Exploring the referential range of etymologically-related lexical pairs in the language of the Qur’an: A cognitive-semantic approach

Abstract The present study conducts a cognitive-semantic analysis of etymologically-related lexical pairs in the language of the Qur’an. Based on objective selection criteria, the lexical pair rīĥ (a singular form literally meaning wind) and riyāĥ (a plural form literally meaning winds) has been claimed to be representative of the final data set, which includes 20 lexical pairs. Building on the theoretical underpinnings of descriptive semantics and frame semantics, the analysis sought to fulfill three main objectives: (a) identifying the referential range of the pair rīĥ and riyāĥ and its central reference point; (b) explaining the way the historical and theological context helps to mark the connotations associated with each sense in the referential range; and (c) sorting the discourse functions communicated through the cognitive frame(s) evoked by such a lexical pair. Findings showed that the central cognitive frame of both lexical items is that of moving air. However, rīĥ has developed, through metaphorical extension, two other senses that are not applicable to riyāĥ: power/predominance and smell. Finally, both lexical items have been proven to have positive, negative, and neutral connotations that have been divinely manipulated to perform various discourse functions.


Introduction
Arabic, a Semitic language, involves two high varieties with different norms: Classical Arabic (CA) and Modern Standard Arabic (MSA).While CA is the language of pre-Islam poetry, Prophetic speeches, and the Qur'an, MSA is the language of formal media, publications, and education.It has been largely affirmed that the language of the Qur'an is a subvariety of CA.A close reading of the Qur'anic text shows that many lexemes share the same origin (etymon), but simultaneously they have quite different senses and connotations.Accordingly, they could be claimed to perform different communicative functions and augment peculiar readings, considering their underlying historical and theological contexts.In relation to this axiom, homonymic lexemes, i.e., those with a different sense, are assumed to be interpreted differently, thereby causing problems in understanding the (Qur'anic) text and in translation.It is commonly assumed that the sense associated with a singular form is kept in the plural form.For instance, the Qur'anic lexeme " ‫ﻟ‬ ‫ﺒ‬ ‫ﺎ‬ ‫ﺱ‬ " (libās [raiment]) is homonymic as it is used to signify good deed, e.g., (wa libāsu at-taqwá dhālika khayr ["But the raiment of righteousness, that is the best."])[7:26], 1 and clothes, e.g., (yā banī 'ādama qad 'anzalnā `alaykum libāsāan yuwārī saw"ātikum wa rīshāan ["O ye Children of Adam!We have bestowed raiment upon you to cover your shame, as well as to be an adornment to you."]) [7:26].Though the plural form " ‫ﺃ‬ ‫ﻟ‬ ‫ﺒ‬ ‫ﺴ‬ ‫ﺔ‬ " ('albisah) is not mentioned in the Qur'anic text, we assume that both senses of good deeds and clothes would be associated with such a plural noun.The singular and plural forms are assumed to frame the same situation differently.Also, there is a conceptual mapping from the physical domain of "clothes" to the cognitive structure of "good deeds." The present study offers a qualitative analysis, based on a pilot quantitative analysis, of Qur'anic lexemes sharing the same root but used with different senses in order to explain the cognitive frames through which these lexemes acquired such different senses.The target word pair is rīĥ (a singular form literally meaning wind) and riyāĥ (a plural form literally meaning winds), representing a singular and a plural form, respectively.This word pair was chosen specifically because it appears frequently in the Qur'anic text and has a wide range of referential meanings.For the identification of the so-called referential range (i.e., range of senses) of the target word pair, Classical Arabic dictionaries are consulted, along with vastly cited exegetical interpretations for understanding the underlying context of each verse containing either of the target words.
In essence, the present study aims at (a) identifying and comparing the senses associated with rīĥ and riyāĥ in the Qur'anic text (i.e., their conceptual content;Langacker, 2008), (b) linking such senses to historical and theological contexts underlying the use of the target pair to show how they are cognitively framed, and (c) comparing the connotations (positive, negative, and neutral) marking the use of each word.In view of these objectives, the study questions could be stated as follows: (1) Given the boundaries of the Qur'anic discourse, what is the referential range of the pair rīĥ and riyāĥ?And based on such a referential range, which form is polysemic and which is monosemic; and regarding the polysemic form, what is the central reference point from which other senses developed?(2) Given such referential ranges, how do the context and cotext help to mark the connotations associated with each sense?And (3) What are the discourse functions communicated through the cognitive frame(s) evoked by such a word pair?
