[Lexicog] Law of Synonyms

[William Poser]

Fritz,

With regard to the Arabic words for "love", it is certainly
possible that no two of them are synonyms. I don't know Arabic
nearly well enough to know. My point is only that there CAN be
synonyms. Whether in any particular case word conventionally
glossed the same way actually are synonyms will depend on the
case.

But, another point to note is, insofar as only one Arabic word is
appropriate for translating "God is love" in the New Testament,
that might be due to a differences in truth conditional meaning
(perhaps the other words all imply a sexual aspect) or connotation,
but I can imagine that only one word is appropriate simply because
it is the only word that belongs to the appropriate register. 

With regard to the Dutch sentences, I would think that one would
get different reactions from the different sentences, though as
my Dutch is far from fluent I don't have a good understanding of
the nuances of all of the expressions. But I'm not sure what
your point is. Are you proposing that two expressions should only
be considered synonymous if they elicit the same reaction? I'm
not sure that I want to go there. Using different registers can
elicit different reactions simply because of the perceived appropriateness
of the use of the choice of register.

Bill


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