Secondary Senses of Imperative Sentences in Iqbal Lahori's Poems

• Published in: Funūn-i adabī Vol. 14; no. 3; pp. 99 - 122
• Main Authors: Mohammad Sadegh Basiri, Najmeh Hosseini Sarvari, Ali Jahanshahi Afshar
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: Persian
• Published: University of Isfahan 01-09-2022
• Subjects: hierarchy of speaker and audience; imperative verbs; iqbal lahori; rhetoric; secondary senses
• ISSN: 2008-8027; 2322-3448
• DOI: 10.22108/liar.2022.134004.2154

Iqbal Lahori, a Muslim thinker, believed that poets, like prophets, are leaders and guides of human beings. Poetry, in his belief, is the means of expressing the truth and inviting people to fight for the truth. Iqbal has paid attention to the instructive and persuasive aspect of speech, as well as the eloquence and rhetoric of words and meanings of poetry. Imperative sentences show the most important aspect of the conative function of language. For these reasons, the function of secondary senses of imperative sentences in Iqbal poetry was studied and analyzed in this study. The research method was based on the identification and classification of secondary senses of imperative sentences in Iqbal's poetry besides analyzing the evidence based on the two-way relationship between the speaker and the audience. This was an important research because it could explain the function of language and message transmission methods according to the interaction between the poet and his audience. The results of this study showed that in Iqbal's poems, 770 sentences had been used with secondary meanings, while the imperative sentences had the meaning of guidance in 50% of them and he was thus in a superior position to the audience in terms of knowledge and awareness. In 35% of the evidence, he spoke to the audience with an equal verbal communication so as to persuade them. He showed a lower position in front of the audience only when he spoke to God and absent or imaginary audience.IntroductionIqbal Lahori (1877-1938) was a Muslim philosopher, politician, poet, thinker, and one of the leaders, who revived religious thoughts and strived for the unity and progress of Muslims in the world. He was an knowledgeable thinker. He studied in European universities. He was fluent in Persian, Arabic, Urdu, Sanskrit, and English languages. He also knew the views of philosophers, such as Hegel, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, etc. and criticized some of them. He believed that a poet's duties are finding out the secrets of existence and revealing them to humanity. Therefore, according to him, the purpose of a poem is changing people's thoughts and inviting everyone to make an effort for revolution. That's why "his poems are lively, powerful, and exciting in terms of theme and music of combined words." (Yusefi, 1990: 407)Iqbal knew Urdu, Persian, Arabic, Sanskrit, and English languages, but chose Persian language to express his passionate thoughts. He wrote poetry in all forms and styles of Persian poetry; yet, his poetry is not an imitation of the poems of other poets. and "Although he did not intend to be a poet, he was the greatest thinker and poet of his time due to the eloquence of his words, rhetoric of his meanings, and popular nature of his poetry." (Schimmel, 2004: 222) His poetry is worthy of attention because he paid attention to the instructive and persuasive aspects of speech while paying attention to the eloquence of the words and meanings of his poems. Imperative sentences show the persuasive role of language in the best way. Therefore, paying attention to the use of imperative sentences and their other meanings reveals a poet’s ways of using an artistic language to us. Material & MethodsThe aim of this study was to analyze the secondary meanings of imperative sentences in Iqbal Lahori's poems. For this purpose, all the imperative sentences of his poems were extracted from the general texts of his Persian poems and analyzed in terms of their secondary meanings. Discussion & ResultsThe importance of this research was not in revealing the thematic aspects of Iqbal's poems and explaining his thoughts, but in paying attention to the functions of language and methods of conveying the message in his poetry. By explaining the semantic aspect of the sentences based on the two-way communication between the speaker and poet and the listener and singer and finally analyzing the frequency of using them, as well as the position and role of the speaker in relation to the reader, we tried to answer the following question: What are the views of Iqbal as a Muslim thinker and leader about a poet’s role and duty and how are they reflected in his poems?Abdul Qader Al Jorjani is considered the founder of rhetoric. In his book entitled Dalael-al-E’jaz (The Reasons for Miracles), he considers rhetoric to be "the science of speech" and believes that the eloquence of words is related to the order of hidden features in speech unlike those who thought that rhetoric is related to words". (Shauqi Zeyf, 2004: 216-218) Syntactic purposes do not cause advantages absolutely and by themselves; rather, the advantage is related to purposes, according to which the speech is organized (Jorjani, 2004: 93). In