The role of qiraahs in Ibn Hisham Al-Ansari's language istishhads

In this study, the way how Ibn Hisham al-Ansari uses the Koran qıraahs in his linguistic istishhads is examined specific to his Mughni al-labib 'an kutubi'l-e'ârib. It can be said that not only his personal effort but also the religious, socio-cultural, economic and political life of his time have an influence on the success of this author, who has a lot of works mostly in the field of syntax. The outbreak of the Mongolian invasion in the East and the civil strife and social conflict in Andalus in the West made Cairo, where the author lived, a center of culture and development. It is also seen that there was a productive scholarly atmosphere and many scientists grew up because of the political stability in the region. Ibn Hisham wrote a lot of works owing to this scholarly atmosphere, as well. The author puts emphasis on using conveyed evidences in his linguistic istishhads. The number of the ayahs he uses in Mughni al-labib reaches up to three thousand together with the reiterated ones. Even though there were controversies about using the hadiths in linguistic istishhads, Ibn Hisham showed the hadiths as evidence and encouraged use of them in his works. Besides, it is observed that the author gives great importance to Arabian kalam and often uses them in the syntax-based istishhads. The qıraahs are among the most important arguments that Ibn Hisham uses in the detection of linguistic bases. Since the early periods, the qıraahs have been used as evidence for the works written in the field of Arabic language, and at the same time the validity of the qıraah in the works of the field of qıraah have been tried to be proven by showing the Arabic language bases as evidence. In addition to this, it is seen that the linguists have handled with the qıraahs according to their own methods and ways, and they have subjected them to linguistic analysis for a variety of reasons in spite of accepting that "qıraahs are sunnahs to be complied with." As a result of the study, it is found out that the author often refers to the conveyed evidences and especially to the ayahs and qıraahs of Koran, and he shows both seven recitations and other readings as evidence to many lingual bases. It is also observed that Ibn Hisham has a preference about his readings among the seven recitations under the influence of his linguistic identity and he subjects some of them to linguistic analysis. It is viewed that some of his qıraahs has become isolated in attributing to their orator, and so have some other qıraahs in their reading. Ibn Hisham also adduces evidence through local Koran hujjat, which means to show evidence from the Koran which has been sent to a certain region, and he sometimes does not abstain from showing the qıraahs that are described as "unlikely to use, weak and baseless" by some linguists as evidence. It is also identified that the author adduces evidence from the readings, which do not comply with the writing style of the Koran.