As we have seen in an earlier blogpost, final weak verbs written with a <y> were probably pronounced as ē in the language of the QCT, e.g. ramē<rmy> < Proto-Arabic *ramaya. This is different from the Classical Arabic language which reads this words as ramā. There is however two verbs in the Qurʔān that don't play nice, they are the reflexes of *raʔaya'to see' and *naʔaya'to distance oneself'. In Classical Arabic orthography these are spelled راى <rʔy> raʔā and ناى <nʔy> naʔā respectively, but in the QCT they are written without the final <y>: را <rʔ> and نا <nʔ>.
One's first impression is that such spellings may suggest a pronunciation **raʔā, **naʔā, rather than the predicted **raʔē, **naʔē. As all other final weak verbs get their etymologically correct ending <ʔ> for final-w and <y> for final-y verbs, this is not a very satisfactory explanation.
So how do we account for this discrepancy? I suggest that we assume a fairly early loss of the glottal stop, with subsequent lengthening of the vowel in the language of the QCT.
Proto-Arabic *raʔaya> Loss of ʔ *rāya.
At this point, we still are not at the form that we expect because *rāya would be spelled just like *raʔē as <rʔy>. However, there is a subsequent sound law *āy/wv> āʔv well-attested in cases like the *samāyun'sky' > samāʔun (as in Classical Arabic), *qāwimun'standing' > qāʔimun, and finally *ʔaḍāyatun'watering hole' > *ʔaḍāʔatun.[1]
*rāya> *rāʔa, and this leaves us at the form that we find in the Qurʔān, which may either have been pronounced *rāʔ(a), or simply *rā (with a second loss of ʔ).[2]
A prediction this hypothesis makes, is that the Yemeni dialect of the Minabbih area, which did not undergo the *āy/wv > āʔv shift would have the reflex rāy in the 3sg.m. form, and it does (Behnstedt 1987: 202)! Below is a diachronic Paradigm of the verb 'to see' in the language of the QCT:
| Proto-Arabic | Loss of ʔ | āyv > āʔv | QCT |
3sg.m. | *raʔaya | *rāya | rāʔ(a) | <rʔ> |
3sg.f. | *raʔat | *rāt | rāt | <rʔt> |
2sg.m./2sg.f./1sg. | *raʔayta/i/u | *rāyta/iu | rāyt(a/iu) | <rʔyt> |
3pl.m. | *raʔaw | *rāw | rāw | <rʔwʔ> |
3pl.f. | *raʔayna | *rāyna | rāyna | Unattested |
2pl.m. | *raʔaytum | *rāytum | rāytum | <rʔytm(wh)> |
2pl.f. | *raʔaytunna | *rāytunna | rāytunn(a) | Unattested |
1pl. | *raʔaynā | *rāynā | rāynā | Unattested |
As far as I'm concerned, this conclusively shows that in the language of the QCT *ʔ was lost completely (paceMyself)
The raʔē form remembered?
In Surat an-Naǧm we actually find the Classical spelling راى <rʔy> for this verb twice (and those are the only attestations in this Surah). This Surah has a clear rhyming scheme, rhyming with an ē<y> from Ayah 1 to 56 (of the 62 Ayah's). Q54:11 uses <rʔy> in the rhyme. [3] This might suggest that the composer of this Ayah invoked a dialectal form, to suit the rhyme. This is, of course, not unlikely, but it is surprising that the second attestation of this verb is not invoked to suit the rhyme, as it appears in the middle of an Ayah (Q54:18). Is this Surah composed in a different dialect altogether? Or is this simply an attempt by scribes to unify the spelling within a single Surah?
Classical Arabic getting it wrong
Another unusual feature of the verb raʔā in the imperfective is that it's the only verb that applies the *Cʔ > C sound law that I have posited even in the reading tradition and Classical Arabic. As such the reflex of *yarʔayu is yarā (or yarē) <yry> in the reading tradition, and not the predicted **yarʔā, **yarʔē. This goes to show just how artificial the reading tradition is, in that it is unable to reconstruct the correct pronunciation in an ambiguous case like this verb. There is one other verb which also underwent this sound law and that is the imperative of saʔala'to ask', which is read as sal rather than the predicted **isʔal.
[Edit] Lameen Souag pointed out in the comments that this last paragraph was a little confusing. What I meant to say is: In Classical Arabic (and in the Qurʔānic reading tradition) the imperfective of the verb 'to see' undergoes the *Cʔ > C. Within the linguistic system of Classical Arabic, this is irregular, as all other cases of *Cʔ (besides sal) are simply retained. This seems to suggest that somehow the colloquial usage (and/or dialectal usage) of this verb ended up in the Classical Language, whereas this has not happened with less high-frequency words.
[1] Interestingly, this sound law appears to not always operate word-internally, while it did operate word-finally, e.g. Moroccan Arabic ḍaya'lake, pond' < *ʔaḍāyah but sma'sky' < *samāʔ
[2] This two-step loss of first etymological *ʔ and secondary ʔ < y/w may explain the asymmetry between *aʔu and *āʔu where one yielded <wʔ> spelling from the earliest documents while *āʔu did not. If we assume that the word-final short vowels were around with the first loss, but not with the second loss, we would get the exact forms we find:
*malaʔu > malawu > malawu > malaw > mala
*ǧazāyu > ǧazāyu > ǧazāʔu > ǧazāʔ > ǧazā
[3] Note that the rhyme is broken in Q53:28 by šayʔan. Obviously, in its caseless pronunciation, this word would fit the rhyme. Perhaps it was originally composed without the case ending, and therefore with šay. In the regular reading tradition where Pausal -an is pronounced ā this rhyme works out, but the Warsh reading actually does not break the verse at this point (and therefore the numbering is different), because the rhyme does not work. Still considering the length and syntactic unit, it seems reasonable to suppose the Ayah probably ended here originally.