through their wording and the accompanying indications pointing to the referent and to the explicit antecedent explaining the pronoun.

A better formulation when presenting a hadith for confirmation is, “He narrated to me that So-and-so said,” or “He informed me that So-and-so said,” rather than, “So-and-so informed us, saying, ‘He informed us,’” or “So-and-so narrated to us, saying, ‘He narrated to us.’” This is also the formulation used in testimony: “I testify that So-and-so, son of So-and-so, made an acknowledgment,” or “that he issued a judgment,” or “that he established an endowment.” Likewise, some hadith masters distinguish transmission by authorization from other methods. For authorization, they say, “So-and-so informed us (anā) that So-and-so narrated to them,” unlike their wording for direct hearing.

Some have held that there is no difference between the two formulations. They have even preferred anna (“that”), supposing that it adds emphasis. But the matter is not as they imagined: anna, with its initial a, together with its predicate, functions as a verbal noun. Thus, “He narrated to me that he said” amounts to “He narrated his statement to me.” Hence the grammarians agree that inna, with its initial i, occupies the position of a complete sentence, whereas anna occupies the position of a single nominal expression.

Thus, His words:

“The angels called to him while he stood praying in the sanctuary, that Allah gives you glad tidings”

—according to the reading with anna—amount to saying, “They called to him with His glad tidings.” This conveys the meaning of what they called out to him, without reproducing the wording. Whoever reads inna Allāha (“Indeed, Allah”), however, reproduces the actual wording. The same distinction applies between saying, “The first thing I say is, ‘I praise Allah,’” and “The first thing I say is, ‘Indeed, I praise Allah.’”