Speech Acts in Abu Hamza al-Thumali's Supplication - A Pragmatic Study

Abstract

This research aims to analyze speech acts in the supplication of Imam Zayn al-Abidin (peace be upon him), known as the Supplication of Abu Hamzah al-Thumali, within the framework of pragmatics, a linguistic approach concerned with studying the functional use of language in context.

The analysis of the supplication’s passages focused on the theory of speech acts, founded by the English philosopher John Austin and later developed by his student, the philosopher John Searle, who classified speech acts into five main categories: assertive, directive, expressive, commissive, and declarative acts.

The Supplication of Abu Hamzah al-Thumali is considered a rich linguistic model for understanding the linguistic use of speech acts and studying them within a religious text. The supplication is marked by spiritual interaction and a diversity of style and meaning, through which the speaker expresses psychological and spiritual states such as supplication, hope, remorse, repentance, confession of sin, fear, and aspiration.

The research adopts a descriptive-analytical method, in which several excerpts from the supplication were selected, and the illocutionary purposes of the speech acts were classified according to their pragmatic functions and discourse contexts.