Lacunarity or Conspicuous Translatability: The Internet Phenomenon in the Holy Quran? A Lexical Semantic Exploration of Prototypicality and Exemplarity in Seven Quranic Constructions and Their Translations into English

Seven Quranic nominal and verbal phrases exhibit onomasiological and semasiological semantic features that could amount to their being conspicuously translatable to a projection or reporting of several ‘internet phenomena’. This study aims at presenting their semantic features as a case of the transcendence of the language of the Holy Quran, not from the elongated perspective of untranslatability or (lexical semantic) matchlessness, but from the perspective of time-bound translatability of some Quranic lexes. The phrases are: (1) "يَمُوجُ فِي بَعۡض" [ymūǧu fī bcḍ] (‘lkahf. Q. 15: 99); (2)" بَيۡتُ ٱلۡعَنكَبُوتِ" [bāyt ʾlʿnkbūt] (ʾlʿnkbūt, Q. 20: 41); (3)"لَّجُّواْ فِي عُتُوّٖ وَنُفُور" (ʾlmulk, Q. 67: 21); (4) "مُكِبًّا عَلَىٰ وَجۡهِهِۦ" [mukḷbānnʿla wǧhihi] (ʾlmulk, Q. 67: 22); (5) "يَسُوءُوا وُجُوهَكُمْ" [ysuʾū wuǧūhakum] (ʾlʾisrāʾ, Q.17:7); (6) "طَٰآئِرَهُۥ فِي عُنُقِهِ"[ṭāʾiruhū fī ʿunuqih] (ʾlʾisrāʾ, Q.17 :13); and (7) "َيُبَتِّكُنَّ ءَاذَانَ ٱلۡأَنۡعَٰمِ" [Yubatikun ʾāḏānʾlʾnʿām] (ʾnisāʾ, Q. 4 : 119). The research explores translations of these constructions in cAbdelhaleem (2004), Al-Hilali & Khan (1998), Arberry (1955), Asad (1980), Bewely (1999), Gerrans (2016), Ghali (2003), Hammad (2009), Itani (2012), Naser et al. (2015), Pickthall (1938) and Yusif-Ali (1934). The exploration shows that these constructions were sometimes treated or rendered as lacunae. Linking the phrases to internet phenomena is discussed based on feature prototypicality and exemplarity addressed in (cognitive) semantics theories as well as lexicological and contextual research of their meanings. The study underscores the semantic time bound nature of some Quranic lexes and the necessity of consulting Islamic exegeses to support proposed renderings of (these) Quranic constructions.