Al Qaabid

Qabḍ is the closing of a hand — drawing a thing in, holding it back. The same root gives qabḍa, a handful, and the ordinary word for taking possession of something.

This written form is not in the Qur’anic text; the name comes down in the list the tradition carries, where it is never printed away from its opposite. The verb is in the text, though, and it is in the same breath as that opposite: Allah withholds and gives abundantly, one ayah, two hands. A season of less is not the absence of the giver.