To offer objective answers to these questions, the present study adopts a qualitative cognitive semantic approach.It links the foundations of descriptive semantic theories as proposed by scholars such as Ullmann (1953Ullmann ( , 1957)), Leech (1974), Lyons (1977, 1995), and Stalnaker (2017) to the cognitive basis underlying lexemic selection and use as proposed by Ch.J. Fillmore (1976), Ch. Fillmore (2007) in his account of frame semantics.The cognitive-semantic approach best fits the study objectives as it would help to trace and compare the senses (referential range) associated with rīĥ and riyāĥ (their semantic representations) in the Qur'anic text with special reference to connotative and functional meaning aspects.Empirically, it would bridge the gap between meaning construction and knowledge representation as it approaches meaning as inherently experiential (or conceptual) rather than arbitrary.That is, it would show how both lexemes encode similar or different conceptualizations of experience.In this regard, Fillmore and Baker (2010) affirm that all content words require an appeal to the context frames in which the message they express is motivated and interpreted in order to be understood.Furthermore, such an approach would hopefully offer new lexicological and lexicographical insights in Qur'anic linguistic research, as it would open new avenues of research to explore similar etymologically related Qur'anic lexemes in terms of their referential range as well as their possible textually-invoked cognitive frames.
The rest of the paper is structured as follows: Section 2 discusses related literature.Section 3 explicates the theoretical framework of descriptive semantics, with particular emphasis on denotation, connotation, referential range, and cognitive framing.The methodology is explained in Section 4 in terms of data description and procedure of analysis.Section 5 analyses the data and states the main findings.Section 6 discusses the study findings and offers insights for further research.
In addition to the concept of "al-"alfāž al-mutawaāţi'ah', Arabic studies maintain a pool of terms that capture the essence of the phenomenon of having words with similar forms and (un)related senses, including "al-wujuūh wa-an-nažaā'ir" (senses and referents), al-mushtarak al-lafžī (polysemy, i.e., words having the same form and related meanings), at-taraāduf (synonymy, i.e., words with the same or similar meaning), and at-taşrīf (declension, i.e., the alteration of a word's form by some inflection, usually to express how it functions syntactically in a sentence).These terms could be traced in different annotated manuscripts such as Al-Tha`aālibī (1932), Al-Damaghaānī (1983), Al-Qaāri ' (1988), Bin-Sallām (2007), and Bin-Sulaymaān (2011).As an independent discipline of Qur'anic studies, "al-wujuūh wa-an-nažaā'ir" studies lexemes with a similar form and variant senses, as "al-wujuūh" stands for senses and "an-nažaā'ir" stands for referents (see Section 3).That is, while "al-wujuūh" refers to the different senses of lexemes as they are used in different contexts in the Qur'anic text, "an-nažaā'ir" refers to the lexemes used across the Qur'anic text even if they do not keep the same form.For instance, in the Qur'anic text, the referent " ‫ﺑ‬ َ ‫ۡﻌ‬ ‫ﻞ‬ ِ " (ba`l) stands for both "a husband" as in " " (qālat yā waylatā 'a'alidu wa 'anā `ajūzun wa hadhā ba`lī shaykhāan [She said: Alas for me!Shall I bear a child, seeing I am an old woman, and my husband here is an old man?]) [11:72], and "an idol" as in " " ('atad`ūna ba`lāan wa tadharūna 'aĥsana al-khāliqīna [Will ye call upon Baal and forsake the Best of Creators]) [37:125].
