someone reporting a matter, he may form a probable belief, which is then strengthened by another report until it becomes immediate and unavoidable knowledge. Likewise, when he hears a speaker’s words, he may know the intended meaning from the outset, or he may initially consider it probable. Then, as the speaker repeats his words, or as he repeatedly hears those words and whatever indicates their intended meaning, his knowledge of that meaning becomes immediate and unavoidable.

Knowledge of the intended meaning may also be inferential, reached through reasoning. In that case, it may depend on a single premise, two premises, or more. But the claim that every inference concerning a speaker’s intended meaning drawn from verbal evidence depends on ten premises is certainly false. Still more false is the claim that every such premise is merely probable. Rather, most of the premises on which understanding the speaker’s intended meaning depends may be certain in the ordinary course of things for anyone who reflects on the matter.

If it is said, “If the speaker has explained his intended meaning in words other than the expression in question, and this explanation has been transmitted from him through mass transmission, then that meaning is derived not from the expression itself but from that transmission,” the reply is: They transmitted the intended meaning, and they also transmitted that this is what the expression means and that the expression signifies it—just as they transmitted the obligation of Hajj and that this obligation is what is intended by His words: