fatwa
/ˈfætwɑː/
"fatwa" is a 5-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“fatwa” has 7 generated spelling variants in the English index at frequency #41,624. The variants make it a useful spelling check.
- #41,624
- frequency rank, English
- 18,613
- “F” headwords
- 7
- tracked misspellings
- 17
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - A formal legal decree, opinion, or ruling issued by a mufti or other Islamic judicial authority.
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | fatwa |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈfætwɑː/ |
| Letters | 5 |
| Frequency rank | #41,624 |
| Misspellings tracked | 7 |
| Confusable pairs | 17 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “fatwa” sits in English frequency
A misspelling magnet
The generator records 7 spelling variants around fatwa (IPA /ˈfætwɑː/), anoun. Corpus frequency is #41,624 among 18,613 “F” headwords. Wiktionary lists 4 senses, so context still picks the gloss.
Our generated misspelling index lists 7 likely wrong-spelling variants for fatwa, with forms such as "aftwa", "fataw", and "fattwa". Each of these forms differs from the correct spelling by one small edit: a doubled letter, a dropped silent letter, or a substituted vowel. It also participates in 17 confusable-pair relationships, "FTA", "FTW", "fawn", and more, where similar look or sound leads writers to substitute one word for another in context.
Etymologically, the entry records: The noun is borrowed from Arabic فَتْوَى (fatwā, “formal legal opinion”), the verbal noun of أَفْتَى (ʔaftā, “to deliver a formal opinion”) (whence مُفْتٍ (muftin, “mufti”), the active participle of the same verb: see mufti). The forms fetwa, fetwah are der… The correct English form is fatwa, spelled F-A-T-W-A.
Definition
- 1A formal legal decree, opinion, or ruling issued by a mufti or other Islamic judicial authority.
- 2A decree issued by a mufti or other Islamic judicial authority that a person should be put to death, usually as punishment for committing apostasy or blasphemy.
- 3A formal decree or ruling, or statement, issued by an authority of a religion other than Islam.
- 4An emphatic decree or opinion, especially one which condemns or criticizes.
Etymology
The noun is borrowed from Arabic فَتْوَى (fatwā, “formal legal opinion”), the verbal noun of أَفْتَى (ʔaftā, “to deliver a formal opinion”) (whence مُفْتٍ (muftin, “mufti”), the active participle of the same verb: see mufti). The forms fetwa, fetwah are derived from Italian fetfà (obsolete), and directly from its etymon Ottoman Turkish فتوی (fetva) (modern Turkish fetva), from Arabic فَتْوَى (fatwā): see above. Modern uses of noun noun sense 1.2 (“decree that a person should be put to death”) and the corresponding verb sense are probably influenced by the issuance of a fatwa on 14 February 1989 by the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini (1900 or 1902 – 1989), the Supreme Leader of Iran, calling for the British-American author Salman Rushdie (born 1947) and his publishers to be put to death for alleged blasphemy in his novel The Satanic Verses (1988). The plural form fatawa is borrowed from Arabic فَتَاوَى (fatāwā). The verb is derived from the noun.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: aftwa,fataw,fattwa,fatwwa,fawta,ffatwa,ftawa
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of fatwa - counted as single-character edits (an insertion, a deletion, or a substituted letter). The larger the bar, the easier the typo is to spot; one-edit slips are the ones that sneak past readers.
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA); frequency ordering uses the FrequencyWords open word-frequency list (2018 English corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
Frequently Asked Questions
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Using “fatwa”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is F-A-T-W-A - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈfætwɑː/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “FTA” - see the side-by-side comparison. fatwa vs FTA
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
Same frequency band
Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.