of their party; as though they offered themselves as ransoms or victims; and hence it is applied to the sect called in our histories of the Crusades “The Assassins”]. (TA.)

[مَفْدِىٌّ, originally مَفْدُوىٌ. In the saying بِنَفْسِى فُلَانٌ مُفْدِىٌّ With my soul, or myself, may such a one be ransomed, مَفْدِىٌّ is often suppressed; being meant to be understood.]