directly, whereas in the other passage He included lām. Here, His expression fa-iyyāya (“Me alone”) is fuller than fa-lī (“for Me”). There, His expression li-rabbihim (“of their Lord”) is fuller than rabbihim (“their Lord”). The independent accusative pronoun is more complete than the genitive pronoun yā’. In the other passage, however, an explicit noun is used, so strengthening it with lām is more appropriate and complete than leaving it without that preposition.

Another example is His statement:

“If you can interpret dreams.”

Here the wording is li-l-ru’yā taʿburūn, although one says ʿabartu ru’yāhu (“I interpreted his dream”). Likewise, He says:

“Indeed, they are enraging us.”

Here the wording is lanā la-ghā’izūn, although one says ghiztuhu (“I enraged him”), not ghiztu lahu. There are many such examples. Thus, in the expression mā anta bi-musaddiqin lanā (“You do not believe us”), lām is included because musaddiq is an active participle. Otherwise, one says saddaqtuhu (“I believed him”), not saddaqtu lahu. Had they used the verb, they would have said mā saddaqtanā (“You did not believe us”).

This differs from the word īmān (“belief”), which always takes a pronominal object through lām. One never says āmantuhu; rather, one says āmantu lahu (“I believed him”), just as one says aqrartu lahu (“I acknowledged what he said”). Explaining it in terms of acknowledgment is therefore closer than explaining it in terms of accepting something as true, although there is a distinction between the two.

(Second: It is not synonymous in meaning with tasdīq (“accepting as true”). In Arabic, anyone reporting something witnessed or unseen may be told sadaqta (“You have spoken the truth”), just as he may be told kadhabta (“You have lied”). If someone says, “The sky is above us,” one may say of him, “He has spoken the truth,” just as one may say, “He has lied.”

The word īmān, however, is used only concerning a report about something unseen. There is no attested usage in which someone reporting something witnessed—for example, “The sun has risen” or “It has set”—is spoken of using āmannāhu, as he would be using saddaqnāhu (“We believed him”). Thus, concerning hadith transmitters, witnesses, and the like, one says saddaqnāhum (“We believed them”), not āmannā lahum.

Īmān is derived from amn (“security”). It is therefore used only concerning a report with which its speaker is entrusted, such as a matter unseen about which the speaker is trusted. Hence, the expression āmana lahu is never found in the Quran or elsewhere except in this kind of context. And when two people share knowledge of something,