Someone is hurrying a task or journey whose finish they do not fully control.
Similar practical message with a limited difference, shown beside the similarity.
What supports this analysis
Every required claim and relation in this set passed its recorded review path.
Both member expressions and their functional contexts are well located, but the cross-language relationship is an AI editorial comparison and no transmission is claimed.
- Last reviewed
- 2026-08-24
- Reviewed by
- AI publication-readiness review run, independently of the proposer (AI data-completeness review run)
How this record reached us: AI suggested. This describes provenance and does not raise confidence.
- Verified:
- Passed the recorded review path, with sources, rights and review roles shown.
- Disputed:
- Credible disagreement exists. Review the competing interpretations before classroom use.
- Partial coverage:
- Some required claims are reviewed but not yet verified. Read the evidence before classroom use.
Candidate, reviewed and rejected material is editorial-only and never appears on this site.
Why these are connected
Both sayings concede the goal but dispute hurrying as the method. Each warns that speed at the beginning need not produce an earlier finish.
Where they differ
The English member states a general paradox: haste makes the overall process slower. The Arabic member uses a specific Nile-ferry scene, where the hurried and slow travellers wait for the same departure. The source establishes historical Cairene context, not present-day usage.
Relationship detail
Supporting facets. One label cannot carry a whole relationship.
- Alignment
- Aligned
- Evidence quality
- Moderate
- Metaphor overlap
- Low
- Use-case overlap
- High
- Semantic closeness
- High
- Historical direction
- Not established
Historical relationship
Not established. The reviewed sources do not support a claim about transmission or shared origin between these members, so none is made.
Compare
- Sense: Verified
Member 1: English
EnglishThe more haste, worse speed.
- Literal translation
The more you hurry, the slower the overall result.
- Natural translation
The more you hurry, the slower the overall result.
- Functional meaning
Warns that hurrying can delay completion rather than accelerate it.
- Usage context
Used when haste itself is making a task or journey take longer.
Relationship to this situation
Near equivalentRelationship: VerifiedDirectly says that more haste can produce worse overall speed.
- Community
- Unknown
- Region
- Unknown
- Historical period
- Recorded from 1542; less-speed variants are documented in 1829 and 1919.
- Register
- historical proverb; a less-speed variant is more familiar today
Full proverb detail: The more you hurry, the slower the overall result.Reviewed 2026-08-24 - Sense: Verified
Member 2: Arabic
Arabicالمستعجل والبطي عند المعدية يلتقي
al-mustaʿjil wa-l-baṭīʾ ʿind al-maʿaddiyya yaltaqī
- Literal translation
The one who hurries and the slow one meet at the ferry.
- Natural translation
The one who hurries and the slow one meet at the ferry.
- Functional meaning
Hurrying gains nothing when the real bottleneck is outside the traveller’s control.
- Usage context
The source explains that Nile ferries waited for enough passengers, so early and late arrivals could leave together. No current-use claim is made.
Relationship to this situation
Near equivalentRelationship: VerifiedUses a ferry bottleneck to show that arriving faster may not produce an earlier finish.
- Community
- Cairene Arabic speakers as recorded by Burckhardt
- Region
- Cairo, Egypt
- Historical period
- Recorded as current at Cairo c. 1816–17 and published in 1830; no claim of current 2026 usage.
- Register
- colloquial Egyptian Arabic as historically collected
Full proverb detail: The one who hurries and the slow one meet at the ferry.Reviewed 2026-08-24
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