Given the scope of the present study, many studies have addressed the semantic relations built on the idea of sameness of meaning, especially synonymy and polysemy.For instance, Abdul-Ghafour et al. (2019) explored the interrelation between synonymy and polysemy in the Qur'anic text as instantiated by the lexical pair "al-asfār" and "al-kutub" (the Books) and their translations.Findings showed that though the two words are commonly viewed as near-synonyms, it has been proven that they semantically differ in some aspects as far as their contextual meanings are concerned.Yet, available translations do not capture such semantic differences.Furthermore, findings revealed that though the plural form "alkutub" is polysemous in the Qur'anic text, it is literally translated as "the books." Likewise, Musahar et al. (2019) analyzed the different senses of the polysemous words "Imam" and "Ummah" in the Qur'anic text and their translations into English and Malay.For this reason, the study relied on one of the officially used interpretation books in Malaysia known as Tafsir Pimpinan al-Rahman and Yusuf Ali's translation.Findings revealed that Ali's translation of the target lexical pair is literal, though the interpretations offer precise senses for each lexical pair.In this regard, Ali et al. (2014) highlighted the translation problems resulting from not considering the polysemic nature of some Qur'anic lexemes.Furthermore, Alhaj (2015) considered polysemous words in the Qur'an untranslatable unless an interpretative translation was conducted based on available exegetical interpretations.
To recap then, it is clear that little attention has been paid to the exploration of word forms derived from the same root but developed different senses.Also, none of the available studies sought to trace the central meaning from which other senses are derived.Furthermore, from a methodological perspective, previous studies did not offer clear quantitative and qualitative rubrics for the selection of polysemous Qur'anic words, and the semantic analyses offered in these studies did not dig into the conceptual schemas forming any polysemy network in the Qur'anic text.Therefore, the present study would hopefully fill in this gap using mixed (quantitative and qualitative) methods to explore the referential range of the lexical pair meeting the requirements of selection (see Section 4), explain which of the pair is polysemic and the central reference point from which other senses developed, investigate the role of context and cotext in highlighting the connotations associated with each sense, and in interpreting the discourse functions communicated through the cognitive frame or frames evoked by such a lexical pair.

Theoretical framework
Based on the Saussurean concept of sign (Saussure, 1916), a lexeme is construed as a sign with a particular form (signifier) and a particular meaning or meanings (signified).Each lexeme is rendered semantically distinct through a set of semantic features forming its descriptive meaning.Over time, and as a result of our expanding experiences and changing worldviews, such semantic features are updated or deleted.Accordingly, particular meanings disappear, and new meanings are born (Sweetser, 1990).The set of developed meanings of a lexeme or a linguistic expression is called its referential range.The referential range of language expressions "is fixed by their meaning in the language.But their actual reference depends upon a variety of contextual factors" (Lyons, 1995, p. 294).The way language expressions are given their semantic values falls under the scope of descriptive semantics, that is concerned with "the semantic properties" of words (Epstein, 2014, p. 44).As Stalnaker (2017) avers, it "assigns semantic values to the expressions of the language and explains how the semantic values of the complex expressions are a function of the semantic values of their parts" (p.535).Furthermore, descriptive semantics concerns all the matters that help with evaluating the truth or falsity of the sentence in which a particular lexeme or expression is used (Epstein, 2014).
Broadly speaking, each lexeme is claimed to have both denotative and connotative meanings.Denotative (or descriptive) meaning refers to the basic, explicit referential meaning of a lexeme (denotatum) as shared by all people, whereas connotative (or associative) meaning refers to the associations, emotional suggestions, attitudes, and communicative power that a lexeme carries in different contexts (Lyons, 1977;Raghunath, 2022;Rambaud, 2012).Based on the context, connotations may be neutral, positive, or negative, as represented by expressions such as "people with no fixed addresses", "homeless", and "vagrants", respectively.For Barthes (1967), connotative meaning is naturalized, conventionalized, and finally established as a primary denotative meaning.
Relatedly, the terms "denotative" and "connotative" meanings are sometimes replaced by "reference" and "sense".While reference signifies a real-world object, sense signifies the mental image it expresses.In a natural language, reference includes nouns, noun phrases, and referring and nonreferring expressions.However, a sense of an expression is realized through a set of sense relations such as synonymy, antonymy, polysemy, meronymy, homonymy, etc. Lyons (1995) affirms that the denotation and reference of an expression are not the same.He argues that the denotation of an expression is invariant and utterance-independent.Meanwhile, the reference of an expression is variant and utterance-dependent.For instance, the lexeme "dog" denotes a four-legged canine animal, but it could be lexically referred to as "friend" or "love" in a particular context or semantic situation.Such flexibility in propositional meanings pertaining to lexemes has been supported by common theories about the lexicon, which entail that the semantics of words are underspecified and that more particular information is filled in by the context (e.g., Blutner, 1998Blutner, , 2004;;Reyle, 1993), and is further advocated by Hogeweg's (2019) argument that the interpretation of words entirely depends on the contextual environment wherein these words occur.
A semantic situation, according to Ullmann (1953, p. 228), is formed considering three variables: (1) the motivated or unmotivated nature of the name (i.e., the acoustic shape of the word), referring to simple/derivative, or compound terms respectively, (2) the greater or lesser precision of the sense (i.e., referential range), (3) the emotive elements that may develop around either component (i.e., associations).Based on these three variables, it is possible to conclude that Arabic tends to favor unmotivated word structure with a plethora of derivatives.Also, in general, Arabic lexemes tend to have a broad referential range that covers both descriptive and non-descriptive semantic properties.Relatedly, each sense is presumed to have positive, negative, and neutral associations.Each sense is formed in terms of a set of semantic features that distinguish a particular lexeme from other lexemes by affirming (+) or negating (-) their presence.The analysis of such semantic features is known as "componential analysis" or "lexical decomposition" (Allan, 2001(Allan, , 2014;;Goddard, 1998;Leech, 1974).One common example in this regard, stool can be distinguished from sofa as follows: stool (-with black, + with legs, + for a single person, + for sitting,-with arms, + rigid) and "sofa" (+ with back, + with legs,-for a single person, + for sitting, + with arms, + rigid).
There remains a question: how do language users schematize the proposition of an utterance in view of the lexemes used?Fillmore's approach to "frame semantics" (Barsalou, 1992;Ch. Fillmore, 2007;Ch. J. Fillmore, 1976;Löbner, 2002Löbner, , 2021) ) would offer an answer to such a question as it relates linguistic semantics to encyclopaedic knowledge.A semantic frame covers the set of facts specifying the "characteristic features, attributes, and functions of a denotatum, and its characteristic interactions with things necessarily or typically associated with it" (Allan, 2001, p. 252).The lexical meaning of a lexeme thus becomes incomplete unless all essential knowledge related to this lexeme is accessed.
In any utterance, lexical choices are made to help with building particular cognitive frames, as lexemes represent categories of experience underlain by a motivating situation (Ch.Fillmore, 2007, p. 238).A cognitive semantic frame is thus perceived as a structured, dynamic, and contextdependent way of interpreting experiences in terms of a motivating context (Barsalou, 1992).That is, in a particular context, a lexeme evokes a frame of semantic knowledge and other linguistic material associated with a potential frame.Furthermore, a lexeme might acquire a new sense (or new senses) as a novel schematization is offered, and hence a new cognitive frame is established.This means that the same lexeme is said to motivate different cognitive frames as long as the context varies, provided that the receptor has enough and appropriate knowledge of such context.By way of demonstration, the lexemes shore and coast, though partially synonymous, designate two cognitive frames that schematize the world differently.While shore is a boundary between land and water from the water's point of view, coast is a boundary between land and water from the land's point of view (Fillmore, 2007, p. 246).
Likewise, the same lexeme or form could develop different senses across genres and across different historical periods.The developed senses could be related or unrelated.If they are related, they are semantically described as polysemous.As mentioned earlier, polysemy refers to the coexistence of many different, but related, meanings for a word or a phrase.For instance, the lexeme bright means both shining and intelligent; however, if the senses of one lexeme are unrelated, they are semantically described as homonymic.Homonymy refers to the existence of unrelated words that sound or look the same.For instance, the lexeme bat means both "a stout solid stick" and "a nocturnal flying mammal".That is, they are etymologically distinct (Palmer, 1976).
Building on the concept of polysemy, the central meaning from which other senses are derived is referred to as "conceptual schema" (Antonova, 2020;Cruse, 2017;Talmy, 1983) or "central reference point" (Rice, 1996;Tribushinina, 2008).Taking the conceptual schema as the core node of any polysemy network, three developments might happen, and therefore new senses emerge.Firstly, the conceptual schema is slightly modified by adding or removing particular semantic features.Second, the conceptual schema's reference is specialized.Finally, language users implement a kind of metaphorical mapping between one conceptual schema and another.With new mappings, the polysemy network expands.

