غرب

Core meaning

To pass into darkness: the sun that vanishes on the horizon, the side where it sets, and, by hue, the deepest black, that of the raven.

Uses

1. غَرَبَت, تَغْرُبُ, ٱلْغُرُوب → "to set", "the setting" : the sun going away and ceasing to give light.

   • «وَإِذَا غَرَبَت تَّقْرِضُهُمْ ذَاتَ ٱلشِّمَالِ» — "and at its setting, leave it with a graze on the left" (18:17)
   • «وَقَبْلَ غُرُوبِهَا» — "and before its setting" (20:130)

2. ٱلْمَغْرِب, ٱلْمَغْرِبَيْنِ, ٱلْمَغَٰرِب → "the west", "the setting", "the settings" : the side where the sun vanishes, always named with the east.

   • «وَلِلَّهِ ٱلْمَشْرِقُ وَٱلْمَغْرِبُ» — "And to God belong the east and the west" (2:115)
   • «رَبُّ ٱلْمَشْرِقَيْنِ وَرَبُّ ٱلْمَغْرِبَيْنِ» — "Guardian of the two risings and Guardian of the two settings" (55:17)
   • «حَتَّىٰٓ إِذَا بَلَغَ مَغْرِبَ ٱلشَّمْسِ» — "having reached the setting-place of the sun" (18:86)

3. غَرْبِيَّة, ٱلْغَرْبِىّ → "of the west", "western" : what lies on the side of the setting.

   • «لَّا شَرْقِيَّةٍۢ وَلَا غَرْبِيَّةٍۢ» — "neither of the east nor of the west" (24:35)
   • «وَمَا كُنتَ بِجَانِبِ ٱلْغَرْبِىِّ» — "You were not on the western side" (28:44)

4. غُرَاب → "a raven" : the black bird, the one that shows how to conceal.

   • «فَبَعَثَ ٱللَّهُ غُرَابًۭا يَبْحَثُ فِى ٱلْأَرْضِ» — "God then raised up a raven, which scratched the earth" (5:31)

5. غَرَابِيب → "intensely black" : black at its extreme degree, at the end of a range of colours.

   • «وَغَرَابِيبُ سُودٌۭ» — "and others intensely black" (35:27)

Evidence from the text

The west is the point where light goes away. Ibrahim sets it against the east to confound the one who claims to give life: "bring it, then, from the west" (2:258); Dhu-l-Qarnayn, having reached the setting-place of the sun, finds it "setting in a muddy spring" (18:86); and the sleepers of the cave remain out of its light, at its rising as at its setting (18:17). The pair of east and west says the whole expanse, which God possesses (2:115, 26:28, 73:9), in the singular, the dual (55:17) or the plural (70:40).

The hue follows the same gesture. In 35:27, the tracts of the mountains go from white to red, then to the deepest black, غَرَابِيب, the black of the raven. And the raven of 5:31 teaches concealment: it scratches the earth to show how to cover a brother's nakedness, what must vanish from sight.

Distinctions

• شرق — the east, whence light comes; غرب names the side where it goes away