Question

Assalamu alaykum wa rahmatullah

Thank you for your clarification on the spelling of the name of Allah (subhanahu wa ta 'ala). I take the opportunity to ask further clarification: Why is the laam  lengthened, while there is not lengthening (madd) letter? Did the Prophet (peace be upon him) explain the case?
Wassalamu alaykum wa rahmatullah

Answer

Wa alaikum assalaam wa rahmatu Allahi wa barakatuhu,

One thing we should point out that we didn’t point out in the previous answer, is that in Arabic they do not use the phrase “name of Allah”, since that puts Allah, the Exalted, in less respect.  Instead the phrase used is “lafth al-Jalaalah” ( ), or glorious or lofty expression or word is used when referring to Allah’s glorious name.  We are not finding fault with the questioner since he added the glorification after the expression, but just pointing this out for all that read this.

We believe you are wondering about the pronounced alif after the  with a shaddah on in in the Glorious word .  This alif is not written in many copies of the Qur’an and in particular the Medinah press copy that is prevalent in the Muslim world does not have it written.  Please remember that the vowels and “dagger alifs” or the little alifs that are over some words were not written in the Qur’an copy made during the time of the Prophet, ; as a matter of fact, the dot system was not in use then either.  These were all developed later as Islam spread and non-Arabs entered Islam and needed these “crutches” to read the Qur’an properly.  We have addressed this aspect in detail in a previous answer to the different ways of recitation. 

When the committee for the diatricts, vowels, and writing of the Medinah copy of the Qur’an came to the Glorious word , they chose not to write in the little “dagger” alif because it was so well known that there was no need for it.  We have heard a prominent  scholar of the Qur’an wish that this hadn’t been the case, and we cannot help but agree that it would have cleared up a lot of confusion among the non-Arabs if they would have written in the small alif. 

In conclusion, there is an alif after the  with a shaddah in the Glorious word , but the committee for the Medinah press copy of the Qur’an decided it was so well known that there was no need to write it in.  This means that there is a natural two vowel count medd when continuing on with the Glorious word, and when stopping on the Glorious word , there is a presented sukoon lengthening of 2, 4, or 6 counts.

Wa alaikum assalaam wa rahmatu Allahi wa barakatuhu