Quranic root
عصم
ʿ · ṣ · m
The root centers on holding, restraining, preventing, and remaining attached to something.
From the basic idea of holding or preventing, the usage develops into protection and preservation, clinging to a protective support, fastening or binding, and marks or features that remain attached.
- Maqāyīs · row 3226
- 5
- Quran-attested forms
- 5
- Quran senses
- 13
- Quran occurrences
Forms in the Quran
The forms this root actually takes in the Quran. Select one to jump to its senses and examples.
عَصَمَ
ʿaṣama
- Part of speech
- Verb · Form I
- Form
- I
- Quran occurrences
- 3 occurrences
Selected examples are shown with the sense they illustrate — chosen to teach that sense, not the complete list of this form’s Quran occurrences.
To protect, defend, or preserve from harm.
A transitive verb of protection or preservation; in the Quran it is used of protection from people, danger, or divine decree.
- Lane · entry 3508
- Mufradāt · row 984
Selected Quran examples
Quran 5:67word 16
“will protect you”
Quran 11:43word 5
“(that) will save me”
Quran 33:17word 5
“(can) protect you”
اِعْتَصَمَ
āiʿtaṣama
- Part of speech
- Verb · Form VIII
- Form
- VIII
- Quran occurrences
- 5 occurrences
Selected examples are shown with the sense they illustrate — chosen to teach that sense, not the complete list of this form’s Quran occurrences.
To hold fast to, cling to, or take refuge in a protecting support.
Commonly constructed with بِـ or إِلَى. Quranic uses describe holding fast to God, His bond, or His guidance; the construction can also express seeking protection through that attachment.
- Lane · entry 3509
- Lane · entry 3511
- Mufradāt · row 984
Selected Quran examples
Quran 3:101word 11
“holds firmly”
Quran 3:103word 1
“And hold firmly”
Quran 4:175word 5
“and held fast”
Quran 22:78word 37
“and hold fast”
اِسْتَعْصَمَ
āistaʿṣama
- Part of speech
- Verb · Form X
- Form
- X
- Quran occurrences
- 1 occurrence
Selected examples are shown with the sense they illustrate — chosen to teach that sense, not the complete list of this form’s Quran occurrences.
To seek protection for oneself and hold oneself back from wrongdoing.
The Quranic use describes deliberately seeking what will preserve one from an immoral act; the reflexive construction focuses on self-restraint and self-preservation.
- Lane · entry 3512
- Mufradāt · row 984
Selected Quran examples
Quran 12:32word 10
“but he saved himself”
عَاصِمٌ
ʿāṣimun
- Part of speech
- Active participle
- Quran occurrences
- 3 occurrences
Selected examples are shown with the sense they illustrate — chosen to teach that sense, not the complete list of this form’s Quran occurrences.
A protector, defender, or possessor of protective power.
In negated constructions, especially concerning God's decree, it means that there is no defender or source of protection; the active-participle form may also be interpreted in a possessive or quasi-passive relation to protection.
- Lane · entry 3522
- Mufradāt · row 984
Selected Quran examples
عِصْمَةٌ
ʿiṣmahun
- Part of speech
- Noun
- Quran occurrences
- 1 occurrence
Selected examples are shown with the sense they illustrate — chosen to teach that sense, not the complete list of this form’s Quran occurrences.
A marital tie or marriage bond.
The Quranic form is the plural عِصَم, used of matrimonial bonds that are no longer to be maintained.
- Lane · entry 3517
- Mufradāt · row 984
Selected Quran examples
Quran 60:10word 40
“to marriage bonds”
Occurrences in the Quran
Every place this root appears, in Quran order. The first few are shown here.
- 3:101يَعْتَصِمholds firmly
- 3:103وَٱعْتَصِمُوا۟And hold firmly
- 4:146وَٱعْتَصَمُوا۟and hold fast
- 4:175وَٱعْتَصَمُوا۟and held fast
- 5:67يَعْصِمُكَwill protect you
Broader Classical Arabic meanings
Recorded for this root in the Classical lexicons beyond its Quran usage. These are secondary to the Quran senses above.
Show 29 Classical meanings
عَصَمَ
To fit a water-skin with its tie, or to bind it with that tie.
A technical construction concerning the fastening of water-skins and similar leather vessels.
- Lane · entry 3508
عَصَمَ
To gain, earn, or seek the means of subsistence.
A distinct Form I usage reported in Classical Arabic.
- Lane · entry 3508
عَصَمَ
To adhere or stick, as dust adhering to a tooth.
Used of dust or a similar substance becoming attached to a surface.
- Lane · entry 3508
عَصِمَ
To be marked with the characteristic feature called أَعْصَم.
Reported especially of gazelles and mountain-goats, and apparently also of horses; the feature is the whiteness described under أَعْصَم.
- Lane · entry 3508
أَعْصَمَ
To be unsteady in one’s seat on a horse.
