Investigating Proverbs Genuine Reflection of Religious Teachings in Persian Prose Texts

Proverb is a popular brief statement including a simile or a theme of wisdom used in public conversations and reflecting the thoughts and beliefs, ways of thinking, attributes and temperament of the people of the past. Undoubtedly, religious truths have also been reflected in proverbs; however, since proverbs originate in the knowledge of the public, representation of truth, and, especially, of religious teachings, do not often conform with reality, and cause distortion of religious facts on the one hand, and infect the domain of Persian literature on the other. Therefore, it seemed suitable to acquire some criteria to note the inadequacy and contradictions of proverbs in reflecting religious facts, especially in the most regarded field of human entities of men and women. After deductive division of proverbs, the researchers concluded that, for different reasons like motivation of the proverb maker or limitation in expressive structure, Persian proverbs have failed to reflect religious teachings in many cases, and have caused erroneous interpretations that do not originate from religion.