the semantics of Ḍaraba

The meaning of the word Ḍaraba in the phrase iḍrebuhunna in the verse 34 of Surah An-Nisa is one of the words of the Holy Qur’ān that has occupied the minds of commentators. According to this verse, the Holy Qur’ān gives three orders to men whose wives are disobedient: advise them, forsake them in bed or beat them. Throughout the history of the Holy Qur’ān interpretation, there have been many discussions about the meaning of iḍrebuhunna by commentators, and in the contemporary era, many scholars of the Holy Qur’ān have talked about the meaning of this word. The purpose of this article is to clarify the meaning of Ḍaraba in this verse. Indeed, this study tries to find what the exact meaning of Ḍaraba in the phrase iḍrebuhunna in the verse 34 of Surah An-Nisa is. To figure out the meaning of iḍrebuhunna , we used the method of semantics and the method of qualitative content analysis and examined and classified the commentators’ opinions. The result is that what God means by “beating” in this verse, based on the severity of beating/hitting, is the psychological beating in such a way that a man is ready to hit with anger so that the woman stops disobeying her husband; however, this does not involve the stage of physical hitting.