A Form IV usage associated with riding and lack of firmness in the saddle.
- Lane · entry 3509
أَعْصَمَ
To prepare a handhold in a camel’s or horse’s saddle for someone.
The prepared object is something by which the rider can hold on to avoid falling.
- Lane · entry 3509
اِنْعَصَمَ
To become protected, defended, or preserved.
A quasi-passive Form VII usage describing the subject as receiving protection.
- Lane · entry 3510
اِعْتَصَمَ
For a girl or young woman to apply collyrium to her eyes.
An idiomatic usage unrelated to the Quranic holding-fast construction.
- Lane · entry 3511
عُصْمٌ
A remnant, trace, or residue of something.
Includes a remaining trace of coloring, tar, saffron, henna, or a similar substance.
- Lane · entry 3513
عُصْمَةٌ
A collar or bracelet-like band; by extension, something possessed or given in its entirety.
The idiom دَفَعْتُهُ إِلَيْهِ بِعُصْمَتِهِ means that it was handed over altogether, with all that belongs to it.
- Lane · entry 3516
عُصْمَةٌ
The characteristic contrasting whiteness denoted by أَعْصَم.
Used of a whitened extremity, especially the wrist or foreleg of an animal.
- Lane · entry 3516
عِصْمَةٌ
Protection, preservation, or defence from destruction, want, or harm.
The noun can denote ordinary protection, a defender’s support, or divine preservation; it is also used for the preservation attributed to God.
- Lane · entry 3517
عِصْمَةٌ
A faculty or disposition that preserves someone from disobedience while leaving the power to commit it.
A technical theological usage, also described as an inability to disobey or a disposition preventing disobedience without coercion.
- Lane · entry 3517
عِصَامٌ
A cord, strap, tie, or loop used to fasten or carry a water-skin, leather vessel, or similar receptacle.
The term also extends to anything serving to secure or preserve an object, including the cords of a travelling litter.
- Lane · entry 3518
عِصَامٌ
The slender terminal part of an animal’s tail, or the tail with its hair and central strip.
A zoological usage with the plural أَعْصِمَةٌ.
- Lane · entry 3518
عِصَامٌ
Collyrium.
Named in connection with the eye-protecting or strengthening function attributed to it.
- Lane · entry 3518
عَصُومٌ
Edacious or voracious.
Applied to a she-camel or to a human being, male or female.
- Lane · entry 3519
عَصُومٌ
A woman whose family or household has become numerous.
A specialized nominal use referring to the growth of a woman’s household or family.
- Lane · entry 3519
عَصِيمٌ
A dried or adhering residue, such as sweat-rust or dirt and dried urine on a camel’s thighs.
Used especially of deposits that dry onto an animal’s body.
- Lane · entry 3520
عَصِيمٌ
Black hair growing beneath a camel’s fur after the outer fur has shed.
A specialized camel-related usage.
- Lane · entry 3520
عَصِيمٌ
The leaves of trees.
A separate nominal usage reported in Classical Arabic.
- Lane · entry 3520
عِصَامِيٌّ
Self-ennobled; noble through personal character or achievement rather than ancestry.
Contrasted with عِظَامِيٌّ, one who takes pride in inherited lineage.
- Lane · entry 3521
العَاصِمَةُ
A name for Medina.
A proper-name usage derived from the protective sense.
- Lane · entry 3522
أَبُو عَاصِمٍ
An appellation for certain foods, especially parched barley meal and sikbāj.
A fixed food-name expression rather than a productive personal name.
- Lane · entry 3522
عَيْصُومٌ
A woman who sleeps for a long time and speaks angrily when roused.
A specialized descriptive noun; the related form عَيْصَامٌ is cross-referred to this usage.
- Lane · entry 3524
أَعْصَمُ
Having a contrasting whiteness on a forelimb, wing, leg, or analogous extremity.
Applied to gazelles, mountain-goats, and horses for whiteness in the forelegs; applied to a crow for a rare white feature in a wing or leg. The exact body part varies by animal and lexical authority.
- Lane · entry 3516
- Lane · entry 3525
مِعْصَمٌ
The wrist or the part of the forearm where a bracelet is worn; by extension, the arm.
The primary anatomical sense concerns the bracelet-bearing part of the forearm, with poetic or extended use for the arm.
- Lane · entry 3526
مِعْصَمْ
A name used to call a she-goat for milking.
Used without the definite article as a repeated vocative call.
- Lane · entry 3526
مُعْتَصَمٌ
A place of defence, protection, or preservation.
A nominal place-of-protection usage.
- Lane · entry 3527
Cautions
Points that affect how this root should be read.
Lane’s printed historical Quran references are not converted into modern verse locations; Quran examples here use only independently supplied QAC locations.
The Quranic plural عِصَم is presented under the supported singular dictionary citation عِصْمَةٌ.