Methodology
This section offers a description of the data, data collection procedure, and procedure of analysis.

Data collection and description
The Qur'an is the principal religious text of Islam, commonly believed to be a revelation of God to the Prophet Muhammad over a period of 23 years.It is largely claimed to be the finest, most inimitable piece of literature in Classical Arabic.Technically described as a corpus of Classical Arabic, the Qur'an includes 114 Meccan and Medinan chapters, each of which involves 6236 verses, with a total of 77.439 words.In view of the study objectives stated earlier, the present study applies a corpus-based mixed-method (quantitative and qualitative) descriptive semantic approach to offer a cognitive-semantic analysis of two etymologically related Qur'anic lexical pairs thought to have diverse senses.A mixed-method approach is the one that "combines different paradigms and research traditions in an effort to arrive at a more complete understanding of the object under investigation" (Loewen & Plonsky, 2016, p. 117).Therefore, a preliminary quantitative analysis was conducted to collect these lexical pairs and then calculate their frequency and keyness.For data collection, Al-Bāĥiṯ Al-Qur'aānī (The Qur'anic Researcher, available at https://tafsir.app/) was used.The final dataset included 20 etymologically related lexical pairs, as shown in Table 1 below.A literal translation is offered in parentheses.
For the sake of selecting a representative pair for a full-fledged analysis, two criteria have been set: the frequency of both lexical items is >10, and their referential range is considerably variant.Therefore, after the quantification of such pairs, all the potential senses of each pair, in light of its underlying historical and theological context, are configured based on dictionaries of Classical Arabic (Lane, 1968;Al-Rāzī, 1986;'Ibn Manžūr, 1993) and vastly-cited exegetical interpretation resources ('Ibn `ashūr, 1984;Al-Qurtubī, 2006;Al-Zamakhsharī, 2009;M. F. Ar-Rāzī, 1981).The etymologically-related pair that fulfilled the two criteria is rīĥ (a singular form meaning "wind") and riyāĥ (a plural form meaning "winds").

Procedure of analysis
The procedure of analysis followed in the present study operates in three steps.Firstly, it identifies the etymon and semantic components of rīĥ that could be naturally extended to its plural form and riyāĥ so that its prototypical denotative meaning is configured.In so doing, the referential range of each lexeme is defined.Secondly, to offer an integrative semantic profile of the target lexical pair, it explores and compares the connotations associated with rīĥ and riyāĥ in their cotext as well as their historical-theological context.At this stage, four exegeses are consulted: Tafsīr al-fakhr al-rāzī (M.F. Ar-Rāzī, 1981), Tafsīr At-taĥrīr wa-at-tanwīr ('Ibn `ashūr, 1984), Al-jaāmi` li-'aĥkaām Al- Qur'aān (Al-Qurtubī, 2006), and Tafsīr al-kashāf (Al-Zamakhsharī, 2009).Thirdly, it configures the cognitive frames and schema (Ch.Fillmore, 2007;Ch. J. Fillmore, 1976) underlying the use of each lexeme in the target pair.It is to be noted that the selected verses are quoted in their original form of production, i.e., Classical Arabic, and are accompanied by a Classical Arabic transliteration, i.e., words are phonetically transcribed in the manner of production pertinent to their original form, as well as an English translation adopted from Ali's, 1983Ali's, /1934Ali's, [1983]]) translation.The phonetic symbols used in the Arabic transliteration are adopted from the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) with a few differences to tune with the phonetic nature of some sounds in Arabic.Also, an appendix of the symbols used in this study is attached at the end of this paper.

Data analysis
Although rīĥ and riyāĥ have different phonetic and orthographic forms, both are derived from the stem " ‫ﺭ‬ ‫ﻭ‬ ‫ﺡ‬ " r-w-ĥ (pronounced rawaĥa(.Rīĥ is a singular form whose universal semantic components are +natural force, +air, +blowing, and +speed, forming the semantic frame of "wind".The plural form is riyāĥ.Both lexemes are distributed in the Qur'anic text as shown in Table 2.
