▪ Jeffery1938, 152-53: »The three forms [in the Qurʔān] which particularly concern us are
zakā (cf. xxiv, 21),
zakkà (ii, 146; iv, 52; xci, 9), and
tazakkà (xx, 78; lxxxviL 14). – The primitive meaning of the Ar
zky is ʻto grow, to flourish, thrive’, as is recognized by the Lexicons (cf.
LA, xix, 77; and Rāghib,
Mufradāt, 212).
1
This is the meaning we find in the earliest texts, e.g.
Ḥamāsa, 722, 11; Labīd (ed. Chalidi), etc., and with this we must connect the
ʔazkà of ii, 232; xviii, 18, etc., as Nöldeke notes.
2
In this sense it is cognate with Akk
zakū ʻto be free, immune’
3
; Aram זכא ‘to be victorious’, Syr
zəḵā, etc. – In the sense of ʻclean, pure’, however, i.e.
zakā,
i,
zakkà, and
tazakkà, it is obviously a borrowing from the older religions.
4
Hbr זכא (like Phoen זכא) is ʻto be clean or pure’ in the moral sense, and its forms parallel all the uses in the Qurʔān. So the related Aram דכא, זכא, and זכי, Syr
ḏəḵā,
ḏəḵī, and
zəḵā mean ʻto be clean’ both in the physical and in the moral sense. The Ar equivalent of these forms, of course, is
ḏakā ʻto be bright’ [↗ √ḎKW/Y], and so there can be little doubt that
zakā used in its technical religious sense was borrowed from an Aramaic form. It is, of course, difficult to decide whether the origin is Jewish or Christian. Nöldeke,
Neue Beiträge, 25, n.; Schulthess,
ZA, xxvi, 152; and Torrey,
Foundation, 141, favour a Jewish origin, but Andrae,
Ursprung, 200, points to the close parallels between Muḥammad’s use of the word and that which we find in contemporary Syriac literature,
5
so that there is ground for thinking that it came to him from Christian sources.«