al-Shūrā 42:26

Wa yastajību'lladhīna āmanū wa ʿamilu'ṣ-ṣāliḥāti wa yazīduhum min faḍlih; wa'l-kāfirūna lahum ʿadhābun shadīd

"He answers those who believe and do good works, and gives them more of His bounty. As for those who reject, for them is a severe punishment."

The root was treated in al-Fajr (jābu'ṣ-ṣakhra bi'l-wād — "they hewed the rocks in the valley"). The note there: the concrete sense of the root is to cleave, to cut through.

And the sense ijāba (answering) is derived from this, and the transition is instructive: an answer is the filling of the gap a question or a call opens, the cutting through of the distance between. The word "answer" in Arabic, that is, is a verb of reaching.

The root occurs four times in this sūra, and all four stand on its spine:

The arrangement sets up this order: first it is reported that the call has been answered (16), then that God answers (26), then that the servants answer (38), and at the last answering is commanded (47).

This is a fact that can be verified from the text.

There are two readings of how the verb yastajīb takes alladhīna āmanū:

The first reading is the widespread one and accords with the continuation of the sentence: wa yazīduhum min faḍlih — "and increases for them"; the agent there is plainly God. The agent of the second clause, that is, should be the agent of the first as well.

I record this ground but impose no preference; the second reading is also transmitted.

The nazid of the twentieth and twenty-third verses comes here for the third time — and this time together with the word faḍl.

In the twenty-second verse al-faḍlu'l-kabīr occurred; root ف-ض-ل: surplus, what is over. In the sentence, then, two words of increase come one upon the other: yazīduhum + min faḍlihi.

I record this as an observation about the arrangement: "He gives them more of His more." The same idea is reinforced by two words.