Quranic root
زلل
z · l · l
The root centers on slipping or moving away from a position, course, or stable state.
From physical displacement and the ease of sliding, the root extends to deviation and error, while reduplicated forms express repeated agitation or violent motion; clear, sweet water is described as slipping easily from the tongue.
- Maqāyīs · row 2277
- Mufradāt · row 626
- 3
- Quran-attested forms
- 3
- 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.
زَلَّ
zalla
- Part of speech
- Verb · Form I
- Form
- I
- Quran occurrences
- 2 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 slip, move aside, or deviate; hence, to lapse or err.
Used intransitively for physical slipping or movement from a place, and figuratively for deviation or a lapse in speech, judgment, action, religion, or the right course.
- Lane · entry 31392
- Mufradāt · row 626
Selected Quran examples
Quran 2:209word 2
“you slip”
Quran 16:94word 6
“lest, should slip”
أَزَلَّ
ʾazalla
- Part of speech
- Verb · Form IV
- Form
- IV
- Quran occurrences
- 1 occurrence
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 cause someone to slip or fall away, including into error.
A transitive causative use, applicable to physical slipping or displacement and to inducing a wrong action or deviation; in the Quranic occurrence, persons are caused to slip from a place.
- Lane · entry 31394
- Mufradāt · row 626
Selected Quran examples
Quran 2:36word 1
“Then made [both of] them slip”
اِسْتَزَلَّ
āistazalla
- Part of speech
- Verb · Form X
- Form
- X
- Quran occurrences
- 1 occurrence
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 seek to make someone slip or fall into error; to lead someone into a lapse.
A transitive, intentional or attempted induction into slipping, including seeking out or exploiting another person's lapse; the Quranic usage describes being drawn into error until one slips.
- Mufradāt · row 626
Selected Quran examples
Quran 3:155word 9
“made them slip”
Occurrences in the Quran
Every place this root appears, in Quran order. The first few are shown here.
- 2:36فَأَزَلَّهُمَاThen made [both of] them slip
- 2:209زَلَلْتُمyou slip
- 3:155ٱسْتَزَلَّهُمُmade them slip
- 16:94فَتَزِلَّlest, should slip
Broader Classical Arabic meanings
Recorded for this root in the Classical lexicons beyond its Quran usage. These are secondary to the Quran senses above.
Show 41 Classical meanings
زَلَّ
To take or receive something given, especially food.
An intransitive counterpart inferred in legal usage from أَزَلَّ إِلَيْهِ, “he gave to him.”
- Lane · entry 31392
زَلَّ
For a benefit to pass or be transferred from a benefactor to another person.
Used of a benefit or favor moving from its giver to its recipient.
- Lane · entry 31392
زَلَّ
To pass along quickly or run; to move lightly.
Used of rapid or light movement, including the movement of camels between places.
- Lane · entry 31392
زَلَّ
For a person's life to pass or glide away.
A figurative use of passing or moving away.
- Lane · entry 31392
زَلَّ
For money to pour forth, or to become deficient in weight.
Used of dirhams or other pieces of money.
- Lane · entry 31392
زَلَلٌ
Leanness in the hips, haunches, buttocks, or thighs.
A physical description of insufficient flesh.
- Lane · entry 31392
زُلَّ
To be made or rendered thin or slender.
A lexical usage equated with دُقِّقَ.
- Lane · entry 31392
أَزَلَّ
To send or put someone forward to a people or party.
A transitive use distinct from causing someone to slip.
- Lane · entry 31394
أَزَلَّ
To make someone turn away from an opinion.
Used transitively of causing a person to abandon a view.
- Lane · entry 31394
أَزَلَّ
To give or bestow a benefit, gift, food, or part of what is due.
Used with a recipient and, where specified, with food or another apportioned thing.
- Lane · entry 31394
زَلْزَلَ
To put someone or something into motion, agitation, commotion, or violent convulsion; to unsettle or alarm.
Used of violent movement, driving camels forcefully, the agitation of a people, and the casting of fear into them. This reduplicated derived form is Quran-attested in the supplied lexical evidence but is not a supplied QAC form group.
- Lane · entry 31396
- Mufradāt · row 626
زَلْزَلَ
To cause liquid to pass into the throat.
A conventional expression used of putting water into the throat.
- Lane · entry 31396
تَزَلْزَلَ
To be or become in a state of motion, agitation, commotion, or violent convulsion.
Used intransitively of the earth or other things; of the soul, it can describe its heaving in the chest at death.
- Lane · entry 31397
- Mufradāt · row 626
زُلٌّ
A slippery place or surface on which the foot slips.
Used of a standing-place, smooth rock, slope, or slide.
- Lane · entry 31398
زَلَّةٌ
A slip, lapse, fault, wrong action, mistake, or error; sometimes a sin or crime.
A noun for an unintended or blameworthy lapse, especially in speech, conduct, or judgment.
