faʿūl. Thus al-Rahīm (the Merciful), al-Qadīr (the All-Powerful), al-Hasīb (the Reckoner), al-Jalīl (the Majestic), al-Raqīb (the Watchful), and similar names are more numerous than al-Raʾūf (the Compassionate), al-Ghafūr (the All-Forgiving), al-Shakūr (the Appreciative), al-Sabūr (the Forbearing), al-Wadūd (the Loving), and al-ʿAfuww (the Pardoning). Only these six names are known in the latter pattern.

Having established the resemblance between faʿīl and faʿūl in the respects mentioned, we find that the Arabs specifically used faʿūl in its active sense without the tāʾ that distinguishes masculine from feminine, employing the masculine form for both. Thus they said rajul sabūr wa-shakūr (a patient and grateful man) and imraʾah sabūr wa-shakūr (a patient and grateful woman), and similarly with other words. The pair ʿaduww and ʿaduwwah (a male and female enemy) is exceptional. If, however, the tāʾ is intended to convey intensity, it is added for both masculine and feminine subjects: rajul malūlah (a man exceedingly prone to boredom) and rajul farūqah (an exceedingly fearful man), with the same forms used for a woman. When faʿūl has a passive meaning, it takes the tāʾ in the feminine, as in halūbah (an animal that is milked) and rakūbah (an animal that is ridden).

With this established, qarīb (near) in the verse is faʿīl with an active meaning. This does not mean that it signifies qārib (one who approaches), but that it has the general sense of an active participle. It would therefore normally take the tāʾ. Yet the Arabs treated it like faʿīl with a passive meaning and omitted the tāʾ, just as they treated faʿīl with a passive meaning like faʿīl with an active meaning by adding the tāʾ. Thus they said khaslah hamīdah (a praiseworthy quality) and faʿlah dhamīmah (a blameworthy deed), meaning mahmūdah (praised) and madhmūmah (blamed), adding the tāʾ by analogy with jamīlah (beautiful) and sharīfah (noble). Conversely, they treated qarīb by analogy with imraʾah qatīl (a slain woman), kaff khadīb (a dyed hand), and ʿayn kahīl (a kohl-lined eye), omitting the tāʾ. Each category was thus treated by analogy with the other.

A comparable example occurs in the words of Allah Most High:

“He says, ‘Who will give life to bones when they have crumbled away?’”

Here ramīm (crumbled), despite its active meaning, is treated by analogy with imraʾah qatīl and similar expressions. This is one of the strongest approaches to resolving the difficulty, and it is the one on which they rely. Three objections, however, have been raised against it.

The first is that this entails treating intransitive and transitive verbs alike. Faʿīl with a passive meaning belongs to the category of transitive verbs, whereas faʿīl with an active meaning belongs to the category of intransitive verbs, since it generally derives from faʿula, whose middle root consonant bears a dammah. Applying the rule of either category to the other would therefore place intransitive and transitive verbs on the same footing, which is inadmissible.