Glossary: W

wabāl

Evil or disastrous consequences; wabāl amrihim is the evil consequence of their conduct, their disbelief and its wickedness. → Read at 64:5

wadūd

A divine name derived from wudd, love; but wudd is a special love that shows itself visibly in actions such as affection, continuous communication and kindness (). → Read at 11:90

waḥī

Al-Rāghib: to indicate quickly, by speech, symbol, sound or gesture. Its usage shows it is the subtle conveyance of a meaning hidden from others, so instinctual inspiration (ilhām) of animals, dreams and whisperings are all forms of it. → Read at 16:68

waḥy

Al-Rāghib: the word revelation alludes to the speed with which it takes place. In () it is the first of three modes of God's speech (with speech from behind a curtain and through a messenger); since it alone is unqualified, it apparently refers to a subtle mode of communication with no mediator between God and the Prophet. → Read at 42:51

wajh

() The wajh of a thing is what is faced by others, and its direction too; in this sense good deeds are the wajh of God, as are the attributes through which He faces creatures, and whatever is linked to Him in proximity (His names, attributes, religion, the prophets, angels and martyrs). The ʿAllāmah rejects taking wajh to mean God's Person. → Read
() Something's wajh is what it turns toward you and faces you, its root meaning being the face of a human being; His Face is His most beautiful names and supreme attributes, through which those turning to Him turn, those calling Him call, and those worshiping Him worship. → Read
() In common parlance wajh is that by which something faces or turns to another thing and connects with it; God's wajh is that by which He turns to His creatures and they turn to Him, namely His noble attributes such as life, power and knowledge and the attributes of action traced back to them. → Read
() The face of a thing is the aspect with which it turns toward another; God's Face is His noble attributes (knowledge, power, mercy, and so on), the intermediaries through which His blessings and guidance descend on creation. → Read
() Wajh (face) is the aspect of something by which it meets other things; God’s face is His attributes of action through which He bestows benefits, in short His universal mercy, and at a second level His essential attributes, so acting for God’s face means seeking His mercy and pleasure alone, or serving Him because He is worthy of it. → Read

wajs

Al-Rāghib: wajs means a secret voice, and ījās is its presence in one's soul; awjasa khīfatan means he conceived a fear, so wajs is a state of the soul which occurs after the notion, the notion being the beginning of the idea. → Read at 20:67

wakīl

Taking someone as a wakīl (trustee, guardian, agent) means delegating one’s affairs to them so that one’s preferences and actions are replaced by theirs; taking God as trustee means seeing all affairs as belonging to God and ending in Him, both in external events and in following His legislation. → Read at 73:9

walāya

Walāya (or wilāya, which means the same) here is not merely assistance, as the exegetes say; the correct interpretation is that walāya means directorial ownership (mālikiyya al-tadbīr), the meaning shared by all the derivatives of the word. → Read at 18:44

walī

A guardian is the one who directs a thing's affairs; since the order on which our lives depend originates with God's creative act, God alone is our guardian and the guardian of all things. → Read at 32:4

waqār

Waqār here means thubūt, istiqrār and tamakkun (stability, fixity, establishment), the original meaning of the root; God’s waqār is His establishment and firmness in His Lordship, which necessitates that He be worshiped. → Read at 71:13

wāqiʿah

Wuqūʿ is for an event to take place; al-Wāqiʿah is an adjective for any event, used here as a proper name for the Resurrection, as though it were so well known that the noun need not be mentioned. → Read at 56:1

wasīlah

Al-Rāghib: attaining something with longing, more particular than waṣīlah (joining). The ʿAllāmah: it is a spiritual joining that connects the servant with his Master, and that link is nothing but the reality of worship and submissiveness, turning the face of humility and poverty toward Him; knowledge and good deeds are its tools. → Read at 5:35

