Mevzu – Sosyal Bilimler Dergisi

Öz

Arabic is a language that is quite rich in terms of emphatic consonants. In classical tajweed and qira'at literature, emphatic consonants are generally highlighted by their attributes of "istiʿlā" and "tefḫīm". The number of conso-nants possessing these attributes is 6. These are the phonemes "ص" (ṣād), "ض" (ḍād), "ط" (ṭāʾ), "ظ" (ẓāʾ), "غ" (ghayn), and "ق" (qāf). Finding the same or similar phonemes in other world languages is either very difficult or impossible. In this aspect, Arabic typologically exhibits significant differences from other world languages.
Qur’anic Arabic or Classical Arabic (CA) has a very rich structure in terms of emphatic consonants. These phonemes, which have a different phonetic characteristic than the other consonants, have an important role in shaping the deep semantic world of the Qur’an with their phonological functions.
Among the emphatic sounds, which constitute one of the most impor-tant topics of Qur’ānic pronunciation, or in other words, among the consonants with the attributes of tafḫīm and istiʾlā, the phonemes /ض/ and /ظ/, although they are confused due to some similarities in terms of articulatory mechanics, differ from each other with serious differences due to their phonological functions. The phonemes /ض/ and /ظ/ have been the subject of extensive research in terms of both their phonetic and phonological properties since the early periods of the history of the Arabic language, and separate booklets have been written on these sounds in almost every period. In this study, a new analysis of the same subject will be made within the framework of modern linguistic findings and the science of Qiraat. These sounds will be compared in terms of phonetics and the phonological differences that may occur as a result of the changes of these sounds will be emphasized.