Bibliotheca Polyglotta

Ultimately from ↗naqaba ‘to make a hole, pierce’? If so, semantics could be explained as *‘deeds that exceed the usual and penetrate into higher, lofty spheres’, or as a figurative use of the pl. of manqab *‘place where a breach has been made’ (n.loc.), hence ‘pass (in the mountains)’, i.e. a difficult trail. Other ClassAr etymologies connect the term either to ↗naqībaẗ ‘soul; trait of character, disposition’, or to ↗naqīb ‘chief’ (the one who scrutinizes).

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↗naqaba.

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Ch. Pellat, “Manāḳib”, in EI² : »To define this term, the lexicographers make it a synonym of ʔaḫlāq, taken in the sense of ‘natural dispositions (good or bad), innate qualities, character’, and associate it with naqībaẗ, explained by nafs ‘soul’, ḫalīqaẗ or ṭabīʕaẗ, likewise signifying ‘trait of character, disposition’, but also with nafāḏ al-raʔy, ‘perspicacity’, in such a way that the connection with the radical n-q-b, which is particularly expressive and implies especially the concrete sense of ‘perforate, pierce (a wall, for example)’, thus, in an abstract sense, ‘succeed in penetrating a secret’, becomes perfectly clear. Perhaps it should be approached as is suggested by Ibn Manẓūr (LA, sub radice n-q-b), via naqīb ‘chief’, thus named because he is privy to ‘the secrets of his fellow-tribesmen […] and to their manāqib, which is the means of knowing their affairs’; in short, manāqib would signify almost simultaneously both ‘traits of character’ and ‘acts and deeds’, and its use to introduce a biography centred not only on the actions, but also on the moral qualities of an individual, would be entirely legitimate. Finally, also worth consideration is an alternative meaning of the verb naqaba, ‘walk, follow a narrow path’, and a subtle connection may be observed between two senses of the singular manqabaẗ : on the one hand, ‘narrow street between two houses’, or ‘difficult path on the mountain’ (cf. Yāḳūt s.v. al-Manāqib; Sīra, ii, 468) and, on the other hand, ‘noble action’, in contrast to maṯlabaẗ ‘villainy, subject of shame’ […]. If the last explanation suggested is correct, one is entitled to consider that a semantic evolution has occurred comparable to that of ↗sīrat.«

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