A Critical Exposition of the Popular 'Jihád'/Appendix A/4

[Sidenote: The Classical tongue and Arabian poets.]

4. What is called the classical language of Arabia or the loghat, and is an authority for the genuineness of the Arabic terms and their significations, is the language which was spoken throughout the whole of the Peninsula previous to the appearance of Mohammad. After the death of Mohammad the language was rapidly corrupted by the introduction of foreign words. This was doubtless owing to the great extension of the Mohammadan power at this period. The classical poets are those who died before these great conquests were effected, and are the most reliable authorities for Arabic words and their significations, and they are called Jáhilí. Next to the classical poets are the post-classical, or "Mokhadrams", Islámi and Mowallads. Mokhadram is a poet who lived partly before and partly after Mohammad, and who did not embrace Islámism during the life of the Prophet. The Islámi poets are the Mohammadan poets of the first and second centuries of the Hejira, and Mowallads, the poets of the fourth rank, followed the Islámis. The earliest classical poets date only a century before the birth of Mohammad, and the latest, about a century after his death. The period of the Islámi poets is the first and second centuries,&mdash;i.e., those who lived after the first corruption of the Arabic language, but before the corruption had become extensive.

The Mowallads co-existed with the general and rapid corruption of the language from the beginning or middle of the second century.