The Theory of Conceptual Metaphor and Its Role in Understanding Religious Discourse: The Metaphor of Life in the Holy Quran

Abstract

This article targets the methods of interpretation in the religious discourse, with the unique characteristics that distinguish this discourse from other human discourses in its relation to the sciences of the Arabic language and modern cognitive linguistics developments. This necessitates us to consider the specificity of this discourse during the process of interpreting and understanding it, especially when it involves a living linguistic phenomenon that has seen significant disagreement among scholars throughout history; specifically, the metaphor according to two contrasting perspectives: the aesthetic perspective and the cognitive linguistic perspective.

This research concluded with a set of results that summarised the path and milestones that metaphor has traversed in the works of scholars and researchers. Among the most important findings were the key differences regarding this concept among earlier scholars and the identification of the underlying reasons behind the dominance of the aesthetic perspective in their various writings. The focus was on how the Qur'anic discourse utilised some common areas among human societies to reinforce its conception of life from a cognitive linguistic perspective. This confirms the possibility of employing the conceptual metaphor theory in understanding the Qur'anic discourse without compromising the sanctity of this sacred text