Machine summary:
'' On the whole, the now existing collections-barring those which trustworthy critics have definitely rejected-must be accepted as original in spirit and language, albeit some words were misplaced, or one poet slipped in some triba-l word, or collectors inadvertently stole in a special Quraishite phrase and inserted some correction of prosody; (16) Shouqi Daif : op.
Ibn Kalbi's work on the ancient idols has remained and the frequent insertion of pagan poetry betrays that he too dictated his text.
lbn Ishaq, for instance, mentioned Abu Sufyan Ibn al-Harith, the Quraishite, among those pagan poets who opposed Hassan lbn Thabit and some Madinese poets, but Ibn Sallarn belies him, stating that he hardly had poems, and neither Ishaq nor 'Ubaid lbn Shariya and the like provide us with useful material for a knowledge of ancient poetry.
The most uncompromising critic, however, was my late friend Professor Margoliouth, 19 who flatly denied the originality of ancient Arabic poetry and definitely maintained that the whole bulk had been composed in Islamic surroundings, while its wordings were borrowed from the Qpr'an.
Arabe, Dr. Taha Husain has trodden the path of the European critics, nay, he even has gone beyond their doubts and scepticism, denying totally the pagan origin of ancient poetry and attributing it to Islamic sources.
Pointing out such misconceptions, errors of deliberate travesty, medieval Arab critics like lbn Sallam, al-Asma'i, 'Amr Ibn al-'Ala. and Mufaddal, repudiated a considerable portion of ancient poetry, without rejecting the whole as spui ious.