Talk:رأي

I don't know if the specifics of Islamic legal discussion need to be treated at this length. I'm in favour of a usage note, but it should probably be shorter.

Some parts of it are also debatable. Historically, "ra'y" was really just "opinion". The early Islamic jurists had no problem with giving judgments based entirely on their own deliberations. (And from a hadeeth-critical point of view, one would say that some of these opinions were later on put into ahadeeth, rather than vice versa; but that's a hypothesis.) At any rate, this kind of "ra'y" became less and less accepted with time and so the concept of "qiyâs" developed as a compromise.

Today "ra'y" may be used neutrally, but in my experience chiefly for the legal judgment that a particular group of scholars hold. So for example you would find " الجمهور يرون أن " ("most scholars are of the opinion that"), and this is a positive or neutral statement. However, it doesn't refer to "ra'y" as a way of arriving at an opinion, just to the holding of an opinion based on other arguments.

But anyway. I'd recommend shortening the note. 2.203.201.249 17:06, 14 November 2020 (UTC)
 * The chief problem with this particular word is that it has gradually acquired a heavily negative "subjectifying" tone while also retaining all its other neutral senses (such as "view," which is roughly synonymous with "ijtihād") and positive senses (such as "insight" and "distinction"). This is why one may find texts scathing "the baseless raʾy of the Kufic jurists (the Hanafis)" while also using the same root elsewhere to mean "view" (as in your example above). This is also why interpreting the evaluation of some viewpoint is often difficult and quite problematic when it simply labeled "a raʾy" since it may be used neutrally (as in the example of the fourth sense, in which it roughly means "view" or "speculation") or degradingly (as in the examples of the fifth sense, in which it is subjectifying and subtlely invalidating).


 * As for connotations of the word "qiyās", it does appear to emphasize the "logical" (or deductive) aspect of the referenced legalistic viewpoint, but it also been used synonymously with the word "raʾy" (in the abovementioned derogatory senses). Indeed, one may find in polemics long, severe reproach of the Hanafis for their "false, erroneous, and invalid qiyās," though this use is not as common as the typical dispraise of "raʾy" in general (as in the examples of the fifth sense). Roger.M.Williams (talk) 23:53, 15 November 2020 (UTC)

RFD discussion: May 2020–December 2022
Arabic. Rfd-sense: “2.1 (derogatory) a subjective opinion perceived as unfounded or invalid”. Redundant to sense 2 “an opinion, a view” --176.224.125.73 13:35, 18 May 2020 (UTC)
 * Resolved. Thadh (talk) 15:48, 29 December 2022 (UTC)

audio pronunciation
The pronunciation of the audio file sounds like [raʔiː], is this common? Exarchus (talk) 13:06, 31 December 2023 (UTC)