المعلقاُت السبع جدليتا الرواية والتعليق

Abstract

This study aimed to explore the dialectics of narration and hanging in the Seven Mu‘allaqāt. The study adopted the inductive-deductive methodology. The study reached several conclusions, including: There is no definitive evidence in the pre-Islamic poetry or in the sources of Arabic language and literature suggested that the Arabs, in general, have selected certain of the finest and longest poems thus naming them as alMu‘allaqāt then, wrote and hung them on the walls of the Kaaba. The variations observed in the Mu‘allaqāt , such as additions, omissions, deletions, or changes in their verses, indicate that they reached the stage of recording through oral transmission, rather than being written down and then hung. The containment of general events that occurred during the pre-Islamic era in certain Mu‘allaqāt suggests that the simple life of the pre-Islamic Arabs along with the widespread illiteracy in their society, reduces the hypothesis of the Mu‘allaqāt being written down and hung. Furthermore, pre-Islamic poetry, which served as the Arabs’ knowledge and a source of their education, in its poems, lyric stanza, or verses, never named or described these Mu‘allaqāt or mentioned their hanging, as the case in some of its verses allude to such traditions like stopping at ruins or employing specific poetic imagery and themes. Rather it referred to the oral tradition’s role in transmitting and preserving poetry. The narrative surrounding the recording and hanging of these poems has no variations in its transmission sources. Rather, it is a single, frequently repeated, and transmitted narrative.