As shown in Table 2, rīĥ is more frequent in the Qur'anic text.In terms of the referential range of rīĥ and riyāĥ, both share the prototypical sense of "wind" or "moving air".This sense could be traced in verses [3:117] Al-lahu al-ladhī yursilu ar-riyāĥa fatuthīru saĥābāan fayabsuţuhu fī as-samā'i kayfa yashā' "It is Allah Who sends the Winds, and they raise the Clouds: then does He spread them in the sky as He wills" However, verses [8:46] and [12:94] offer two other senses for "rīĥ" not shared by "riyāĥ".In verse [8:46] below, "rīĥ" is used in the sense of power, predominance, or good fortune.
wa 'aţī`ū allaha wa rasūlahu wa lā tanāza`ū fatafshalū wa tadh/haba rīĥukum "And obey Allah and His Messenger; and fall into no disputes, lest ye lose heart and your power depart; and be patient and persevering: For Allah is with those who patiently persevere."Indeed,in verse [8:46], a new semantic frame is evoked through the metaphorical mapping of the cognitive frame of wind as a natural force to the cognitive frame of "power" on the part of states.Here, God orders Muslims to obey Him and His Messenger; otherwise, their power and vigor depart.Equally important, in verse [12:94], the prototypical sense of "wind" is made more specialized through a carrier-carried relationship.
wa lammā faşalati al-`īru qāla "abūhum "innī la'ajidu rīĥa yūsufa lawlā 'an tufannidūn "When the caravan left [Egypt], their father said: "I do indeed scent the presence of Joseph: Nay, think me not a dotard." In verse [12:94], rīĥ is used in the sense of "smell" as air is designed to carry smell.Therefore, it could now be stated that the referential range of rīĥ in the Qur'anic text covers three senses: (1) wind, (2) predominance, and (3) smell.The relatedness of senses (1) and (3) renders rīĥ as polysemic, while the senses (1) and (2) render it homonymic, as "smell" departs from the prototypical sense of "wind".Yet, the plural form riyāĥ keeps the sense of "wind" throughout the Qur'anic text.Senses (2) and (3) are contextually motivated, and therefore they are mutually exclusive.That is, they suppress one another across contexts.Each sense provokes a particular frame of attributes and, accordingly, a new conceptual schema.

Rīĥ
In exploring the broader context of the verses in question and the co-text coloring the lexical pairs rīĥ and riyāĥ, it becomes clear that each lexeme has different connotations.Starting with the prototypical sense of wind, the cognitive frame invoked concerns the processes of creating and sending winds, moving ships, causing rain, fertilizing plants, and punishing disbelievers.God is explicitly and implicitly construed as the sender of rīĥ.Consider the following verses.
mathalu mā yunfiqūna fī hadhihi al-ĥayāati ad-dunyā kamathali rīĥin fīhā şirrun "aşābat ĥartha qawmin žalamū "anfusahum fa'ahlakathu "What they spend in the life of this [material] world May be likened to a wind which brings a nipping frost: It strikes and destroys the harvest of men who have wronged their own souls" fa'arsalnā `alayhim rīĥāan şarşarāan fī 'ayyāmin naĥisātin "So We sent against them a furious Wind through days of disaster" The study's first question concerns the analysis of the referential range of the lexical pair rīĥ and riyāĥ.Findings showed that the singular form rīĥ has been proven to be polysemous as it denotes three senses (or lexical units): (1) moving air, (2) power/predominance, and (3) smell, while the plural form riyāĥ is monosemic as it only marks different states of moving air.Based on normal ontological assumptions and the high frequency of using rīĥ to mark the conceptual schema of moving air (or wind), it could be concluded that the conceptual schema of rīĥ as a nature force represents the core node or the central reference point from which the senses of predominance and smell developed.Though such senses are identified, their underlying contexts fettered Qur'an interpreters, and various exegeses are offered due to the elastic scope of rīĥ.
