There is a difference (1) between knowing love and actually being in the state of love; time and again a servant confuses mere knowledge of a thing with its real condition and concrete existence.

There is likewise a difference between a sick person who understands what soundness and balance are while he himself is racked with illness, and a healthy, unharmed person who, even if he cannot properly define health or articulate it, nonetheless enjoys it.

The same holds for fear: describing it and knowing it in theory is one matter, while experiencing it in one’s very being is something else altogether.

Now consider how the Exalted reinforces this meaning in the verse by several layers of emphasis.

The first of these is that the verse opens with the negative particle lā. This lā is not superfluous, as some imagine; it is inserted for a subtle purpose in the oath—namely (2) to signal that what is being sworn about is itself a negation, expressed in His words, “they do not believe.”

This is a recognized convention in Arabic rhetoric: when they swear to deny something (3) they begin the oath-clause with a negative particle, just as in this verse and in the statement of al-Ṣiddīq, may Allah be pleased with him: “Lāhā Allah, he would never strike down a Lion of Allah who is fighting for Allah and His Messenger, only to hand you his spoils.” (4)