The subject of significant narrowing in es-Semîn el Halebet's book Umdetu'l Huffaz - semantic study

Abstract: The issue of identifying the phenomenon of meaning development has occupied everyone interested in Arabic language and science in our ancient and modern world. Modern studies have tried to reveal the reasons and theories of this phenomenon and examined these three phenomena, which are types of meaning transition, meaning expansion and meaning narrowing. This development has shown its effects in the Arab legacy, especially in Arabic dictionaries. Those dealing with these sciences have determined the meaning development of words. This work we have has been discussed under the title (Narrowing of Meaning in his work named Umdetü'l-Huffâẓ fî Tefsîri Eşrefi'l-Elfâẓ). The study aimed to focus on the phenomenon of meaning restriction in one of the Quran words dictionaries. Because, the meaning narrowing is one of the meaning development phenomena that occur in words and expresses an aspect of the main general meaning after the narrowing or that allocates a new and special meaning to the word by imposing some conditions and limitations on the main meaning. The factors affecting this narrowing of meaning (allotment) are diverse, including the emergence of religion or Islam, and the factors within the customs and language itself. At the same time, the study dealt with the topic from a practical point of view. In this rich dictionary named "Umdetü'l-Huffaz", the words that I think have a narrowing of meaning have been determined. These detected words were grouped under three headings: words with religious constriction, words with customary shrinkage, and words with linguistic constriction. These main headings are; 1-The words discussed by the scholars before Semin al-Halebi, 2-The words that only Semin al-Halebi discussed are divided into two sub-headings. The study has reached very important results, some of which are given below: The term narrowing of meaning is a new concept with this title but an old concept in terms of its meaning and position. Ancient and modern lexicographers and linguists drew attention to this phenomenon and made efforts to identify them. Meaning narrowing is a work that has taken its share in the Umdetü'l-Huffaz dictionary among the concepts of meaning development. The study identified meaning allocation in over seventy words. These allocations are spread across religious, customary and linguistic types. In the work of Umdetü'l Hufaz, the facts showing the narrowing of meaning varied between clear and unambiguous signs and implication. Semin al-Halebi followed the views of Ragib and others, who preceded him, that there was a narrowing of meaning in many words, but there were also words that only he mentioned and that someone else did not point out. The number of this species has reached sixteen words in this study. Key Words: Language, Semantic, Meaning development, Meaning narrowing, Dictionary