The study's second and third questions concern the role of co(n)text in marking the connotations associated with the referential range of the lexical pair, as well as the discourse functions communicated through the cognitive frames evoked by such a lexical pair.In this regard, the present study correlates with Cruse's (2000) argument that words' senses are sensitive to the environment where they are used.Though rīĥ and riyāĥ are contextually distinct, their senses merge via metaphorical extension.Furthermore, both lexemes are manipulated to mark both a process sense and a product sense.That is, in some contexts, the process of creating, initiating, and sending good and evil winds is focalized.Conversely, in some other contexts, the impact of winds is much stressed.Therefore, they are perceived as independent lexical items that cannot be used interchangeably in all contexts.This finding is consistent with both Goddard's (1998) and Goddard and Wierzbicka's (2016) contention that the validity of the multiple meanings of a lexical item could be tested by substitution.
Further, the effective role played by context in the interpretation of the lexical pairs under investigation accentuates the semantic connection between words and their combinations, which goes in conformity with Norén and Linell's (2007) theory of "meaning potentials," which is used to describe "the connection between word meaning and context" (p.389), argues for the assumption that lexical items and expressions are used in combination with contextual properties of texts to communicate the situated meanings of language users.This harmoniously semantic correlation between lexical items and contextual factors is also similar in nature to Gibson's (1979, as cited in Norén & Linell, 2007, p. 389) "semantic affordance" theory, which also proposes that lexical units provide language users with affordances of meanings.
The cognitive frame of wind as a natural force is divinely manipulated in the Qur'anic text to spot a set of scenarios, based on actual historical events or similitudes, signifying positive, negative, and neutral connotations.All positive, negative, and neutral connotations of the lexical pair in question are identifiable by virtue of its lexical environment (in the form of a group of related predicates, mainly verbs, adjectives, and nouns) as well as by virtue of its underlying historical and theological contexts.On the one hand, rīĥ demonstrated the ability to conjure divinely bestowed graces (as in the case of Solomon's wind), herald a familial reunion (as in the case of Jacob and Joseph), punish disbelievers, polytheists, and ungrateful people, warn against clash and disunity, and support believers.
In the case of rīĥ, given the metaphorically extended senses of predominance and smell, it has been proven that there is a transfer between two cognitive frames.In verse [8:46], the transfer holds between the cognitive frame of wind (as a natural force) and the cognitive frame of powerful states.The way to keep such power is to unite and obey God and His messenger.In verse [12: 94], given the context of Joseph and his brothers, the transfer holds between the cognitive frame of wind (as a natural force) and the frame of smell.Indeed, the three conceptual frames of natural force, powerful state, and smell have been proven to be conceptually coherent as they intrinsically complement the prototypical sense of moving air.
Likewise, riyāĥ has been proven to have positive, negative, and neutral connotations, marking several graces bestowed by God on the universe, including the formation of clouds, causing rain, sailing ships, fertilizing plants, expelling insects, moderating temperature, etc. (positive), assuming the role of a divine warning to disbelievers regarding the ephemerality of power (negative), and representing winds of varying strength, blowing from different regions (neutral).Overall, despite the various schemas that riyāĥ motivated in the Qur'anic text, it could only be perceived as a natural force within the cognitive frame of wind.
Based on this discussion, we argue that clarifying the referential range of etymologically related polysemous in a systematic way, taking into consideration the cognitive frame(s) underlying their usage in the Qur'anic counterargues against the untranslatability of polysemous lexemes (cf., Alhaj, 2015;Ali et al., 2014).

Conclusion
In conclusion, this study offered empirical evidence that etymologically-related lexemes in the Qur'anic text have the potential to generate distinct referential ranges as far as their historical and theological contexts are considered.A word form in the Qur'anic text could evolve into a polysemy network, with one sense serving as the core node and other senses emerging through metaphorical extension.Each sense represents an independent cognitive frame through which the whole meaning of a verse is communicated.Moreover, even if etymologically related lexemes share one aspect of meaning, they could develop different connotations, each of which is manipulated to perform a particular discourse function.Based on the findings of the present study, further revealing studies are required to offer more in-depth analysis into the grammatical-based typology and discourse functions of etymologically related lexemes in the language of the Qur'an and in other genres in Arabic and English.Complementarily, future studies are recommended to apply a corpus-driven approach to the study of etymologically related lexemes in variant texts (e.g., classical Arabic poetry) in order to identify prospective registerial differences in their usage and functions.You are free to: Share -copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format.Adapt -remix, transform, and build upon the material for any purpose, even commercially.The licensor cannot revoke these freedoms as long as you follow the license terms.
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