waṣiyyah

() Al-Rāghib: to enjoin (waṣiyyah) means to exhort another to follow a course of action. The word implies importance: not every command is enjoined, only those the one enjoining deems important. → Read
() Al-Rāghib: to enjoin is to advise a person to behave in a certain way, accompanied by admonition. → Read

waswasah

Al-Rāghib: a wicked thought; its origin is waswās, the sound of jewelry clinking or faint whispering. → Read at 50:16

wathāq

Al-Rāghib (al-Mufradāt): the root w-th-q means to rely on someone or be content with them; awthaqa means to bind someone, and wathāq or withāq are the ties used to bind a thing. → Read at 47:4

waṭīn

Al-Rāghib: a vein that nourishes the liver, whose severing kills its owner; also called the artery of the heart. → Read at 69:46

waʿy

"Receptive ears" retaining it refers to comprehension, like placing something in a container: firmly embedding and safeguarding the message so that its purpose as reminder and lesson is realized. → Read at 69:12

wilāyah

() The root of awliyāʾ (plural of walī); it denotes authority to manage something, that is, guardianship. The guardian of a minor or an insane person is his walī because he has authority to manage their affairs and property, although the property belongs to the ward. → Read
() Al-Rāghib: al-walāʾ and al-tawālī denote two or more things positioned so that nothing extraneous comes between them, used metaphorically for nearness in place, kinship, friendship, help or belief; al-wilāyah is help and/or management of affairs. In () the wilāyah of God, His Messenger and the believers has one and the same meaning, that of the Messenger and the believers sprouting from God's guardianship. → Read
() Alliance, guardianship, loyalty. As used here it is broader than authority over inheritance or mutual-aid pacts: all Muslims share guardianship over one another, so a pledge of security given by a single Muslim binds them all, since the statement is unconditional. → Read
() Its original meaning is the elimination of any barrier between two things, so that nothing is between them that is not part of them; it is then used metaphorically for closeness in kinship, place, rank or friendship. Walī applies to both parties; God is the believer's walī, taking charge of his affairs and guiding him. → Read
() The word wilāyah (guardianship) has a general meaning applicable in different ways, and its specific meaning can only be disambiguated by a contextual identifier; here "who should inherit from me" shows that waliyy means heir, that is, a son. → Read
() Wilāyah in the verses and narrations does not mean love; it is the administrative rule and disposal of affairs, part of which is the necessity of following and the duty of obedience, while love is an expanded meaning of it and of what normally accompanies it. → Read
() In the Author's comment on a narration about Jonah, wilāyah is the comprehensive divine authority, whose door Imām ʿAlī was the first of this ummah to open: God taking charge of His servant and managing his affairs, so that the servant turns to no one but God and wishes only what God wills. → Read

wiqāyah

() To guard means to protect something from anything that would cause it harm or distress. → Read
() Qū is the imperative of wiqāyah: to protect something from distress or harm; waqūd is what is used to kindle a fire, and the people themselves will be its fuel. → Read

wirāthah

Al-Rāghib: wirāthah and irth mean the transfer of property to someone without involving a transaction. → Read at 21:105

witr

Majmaʿ al-Bayān: to stint means to diminish or deprive; the original meaning of witr is to cut. → Read at 47:35

wizr

() Al-Rāghib (al-Mufradāt): wizr means burden, like the heavy rocks (wazr) of mountains; sin is called wizr as well as thiql (weight). → Read
() Al-Rāghib: wazar is a mountain refuge, and wizr is a burden likened to a mountain, used for the burden of sin. The verse thus means that no one can bear another's burden of sin, and a soul is taken to account only for what it has earned. → Read
() Wizr means “a heavy load”; the Prophet’s burden was the message, his call of the people and its consequences, and removing it means aligning the causes so that he succeeds in his mission. → Read

wulūj

Al-Rāghib: wulūj means entering a narrow opening, and ʿurūj means going upward. → Read at 57:4

wurūd

Wurūd means no more than intentionally coming to something and standing over it, as can be inferred from the dictionaries. → Read at 19:71

Glossary: W ​

Glossary: W