explaining the purposes of words, Abdul Qader has examined the subjects of declarative and non-declarative sentences (interrogative, exclamatory, and imperative sentences) (Insha), but he has not fully explained the types of non-declarative sentences and their meanings (Shauqi Zeyf, 2004: 315). Zamakhshari, who found Jorjani's writings to be the best way of portraying the miraculous rhetoric of the Qur'an, has adapted Abdul Qader’s opinions with the verses of the Qur'an and combined this type of adaptation with many of his own views. In the explanation of interrogative and imperative sentences in the verses of the Qur'an, he has explained other meanings that can be understood from the implicit evidence. He completed Abdul Qader’s comments, but the later scholars of rhetoric did not add anything more to his words. Writers like Fakhr Razi, Sakkaki, Taftazani, Ibn Arab Shah, etc. have only explained and summarized the opinions of these two scholars. They have included a series of useless rules in their books and divided their books into sub-sections with smaller sub-headings (Alavi Moqadam, 1993: 319). Later scholars of rhetoric, such as Siyuti and Taftazani, have not added anything to Zamakhshari's words in the imperative sentences. The definitions of imperative sentences in Arabic and Persian rhetorical books are more or less the same. They have listed different types of secondary meanings with 5 to 20 purposes, in imperative sentences.In explaining the diagram of Jacobsen's communication process, Safavi (1994: 31-32) has mentioned phonetic and imperative constructions as the most obvious examples of the persuasive role of language, a role in which the message is directed towards the listener. Therefore, in any case, the purpose of using imperative construction is to persuade the audience; however, if the meaning of the imperative sentence "executing the command is impossible or inconvenient for the addressee" turns into an exclamatory sentence with an emotional meaning in the context of speech (shamisa, 2007: 49), it will be understood to have a virtual secondary meaning. In addition, the relationship between the speaker and the listener determines the different meanings of imperative sentences; that is, the relationship based on equality or superiority and inferiority on both sides of the verbal communication determines the purpose of the speaker to use an imperative sentence. Also, it should be noted that not only the levels of practical power are the basis of the equality or superiority of the speaker and listener, but also the difference in the levels of awareness and knowledge gives meaning to the process of communication between the speaker and the listener. Accordingly, in this study, all the imperative sentences of Iqbal's poems were identified and classified into 9 groups based on the secondary purposes of the sentences as follows:Guiding and encouragingThe difference between ordering and guiding and persuading is in the question of whether the audience is required to do an action or not. Although the functions of guidance and persuasion are the same, these two meanings are different in terms of the need for the audience to do the work, the relationship between the speaker and listener, and the speaker's level of confidence in the awareness and acceptance of the audience. When the purpose of the speaker is persuading the audience through his guidance, the poet puts himself in a more superior position than the audience in terms of having knowledge and awareness, while it is thought that the audience is empty-minded or his knowledge of the subject is very little and his acceptance of the issue is also doubtful. Persuasion does not have a persuasive aspect because the audience is equal to the speaker in terms of knowledge and information about the subject or at least he is not empty-minded. Among Iqbal's 770 verses, in which imperative sentences had a secondary meaning, 320 verses bore the meaning of guidance and 125 verses had the meaning of persuasion.Praying, wishing, and beggingIn Iqbal's 72 verses, there were imperative sentences with the meaning of prayer and in 111 verses had the meaning of wishing and begging. Praying and begging both mean a request from a subordinate person to his/her superior one. If the audience is able to fulfill the speaker's request, the imperative verb would mean a wish from God, the Prophet, and other great religious leaders, while it means praying, but if the listener is unable to fulfill the speaker's request, the imperative verb can mean a wish and begging. In addition, in the sense of desire, "the speaker does not hope that his desire will be fulfilled because either the request is impossible or his/her superior person is not able to do it." (Dibaji, 2015: 43)Requesting The use of imperative sentences in the sense of request shows the equality of the speaker and the listener; "that is, a friend or colleague asks his friend and colleague to do something." (Kazzazi, 1994: 219) Only in a relatively small number of Iqbal's poems (25 verses), the imperative verb meant a request.Asking for compassionIn this case, the use of an imperative verb means asking the listener, who has the same rank as the speaker. The purpose of this way