Question
Assalamu 'alaykum
I have only recently come across your website, so let me first express my
gratitude to all those who have contributed to it, making it easier for
people like me who have little knowledge of Arabic.
My questions:
#1. When some recitors make Tas-heel of the hamzah in Warsh, they sound like
they are pronouncing the letter ha. Am I hearing this correctly? If so, does
this have a particular name?
#2. I have a Warsh mushaf (the one printed in Saudi Arabia) with an
appendix which mentions something about grand imaalah in connection with the
letter ha in Ta-ha. I do not understand it because my Arabic is very basic -
could you explain it to me please.
#3. Some of the Warsh and Qaloon mushafs from North West Africa use a small
letter sad to indicate the places where one stops. (I am not referring to
the Warsh mushafs printed in Saudi Arabia, which also use the same letter
sad but have them in different places to the African ones). Are these stops
supposed to correspond to complete sentences? Can one apply these same stop
positions to any other recitations apart from Warsh and Qaloon?
May Allah reward you for your help.
Wassalam
Answer
Wa alaikum assalaam wa rahmatullahi
wa barakatuh.
Jazakum Allahu khairan.
1. When two hamzahs meet in one
word, Warsh reads the second hamzah with
, and there is
another allowed way in the reading of Warsh of making the second hamzah an
long alif when both hamzahs have a fat-hah.
is making the
hamzah in between a hamzah and the medd letter that the vowel on the hamzah
is similar to, such as an alif with a fath-hah, a
with a kasrah
and a 
with a
dhammah. It may sound like there is a similar sound to the letter
and
of the hamzah,
but the sounds are not identical. Since the hamzah and the
share the same
articulation point, a changed hamzah may then sound something like a
, but not exactly like
one. In fact, when reading
on a hamzah, if
the sound is produced to sound exactly like a
, it is incorrect .
2. Imaalah is divided in to two
sub-groups:
A.
otherwise
known as the lessor imaalah and
B.
or
grand imaalah.
In
the alif is changed in sound so it is is 25%
and 75% alif.
This is the type of imaalah prevalently found in the recitation of Warsh on
certain letter combinations, such as the words:
with a kasrah,
and
, with a
before the alif
maqsoora with no different allowed reading on these types of combinations,
and words as: 
with
two allowed ways and rules linked to both ways, the first allowed way of
reading with a regular alif, the other way with
on the alif.
The grand imaalah or
has
a changed alif in that the alif is read with 50% of the sound a
and 50% with an
alif. The sound then is in between an alif and a.
The only example, Allah knows best in the reading of Warsh by tareeq Ash-Shaatibiyyah
of is
with the separate letter
at the beginning of
surah 
.
3. We do not have a copy of this
type of mus-haf, so cannot comment with a specific answer. The stop marks
in all different types of printings of the musaahif have been agreed upon by
different groups of scholars and in general are made at the end of a
statement that is sound grammatically. The science of the stop and start in
the Qur’an is one that often has differences of opinions as to where and
what kind of stop each word is, since each phrase may be looked at from a
different aspect amongst the scholars as to the grammatical make up.
Wa iyyaakum.
Wa assalaam alaikum wa rahmatullahi
wa barakatuh.
