"Kutadgu bilig" is not just a book, but a priceless treasure of our ancient Turkish language. If you look at the text of this work with an artistic eye, each word in it is like a masterpiece that has passed through the series of thousands of years.
Yusuf Khos Hajib describes the language as "the language of the heart", "the translator of the mind". Words such as "language", "soz", "knowledge" in it have not lost the charm of ten centuries ago. What a beautiful allusion that the rising of the sun is called "Kuntugdi" (The day was born) in the work! The sun is a symbol of justice, and its light is the truth that dispels darkness.
"Kutadgu Bilig" is a treasure of spirituality, and "Devoni Lugotit Turk" (Dictionary of Turkish Words) created by Mahmud Kashgari in the 11th century is a priceless monument written to prove that the Turkish language is not inferior to the Arabic language, that it is strong and rich like a "raceless horse". Koshgari collected Turkish words like a jeweler sorting jewels. Most of the more than 8,000 words listed in the dictionary are words such as "father", "mother", "mountain", "water", "horse" that we use in everyday life. They are a living heritage that has come down to us unchanged over thousands of years.
Why did we mention the above examples? The reason is that the distortion of the Uzbek language, non-observance of its spelling and speech rules is one of the urgent problems today. Ignoring the rules of the language in correspondence on the Internet and social networks, the increase of abbreviations and incomprehensible words, illiterate correspondence undermines the purity of the language. Non-compliance with the norms of the state language is interpreted not only as moral, but also as legal disrespect. Look at the peshlavhas on the streets of our cities: words that shed tears from misspellings seem to be waiting for us to be saved. After all, the wrong placement or omission of a single letter destroys the root of the whole meaning.
Misinterpretation of the language is not just a grammatical error, it is a lack of national pride and respect for the heritage of the ancestors. Sometimes, listening to the speech of our interlocutor, we feel as if we are walking in a foreign country. In one sentence, "fragments" of three or four languages are mixed: neither Uzbek, nor Russian, nor English. This is not the enrichment of the language, but its impoverishment.
Unreasonable intrusion of extraneous elements into our words is like putting a rough patch on a silk fabric. Now think for yourself, is this our respect for our mother tongue, which includes thousands of years of complex historical processes? We talk a lot about its greatness, but why do we continue to be careless when we all see its corruption? I am very afraid that this will gradually become normal and be taken for granted!..
Khurshidbek ROZIYEV,
Advisor to the Minister of Internal Affairs,
lieutenant colonel