Nahj al-Balaghah

Nahj al-Balaghah, as the most significant source after the Holy Qur’ān, has attracted human thought and provided direction in the realm of science. It is replete with rich literary topics that offer a conducive environment for research. Despite the extensive research conducted on Nahj al-Balaghah from various perspectives, less attention has been paid to specific topics within this valuable book. Considering the endless knowledge and artistry of the speaker of this book, and given the special place literature holds among Arabic speakers, Imam Ali (AS) has employed numerous literary beauties to introduce the world’s main identity. This paper attempts to analyze Imam Ali (AS)’s precise and insightful view of the world, which demonstrates robust thinking and can be examined from the aspects of form and content using a descriptive-analytical method. One of the findings of this research is that Amir al-Mu’minin Ali (A.S.) speaks according to the audience’s needs to reveal the world’s true face. Most of his words about the world are related to his sermons, where his physical presence and face-to-face interaction are more impactful.

"Lexical Chains" is one of the newest branches of statistical semantics, which is defiend as the process of identifying words that have semantic relationship with each other, and help us to identify the topic and main content of the text. In this research, we aim to determine lexical chains of sermons No. 87 and 191 of Nahj al-Balaghah, based on the theory of "Saxena", as well as "Barzilay" and "Elhadad", using the descriptive-analytical and statistical method. The results show that in both sermons, the semantic relation "Antonym" has the most frequency. In sermons No. 87 and 191, respectively, 8% and 5% of the chains are "strong chains", and play the main role in determining the main themes of the sermons. According to the data, choosing the title "religious, ethical, scientific" for the sermon No. 87, and "moral, ethical, social, intellectual" for the sermon No. 191 -contrary to what "Mohammad Dashti" mentioned for them- seems more appropriate.