Thus, a ḥadd—an articulated definition—only points to the thing; it does not disclose its very identity. It is like saying to someone, “So-and-so is in that house”: you have indicated him before he is seen, and the hearer might already picture what he shares with others even without that indication.

Whoever ponders this will realize that the definitions devised for someone who does not yet know the thing are made up solely of shared qualities; they contain no property peculiar to it. Although a distinctive feature is indispensable for a fully differentiating definition, the listener has not yet conceived it. Such definitions therefore do not reveal the thing’s essence, much less portray what would bring it vividly to mind. All they do is acquaint one with it by way of a near likeness; for if an exact counterpart were known, the reality itself would already be known.

The differentiator may be a single attribute, or it may lie in the combination of two attributes. If the listener already knows the property that makes the thing unique, he has grasped it in its very self and thus belongs to the first category—he merely needs the term rendered for him.

Consider, for instance, the word khamr. A person who knows neither the term nor its referent is told that it is “the intoxicating drink.” The word “drink” is a genus that includes khamr and every other beverage—this is obvious. Likewise, “intoxicating,” imagined to be a differentia unique to khamr, is in fact a genus shared by drinks and other things, for intoxication may arise from food, and sometimes from neither food nor drink at all. Hence it makes no difference whether one says “the intoxicant among beverages,” “that in which drinking and intoxication coincide,” or simply “the intoxicating drink.” All of this resembles saying, “a silk garment,” “an iron door,” or “a tall (or short) man,” for “man” is broader than “tall,” and “tall” is broader than “man,” yet when the two are joined a specific individual is singled out.

The same holds true for their definition of the human being as “the rational animal.” When opponents objected that angels also fit that description, later scholars added the qualifier “mortal.” Yet this is an unsound addition, for mortality is not an essential attribute of man; one can conceive of a human being without his death even crossing the mind, indeed without