What Aḥmad said about disliking these names is based on two considerations.

The first: When the meaning of a name is unknown, it might carry a prohibited sense, and a Muslim should not utter what he does not understand. For that reason foreign incantations—whether in Hebrew, Syriac, or any other language—were disapproved, lest they contain impermissible meanings. This is the very point Isḥāq took into account. If the meaning is known to be objectionable, there is no doubt it is disliked; if the meaning is simply unknown, Aḥmad still regarded it as objectionable, whereas Isḥāq’s words allow for the possibility that he did not.

The second: Aḥmad disliked a person’s becoming accustomed to speech in any tongue other than Arabic, for the Arabic language is the emblem of Islam and its people, and languages are among the most prominent hallmarks by which nations are distinguished. Hence many jurists—indeed most of them—disliked invoking or remembering God in the supplications of the prayer in a language other than Arabic.

The jurists differed concerning the remembrances (adhkār) of the prayers: may they be recited in a language other than Arabic? These remembrances fall into three levels. The highest is the Qur’an itself; next comes the obligatory remembrance that is not Qur’an, such as the opening takbīrah (takbīrat al-iḥrām) by consensus, and the taslīm and the tashahhud according to those who deem them obligatory; and finally the non-obligatory remembrance, such as personal supplication, tasbīḥ, takbīr, and the like.

As for the Qur’an, it is not to be recited in any language other than Arabic, whether or not one is able to recite it in Arabic, according to