Quranic root
سول
s · w · l
The root's central image is looseness, slackening, or lack of compactness.
From this physical image, Classical usage includes laxness and pendulousness, while related vocabulary denotes a requested or eagerly desired object. Form II usage is explained as making a desired thing appear attractive or easy, possibly through fulfilling a request or through the associated notion of laxness; the derivation is presented as possible rather than certain.
- Maqāyīs · row 2530
- Lane · entry 42786
- Lane · entry 42787
- 1
- Quran-attested forms
- 2
- Quran senses
- 4
- Quran occurrences
Forms in the Quran
The forms this root actually takes in the Quran. Select one to jump to its senses and examples.
سَوَّلَ
sawwala
- Part of speech
- Verb · Form II
- Form
- II
- Quran occurrences
- 4 occurrences
Selected examples are shown with the sense they illustrate — chosen to teach that sense, not the complete list of this form’s Quran occurrences.
To embellish a desired thing or affair for someone, making it seem good, acceptable, or easy, so that it becomes loved or approved.
Used of the soul's embellishing what a person eagerly desires and representing an objectionable aspect as good or harmless; the construction may take لِ with the person affected and an affair or thing as object.
- Lane · entry 42787
- Mufradāt · row 742
Selected Quran examples
To lead someone into error by enticement, or to facilitate indulgence in grave sins and appetites by making them seem desirable.
A Quran-attested construction used of the Devil's misleading and inciting a person; this is the agent-specific result of the embellishing described in the broader sense.
- Lane · entry 42787
- Mufradāt · row 742
Selected Quran examples
Quran 47:25word 13
“enticed”
Occurrences in the Quran
Every place this root appears, in Quran order. The first few are shown here.
View all 4 occurrencesBroader Classical Arabic meanings
Recorded for this root in the Classical lexicons beyond its Quran usage. These are secondary to the Quran senses above.
Show 10 Classical meanings
سَالَ
To ask or request.
A dialectal form corresponding to سَأَلَ.
- Lane · entry 42786
سَوِلَ
To become lax, flaccid, or uncompact, or to hang down loosely and be pendulous.
Applied to the belly or lower abdomen and, more broadly, to other things such as clouds.
- Lane · entry 42786
سَوَّلَ
To be imaged in the mind, become an object of fancy, or seem a certain way to someone.
A Classical construction describing something as mentally pictured or seeming to a person, distinct from the Quran-attested causative sense of embellishing a desired thing.
- Lane · entry 42787
هُمَا يَتَسَاوَلَانِ
To ask or beg one another.
A reciprocal expression used of two persons.
- Lane · entry 42789
سُولٌ
A petition or request; also the thing requested or eagerly desired.
May denote either what is asked for or an object of want toward which the soul is strongly directed.
- Lane · entry 42790
سُوَلَةٌ
A person who asks or begs much.
An intensive description of a habitual or frequent asker.
- Lane · entry 42793
سُوَالٌ
Asking or requesting; a request.
A verbal noun also used substantivally for a request.
- Lane · entry 42794
سَوِيلٌ
An equal or counterpart.
Used in the expression of being someone's equal in an affair.
- Lane · entry 42795
أَسْوَلُ
Lax, flaccid, or uncompact, or hanging down loosely and pendulous below.
Describes a person, especially the lower belly, and can describe uncompact clouds whose edges hang down.
- Lane · entry 42796
سَوْلَاءُ
A large bucket.
A distinct nominal usage of the feminine form.
- Lane · entry 42796
Cautions
Points that affect how this root should be read.
The printed classical citation associated with the Devil construction is not normalized here to a modern verse location; the displayed 47:25 example uses the independently supplied QAC occurrence.