4- And in what Muḥammad ibn Khālid ibn Khidāsh al-Azdī narrated to you, he said: Silm ibn Qutayba narrated to us, he said: Ḥammād ibn Salama narrated to us, from ʿAlī ibn Zayd, from Yūsuf ibn Mihrān, from Ibn ʿAbbās (may God be pleased with them both) that he was asked about His statement: ﴿Fled from a lion (qaswara)﴾ [Sūrat al-Muddaththir: 51], he said: In Arabic it is the lion (al-asad), in Persian shār, in Nabataean ariyā, and in Abyssinian qaswara (1).

5- And in what Ibn Ḥumayd narrated to you, he said: Yaʿqūb al-Qummī narrated to us, from Jaʿfar ibn Abī al-Mughīra, from Saʿīd ibn Jubayr, he said: Quraysh said: "Why was this Qur'ān not revealed in a foreign tongue and in Arabic?" So Allah (exalted be His remembrance) revealed: ﴿They would have said: "Why are its verses not explained in detail? A foreign [tongue] and an Arab?" Say: "It is for those who believe a guidance and a cure."﴾ [Sūrat Fuṣṣilat: 44]. So Allah revealed after this verse in the Qur'ān words from every language; in it is: ﴿stones of baked clay (sijjīl)﴾ [Sūrat Hūd: 82, and Sūrat al-Ḥijr: 74], he said: It is Persian that was Arabized, sang-i gil (2).

6- And in what Muḥammad ibn Bashshār narrated to you, he said: ʿAbd al-Raḥmān ibn Mahdī narrated to us, he said: Isrāʾīl narrated to us, from Abū Isḥāq, from Abū Maysara, he said: In the Qur'ān there is something from every language (3).

And in reports similar to that, the mention of which would make the Book too long, which indicate that there is in it something from other than the language of the Arabs?

It is said to him: Indeed, what they said regarding that does not depart from the meaning of what we have said—because they did not say: "These words and the like were not speech for the Arabs, nor was that