Question
Assalaamu 'Alaikum wa Rahmatullaahi wa Barakaatuhu
I have heard somebody saying that the letter Raa should be said without any
'rolling' whatsoever. He says that Shaykh Husary & Shaykh Minshaawi (May
Allah have mercy on them) read without 'rolling'. I listened to their
recordings, and those of Abdul Baasit (May Allah have mercy on him) and Dr
Ayman (May Allah preserve him), and am not convinced.
I understood 'without rolling' to mean a sound closer to 'R' in English
(which was how this person read it as) than what I am accustomed to in
Arabic. He also mentioned that there is a difference of opinion on this. Can
you shed any light on this?
Jazaakallaahu Khairan Kathiran
Wassalaamu 'Alaikum wa Rahmatullaahi wa Barakaatuhu
Answer
Wa alaikum assalaam wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh.
There are some modern books of tajweed that mention
that we must avoid
even though it
is a characteristic of the
and that it is a
characteristic we study to avoid,. If we however, turn to the old books on
tajweed, we see that the trilling, or
is mentioned,
but we are warned not to be excessive in it, but not told to avoid it.
Ash-Sheikh Dr. Ayman Swayd, may Allah preserve him,
gave the following definition for
(translated
into English): The light trilling of the tongue when pronouncing the
due to its tight
articulation point. The reciter should be careful not to exaggerate the
repetition leading to the occurrence of more than one of the letter
.
As indicated in the above definition,
is part of the
, but instead of
“avoiding” it, as some books state, we should control it so that it doesn’t
exceed more than one.
The English “r” has a different articulation point
than the Arabic ,
and the absence of excessive trilling will not lead to a sound like the
English “r”. The English “r” does not have the tongue colliding with the
gums of the two front teeth. You should hear the “hit” of the tip and top
of the tip of the tongue as they collide with the gums of the two top front
incisors in the correct Arabic
. This sound is
not heard in the English “r”.
It is quite uncommon to hear a known reciter trill the
excessively so
that the tongue hits the gums and separates from it more than once leading
to the sound of repeated
’s. What is
normally heard is
without
exaggeration and only one
is heard.
We have updated the definition of
on the site to
reflect the more accurate definition put forth by his eminence, Dr.
Ash-Sheikh Ayman Swayd. This is the same definition found in Tajweed Rules
of the Qur’an, part 2, by Ustadhah Kareema Czerepinski.
Wa iyyaaakum wa-l-muslimeen.
Wa assalaam alaikum wa rahmatullahi wa barakatuh.
