Al-Tisʿīniyya - Ibn Taimiya - (2/680)

Al-TisʿīniyyaIbn Taimiya

that accords with external reality; whereas the lying informant who knows he is lying fashions in his mind an estimate that only imitates knowledge. To imagine what exists as non-existent and what is non-existent as existent—in both thought and speech—occurs more times than can be counted (1). Accordingly, the meaning of his statement is nothing but a hypothetical knowledge, not genuine knowledge (2); what is being reported possesses in the external world merely a posited existence, not a real one. What is imagined is not real, neither in the mind nor outside it. Yet because he has imagined himself to be knowledgeable, he likewise imagines the existence of the thing reported outside himself. When the listener believes him and assumes that he is truthful (3), taking what he says to be fact, he does not regard it as imagined but treats it as established. Every unsound belief consists of mental conjectures (4) that have no reality outside the mind. Such conjectures are indeed reports and convictions, even though they are not knowledge (5); yet in outward form they resemble what is real, just as the speech of the liar resembles the speech of the truthful, and his handwriting resembles his handwriting. Thus they are alike in their signification—whether written, spoken, or conceived.

Exactly the same applies to a command issued purely as a test. In reality, the tester is neither truly demanding nor truly willing anything at all; rather, his being a demander and a willer is only hypothesized. For by making that hypothesis, the obedience and compliance of the addressee become manifest just as they would were the demand genuine. Presenting such a test belongs to the realm of indirect allusion (maʿārīḍ): it may be permissible, and it may be impermissible. It is akin to a speaker causing the listener to grasp a meaning the speaker never intended; the wording may point to that meaning from one angle and fail to point to it from another. The speaker’s own meaning is thus something the listener does not apprehend, whereas what the listener understands is something else entirely. Likewise, for the tester the signification of the verbal form, from his own standpoint, is merely a putative request (6) and a putative will, whereas in relation to

(1) In edition T the reading is yahsur. (2) In edition T the reading is lianna (because). (3) In editions S and T the reading is wahasabnahu sadiqan (“and he considered him truthful”). (4) In edition S the reading is taqrirat (confirmations). (5) In the original text the reading is ma‘luman (known); however, I have adopted what I deemed more appropriate for the context from editions S and T. (6) In the original text the reading is talaban muqaddaran (“a predetermined request”); this reading is confirmed by editions S and T.

المطابق للخارج، فالمخبر الكاذب الَّذي يعلم أنَّه كاذب قدر في نفسه تقديرًا مضاهيًا للعلم، فإن تقدير الموجود معدومًا، والمعدوم موجودًا في الأذهان واللسان أكثر من أن تحصر (١) ، فمعنى خبره هو علم مقدر لا علم محقق أن (٢) مخبر الخبر في الخارج وجود مقدر لا وجود محقق، والمقدر ليس بمحقق لا في الذهن ولا في الخارج، لكن لما قدر هو أنَّه عالم قدر -أيضًا- وجود المخبر في الخارج، والمستمع لما اعتقد صدقه وحسب أنَّه صادق (٣) وأن لما قاله حقيقة، لم يظنه مقدرًا بل حسبه محققًا، وكل اعتقاد فاسد تقديرات (٤) ذهنية لا حقيقة لها في الخارج، وهي أخبار واعتقادات وإن لم تكن علومًا (٥) ، لكن هي في الصورة من جنس المحقق، كما أن لفظ الكاذب من جنس لفظ الصادق، وخطه من جنس خطه، فهما متشابهان في الدلالة خطًا ولفظًا وعقدًا. فكذلك أمر الممتحن، هو في الحقيقة ليس بطالب ولا مريدٍ أصلًا، بل هو مقدر لكونه طالبًا مريدًا، لأنه يظهر بتقدير ذلك من طاعة المأمور وامتثاله ما يظهر بتحقيقه، ثم إظهار ذلك هو من باب المعاريض قد يجوز ذلك، وقد لا يجوز، مثل أن يفهم المتكلم للمستمع معنى لم يرده المتكلم، واللفظ قد يدل عليه بوجه ولا يدل عليه بوجه، فمعناه في نفسه هو الَّذي لا يفهمه المستمع، ومفهوم المستمع شيء آخر، وكذلك الممتحن مدلول الصيغة في نفسه طلب مقدر (٦) وإرادة مقدرة، وبالنسبة

(١) في ط: يحصر. (٢) في ط: لأن. (٣) في س، ط: وحسبانه صادق. (٤) في س: تقريرات. (٥) في الأصل: معلومًا. وأثبت ما رأيته مناسبًا للكلام من: س، ط. (٦) في الأصل: طلبًا مقدرًا. والمثبث من: س، ط.