Payer, sum or debt, payee · Arabic case · working claim, revisable
The payer is the subject. A spelled noun subject is nominative. Several printed lines show the payer only in the verb: دَفَعْتُ is first person singular. Arabic has no ergative. The direct object is accusative. A noun after إِلَى, لِـ, بِـ, or عَنْ is genitive.
دَفَعَ · dafaʿa · Form I. Edward William Lane, Arabic-English Lexicon, gives the imperfect يَدْفَعُ and the verbal noun دَفْع. The first sense is to impel, push, or repel. Lane does not gloss that verb “paid.” When the verb is made transitive by إِلَى, Lane, citing the Baṣāʾir, calls it giving or delivering, and cites Qur’an 4:6 as iv. 5: فَادْفَعُوا إِلَيْهِمْ أَمْوَالَهُمْ, “Then give ye, or deliver ye, to them their property.” The property is accusative. إِلَيْهِمْ is إِلَى plus a genitive pronoun. Al-Jawharī, al-Ṣiḥāḥ, prints دَفَعْتُ إلى فلان شيئاً. Lane glosses the same sentence “I gave, or delivered, to such a one a thing,” citing the Ṣiḥāḥ and the Qāmūs. The thing, شَيْئًا, is accusative. The person is genitive after إِلَى. Lane also prints دَفَعْتُ لَهُ قِطْعَةً مِنَ المَالِ, “I gave him a part, or portion, of the property,” from the Ṣiḥāḥ in the article زعب. لَهُ is لِـ plus a genitive pronoun. The portion is accusative. Aḥmad ibn Muḥammad al-Fayyūmī, al-Miṣbāḥ al-munīr, prints دَفَعْتُ الوديعةَ إلى صاحبِها, “I restored it to him.” The deposit is accusative. The owner is genitive after إِلَى. Al-Zamakhsharī, Asās al-balāgha, prints دفع إليه مالاً. The money is accusative. Al-Rāghib al-Iṣfahānī, al-Mufradāt, states the split: if دَفْع is governed by إِلَى it has the sense of giving, and he cites the same Qur’an sentence; if it is governed by عَنْ it has the sense of protection. Zayn al-Dīn al-Rāzī, Mukhtār al-Ṣiḥāḥ, prints دَفَعَ إليه شيئاً and assigns the verb to the pattern of قَطَعَ, Form I. Habib Anthony Salmone, An Advanced Learner’s Arabic-English Dictionary, glosses Form I sense d, “[Ila or La], Gave, delivered, restored, paid to,” and glosses the noun دَفْع as “Payment” beside “Repulsion.” The person is not an accusative object on these lines.
Reinhart Dozy, Supplément aux dictionnaires arabes, prints the debt reading: دفع الدين أي أداه, citing Bocthor, Hélot, Ibn Jubayr, where the page also prints دفع له, al-Maqqarī, and the Alf layla. The debt is the object of that gloss. The same article, from Muḥīṭ al-muḥīṭ, prints طلب مني التاجر سبعة دراهم فدفعت له خمسة. خمسة is accusative, the sum. له is the payee, genitive after لِـ. Dozy also notes that دفع له replaces دفع إلى فلان, and prints al-Nuwayrī دفع الثوبين للمرأتين. The two garments are accusative. The two women are genitive after لِـ. Those things are not a bill. A bill noun as the object of دَفَعَ is unprinted. ثَمَن, عَنْ, and مُقَابِل as what the money is for are unprinted on this verb. بِـ as the cash the sum is paid in is unprinted. Lane’s instrument phrases on this root belong to repelling, not to the debt line.
سَدَّدَ · saddada · Form II. Almaany’s Arabic–Arabic page, the entry labeled al-Muʿjam al-lugha al-ʿarabiyya al-muʿāṣira, prints سَدَّدَ يُسَدِّد ، تَسْدِيدًا ، فهو مُسَدِّد ، والمفعول مُسَدَّد. The payment sense is سَدَّدَ الدَّيْنَ أو القرضَ ونحوَهما: دفعه إلى الدّائن. The debt and the loan are accusative. The examples are سَدَّدَ المصاريفَ and قائمةَ الحساب. Expenses and the account list are accusative. No payee noun stands beside those objects. إلى الدّائن, “to the creditor,” is inside the definition, and the creditor is genitive after إِلَى. It is not a second argument of قائمةَ الحساب. اللهمّ سدّد عنّا دَيْنَ الدنيا والآخرة has عَنَّا, “from us,” genitive after عَنْ. That phrase is not the payee. The debt there is still accusative. تَسَدَّدَ الدَّيْنُ: مُطاوع سَدَّدَ: دُفع إلى الدّائن makes the debt the subject, nominative. There is no payer and no payee argument. Aiming a weapon, and سَدَّدَ اللهُ الشَّخصَ, stay off the bill. A price noun ثَمَن as the object of سَدَّدَ is not in this entry.
