together. No one with understanding could have any doubt about this. Moreover, the genitive reading is weakened (1) by another consideration (2): the awkwardness of the construction, “I passed by Zayd and, after him, ‘Amr,” with ‘Amr in the genitive. The coordinating conjunction takes the place of the preposition, so nothing should intervene between it and the noun in the genitive, just as nothing should intervene between a preposition and the noun it governs.

Further evidence is that when Allah, glorified be He, recounted the story of Abraham and his son who was to be sacrificed in Surah al-Sāffāt, He said:

“When they had both submitted, and he had laid him down on his forehead (103), We called out to him, ‘O Abraham (104), you have fulfilled the vision.’ Indeed, this is how We reward those who do good (105). This was truly the clear trial (106). And We ransomed him with a great sacrifice (107). We preserved his good name among later generations (108): ‘Peace be upon Abraham’ (109). This is how We reward those who do good (110). He was indeed one of Our believing servants.”

Then He said:

“And We gave him glad tidings of Isaac, a prophet among the righteous.” [al-Sāffāt: 103–112]

These were glad tidings from Allah in recognition of his patient endurance of what he had been commanded to do. This very clearly indicates that the son announced here was someone other than the first; indeed, it is virtually an explicit statement to that effect.

If it is said: The second announcement concerned his prophethood. That is, when the father patiently endured what he had been commanded to do, and the son submitted to Allah’s command, Allah rewarded him by granting him prophethood.

The reply is: The glad tidings concerned the whole: Isaac himself, his coming into existence, and his becoming a prophet. This is why “a prophet” is in the accusative as a circumstantial qualifier referring to a future state—that is, envisaging (3) his prophethood. The glad tidings cannot be excluded from applying to the principal element and then restricted to the dependent circumstantial qualifier, which functions as a syntactic adjunct. Such a reading is linguistically impossible. Rather, if the glad tidings concerned his prophethood, then their application