to them, and the Arabs regularly allow one verb to stand in for another, assigning to it the same object and preposition. This well-known device is called tadmīn: a verb is invested with the meaning of another verb, and so it adopts that verb’s pattern of transitivity.

A clear example is the Almighty’s words, “a spring from which the servants of Allah will drink” (al-Insān 76:6). Here the verb yashrabu (drink) carries the meaning of yarwā (be quenched), for no one actually drinks the spring itself; they drink from cups. Some commentators therefore take the preposition “bi-hā” to mean “min-hā” (“from it”), while others hold that yashrabu itself denotes “are quenched by it.” In either case, the verb has been imbued with the meaning of quenching, diverging from its literal sense yet still alluding to drinking through its complement “bi-hā.”

From this it becomes clear that those who imagine certain prepositions may simply replace others are mistaken. They say, for example, that in “He said, ‘He has surely wronged you by asking for your ewe ilā (his) ewes’” (Ṣād 38:24), the particle ilā means “along with,” or that in “Who are my helpers ilā Allah?” (Āl ʿImrān 3:52) it likewise means “with Allah.” The correct view, held by the Basran grammarians, is that the construction involves tadmīn: the request for the ewe implicitly includes the sense of gathering it and adding it to his own ewes.

Explanation

Grammarians have differed over what happens when a verb governs a preposition other than the one it normally takes: Is the figurative shift in the preposition or in the verb? The sound position, as just stated, is that it lies in the verb. The verb is charged with a meaning that properly selects that preposition and thus governs it, as in the verse, “He has surely wronged you by asking for your ewe ilā (his) ewes.” In other words, through the request, the verb implicitly conveys joining—namely, adding your ewe to