Thread by @PhDniX

The extra ʾalif is not really a 'variant' of Q3:158, rather it's a widespread spelling variant that is employed with some frequency in ancient Quranic manuscripts whenever the aseverative la- precedes a word that start with a hamzah. @zxGTS5a

https://twitter.com/dbru1/status/1362058941405016066

This spelling of writing la-ʾilā is in fact not JUST attested in early manuscripts. It is typical in print Qurans of the Indian sub-continent and well-recorded in medieval works on spelling variants.

It is in fact difficult to find manuscripts that *don't* have this spelling.

The Codex Parisino Petropolitanus (which includes Arabe 328a) has it.
1. The Samarkand Codex.
2. The Husayn mosque codex (Alif removed by a later scribe)
3. The Topkapı Mushaf
4. Arabe 332

1. Qāf 47 originally lacked it but was corrected TOWARDS this spelling variant. Which proves that the corrector had an exemplar that had the alif.
2. Wetzstein II 1913 originally had it, but a corrector removed it.

All old mss have it, so it must be original to the archetype

The only manuscript that is considerably ancient that doesn't seem to have it is the Rampur Raza Codex.

The considerably later Arabe 339, and Arabe 350(b) also lack it.

This spelling variant does not do anything to the meaning of the text (reading it as lā ʾilā, as the spelling SEEMS to suggest renders it non-sensical). The occurence of la- + word that starts with hamzah spelled as لاا occurs more often even in print Qurans:

Most prominently you see this in la-ʾaḏbaḥannahū "surely I will slay him" spelled as لااذبحنه.
quran.com/27/21

This is an ancient spelling practice that soon disappeared in Muslim Arabic writing, and memory of it only remains in these ancient manuscripts.

However, it lived on significantly longer in Christian Arabic. There it is so common, in fact, that it gets special mention by Joshua Blau in his book on Christian Arabic of the first millennium CE.

As Blau points out, especially when it involves verbs, this spelling practice is rather awkward and makes it difficult to tell whether the verb is supposed to say "I will surely kill" or "I will NOT kill". Only the context allows you to deduce which reading is correct.

So it is for pretty good reason that in Muslim Arabic this writing practice was soon abandoned, as it could needlessly create ambiguities. In this case of Q3:158, however, that ambiguity is not really there. It's just a variant spelling for the same reading.

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