- Lane · entry 31399
زَلَّةٌ
A benefit, good action, gift, or favor.
A noun distinct from زَلَّةٌ meaning a fault.
- Lane · entry 31399
زَلَّةٌ
A feast or repast prepared for guests; also a marriage feast or food carried from another's table.
Some of these uses are dialectal or colloquial.
- Lane · entry 31399
زُلَّةٌ
A straitened state of the breath.
The lexical analysis is reported with uncertainty over the underlying word in the source explanation.
- Lane · entry 31400
زِلَّةٌ
A stone or smooth stone.
The plural is reported as زِلَلٌ.
- Lane · entry 31401
زَلَلٌ
A deficiency, especially a deficiency in weight.
Used of a shortfall in a measure or balance.
- Lane · entry 31402
زُلَالٌ
A small white animal said to cool or chill water when placed in it.
A rare lexical item describing the animal itself.
- Lane · entry 31403
زُلَالٌ
Of water: cool or cold, sweet, clear, limpid, and easy or quick to swallow.
Used adjectivally of water and its pleasant, unobstructed passage into the throat.
- Lane · entry 31403
زُلَالٌ
Clear or limpid.
The adjective may be applied more generally than to water.
- Lane · entry 31403
زَلِيلٌ
A sweet food called فَالُوذ.
A specialized food term.
- Lane · entry 31405
زِلِّيَّةٌ
A carpet or a type of woollen floor covering.
A loanword and a term for a kind of woven furnishing.
- Lane · entry 31406
زَلْزِلٌ
Household goods, utensils, or the furniture and equipment of a house or tent.
A nominal use distinct from the reduplicated movement vocabulary.
- Lane · entry 31408
زُلْزُلٌ
Light or agile, especially a light, agile boy or young man.
An epithet for physical quickness or agility.
- Lane · entry 31409
زُلْزُلٌ
A skilful player on the drum.
A specialized occupational or skill description.
- Lane · entry 31409
زَلْزَالٌ
Agitation, convulsion, or violent motion, especially an earthquake.
A noun for violent earthly shaking; the supplied evidence also uses it in Quranic expressions, although no corresponding QAC form group was supplied.
- Lane · entry 31412
- Mufradāt · row 626
زُلْزُولٌ
Lightness or activity.
A noun for agility or active movement.
- Lane · entry 31413
زُلْزُولٌ
Light or active in spirit and body; acute, quick, clever, or ingenious in intellect.
An adjective describing physical and mental liveliness.
- Lane · entry 31413
زُلْزُولٌ
Conflict or fighting accompanied by an evil or troubled condition.
Used in the expression تَرَكْتُ القَوْمَ فِى زُلْزُولٍ وَعُلْعُولٍ.
- Lane · entry 31413
زَلَازِلُ
Difficulties, terrors, or causes of fear.
A plural form with an irregular or unreported singular in this usage.
- Lane · entry 31414
زَالٌّ
Deficient in weight, especially said of a coin.
Used of dirhams and dinars; plural forms are also reported.
- Lane · entry 31416
أَزَلُّ
Quick or swift.
A general adjective of rapid movement.
- Lane · entry 31417
أَزَلُّ
Having little flesh in the buttocks, hips, or thighs; lean-rumped.
Applied to a person or animal, including the specifically described wolf; the feminine form is used of a woman with this physical trait.
- Lane · entry 31417
زَلَّاءُ
A bow from which the arrow slips because of the rapidity of its discharge.
A specialized description of a bow and the arrow's rapid release.
- Lane · entry 31417
إِزِلْزِلْ
An exclamation uttered in alarm or distress.
Used on occasions of violent agitation or terror; its etymological analysis is disputed.
- Lane · entry 31418
مَزَلَّةٌ
A cause of slipping.
A proposed primary sense of this variant form; the source directs the reader to the related form مَزِلَّةٌ.
- Lane · entry 31419
مَزِلَّةٌ
A slippery place, such as a smooth rock or similar surface.
The form مَزِلَّةٌ is reported as the more chaste variant; it is also used metaphorically of a hazardous path.
- Lane · entry 31420
مُزَلِّلٌ
One who bestows many benefits or gifts.
An active-participial noun for a benefactor.
- Lane · entry 31421
Cautions
Points that affect how this root should be read.
Lane and Maqayis evidence is matched to the canonical geminate root زلل through the packet's contracted-root mapping; reduplicated زلزل forms are retained as lexical evidence but are not additional QAC form groups.
A historical Lane Quran citation in the Form I discussion is not converted into a modern surah:ayah location; the displayed Quran examples use only independently supplied QAC locations.
The Form I QAC lemma زَلَلْ and the supplied inflected Form IV and Form X candidates have been normalized to the classical citation forms زَلَّ, أَزَلَّ, and اِسْتَزَلَّ.