وَفَى · wafā · Form I, and وَفَّى · waffā · Form II. Almaany labels al-Ghanī: Form I, ثُلَاثِي, وَفَى دَيْنَهُ: أَدَّاهُ كَامِلًا، تَامًّا. The debt is accusative. No payee is printed. The same Almaany page, labeled عَرَبِي عَامَّة, prints وَفَى بِدَيْنِهِ: سَدَّدَهُ، أَدَّاهُ. Here the debt is genitive after بِـ, not accusative. Lane, article وفي, glosses Form II وَفَّاهُ حَقَّهُ, and Form IV أَوْفَاهُ, “He paid, or rendered, to him fully, or completely, his right, or due,” citing the Qāmūs. The person is the accusative pronoun on the verb. The right, حَقَّهُ, is a second accusative. Al-Ghanī labels Form II رُبَاعِي and prints وَفَّاهُ حَقَّهُ: أَعْطَاهُ إِيَّاهُ تَامًّا. Al-Muʿjam al-Wasīṭ prints وَفَّى فُلَانًا حَقَّهُ: أَوْفَاهُ إِيَّاهُ. فُلَانًا is accusative. Al-Muʿāṣira prints وَفَّى الشَّخْصَ حَقَّهُ and the example وَفَّى كُلَّ دُيُونِهِ. The debts are accusative. That example prints no person. Qur’an فَوَفَّاهُ حِسَابَهُ is in the same entry, glossed as requital. It stays off the bill.
أَوْفَى · awfā · Form IV. Al-Muʿāṣira prints أَوْفَى يُوفِي ، إِيفَاءً, and أَوْفَى الشَّخْصَ حَقَّهُ: أَعْطَاهُ إِيَّاهُ وَافِيًا تَامًّا, with أَوْفَاهُمْ صَاحِبُ المَصْنَعِ حُقُوقَهُمْ كَامِلَةً. The factory owner is the subject. The people are accusative. The rights are a second accusative. Lisān al-ʿArab, as Almaany prints it, has أَوْفَى الرَّجُلَ حَقَّهُ وَوَفَّاهُ إِيَّاهُ, “he made it complete for him and gave it to him in full.” The man and the right are both accusative. The عَرَبِي عَامَّة block prints أَوْفَى بِدَيْنِهِ فِي الوَقْتِ المُحَدَّدِ: سَدَّدَهُ. The debt is genitive after بِـ. No payee is in that line. بِـ here governs the debt. It is not a means phrase, and it is not the cash.
أَدَّى · addā · Form II, imperfect يُؤَدِّي, verbal noun تَأْدِيَة. Dozy’s gloss of دفع الدين is أَدَاهُ: the pronoun matches the debt. Al-Muʿāṣira, on Almaany’s page for أدى, prints أَدَّى الدَّيْنَ: وَفَّاهُ. The debt is accusative. That line prints no payee. The same entry prints أَدَّى الحَقَّ / أَدَّى إِلَيْهِ الحَقَّ: أَوْصَلَهُ، وَسَلَّمَهُ, and Qur’an 4:58 أَنْ تُؤَدُّوا الأَمَانَاتِ إِلَى أَهْلِهَا. The trust is accusative. The person is genitive after إِلَى. The debt line and the trust line do not share a payee. The Almaany headword block prints أَدَّى الدَّيْنَ: قَضَاهُ، دَفَعَهُ and أَدَّى مَا كَانَ عَلَيْهِ مِنْ دُيُونٍ. آدَى, Form IV on that page, is to be strong or to take up one’s tools. It stays off the bill. Hans Wehr was not opened. No Wehr gloss is cited.
Where this frame diverges from English pay (a bill). English pay the bill makes the document the object and brings the sum back as with or in. English pay someone can make the person that object. دَفَعَ puts the thing, the sum, or the debt in the accusative, and the person, when one is printed, in إِلَى or لِـ plus the genitive. The person is not the accusative. سَدَّدَ puts the debt, the expenses, or the account list in the accusative and prints no payee beside those objects. وَفَّى and أَوْفَى can put the person in the accusative and the right in a second accusative. That is the one frame here on which the payee is an object, and the right is still a second accusative. وَفَى بِدَيْنِهِ and أَوْفَى بِدَيْنِهِ put the debt in the genitive after بِـ. أَدَّى الدَّيْنَ is the debt alone. What the money is for, and the cash it is paid in, are unprinted on these clauses.