Ibrāhīm 14:32-34

Allāhu'lladhī khalaqa's-samāwāti wa'l-arḍa wa anzala mina's-samāʾi māʾan fa-akhraja bihi mina'th-thamarāti rizqan lakum · Wa sakhkhara lakumu'l-fulka li-tajriya fi'l-baḥri bi-amrih · Wa sakhkhara lakumu'l-anhār · Wa sakhkhara lakumu'sh-shamsa wa'l-qamara dāʾibayn · Wa sakhkhara lakumu'l-layla wa'n-nahār · Wa ātākum min kulli mā saʾaltumūh · Wa in taʿuddū niʿmata'llāhi lā tuḥṣūhā · Inna'l-insāna la-ẓalūmun kaffār

"God is He who created the heavens and the earth, and sent down water from the sky and brought forth fruits with it as provision for you. He made the ships subservient to you, that they might run upon the sea by His command; and He made the rivers subservient to you. · He made the sun and the moon subservient to you, both unceasing; and the night and the day. · And He gave you of everything you asked of Him. Were you to count God's favour you could not reckon it up. Man is indeed much given to wrong, much given to covering over."

The verb is repeated four times in three verses: the ships, the rivers, the sun and the moon, the night and the day.

The root س-خ-ر: to bring a thing under submission and set it to a particular work. The lexicographers explain the word's concrete use by "making someone work without pay": sukhra — getting work done without recompense. (The same root also carries the sense sukhriyya — mockery; the lexicographers record the shared point of the two branches as "belittling someone and making him subject to one's own purpose.")

I record this as an observation about the word order: the verse could have joined the list with a single verb. Its repeating the verb at every item takes the list out of being a single whole and makes it things given one by one. The sense of an enumeration is built by this repetition — and in the thirty-fourth verse it will be said, "you could not reckon them up."

The root د-ء-ب: to keep at a task without wearying, without a break. Daʾaba fī ʿamalih — he kept on at his work untiringly. Daʾb — a continuous behaviour that has become habitual.

The word comes in the dual: dāʾibayn — "both of them unceasing."

Per the method (Method) I draw a boundary: I derive from this word no modern description of the motion of the heavenly bodies. The dictionary sense of the word is "going on without a break"; what the verse says to its hearer is that the sun and the moon do their work without interruption. To produce a piece of astronomy from this would be to make the text say what it does not say.

The lexicographers differ over the understanding of the sentence, and the disagreement rests on the particle:

All three readings are transmitted; I do not impose a preference.

There is a fact about the language that must be recorded: the third reading is possible in Arabic because mā can be both a relative pronoun and a particle of negation. But since the continuation of the sentence (wa in taʿuddū) is tied to the idea of counting, the first two readings run more smoothly. I give this as an indication, not as a preference.

This sentence occurs in two places in the Qurʾān in exactly the same words: here and at al-Naḥl 16/18.

Sūrat al-Naḥl has not yet been treated in the series — for this reason I cannot give a cross-reference to it. A comparison of the two occurrences is work that can be done when al-Naḥl's turn comes. Here I record only that it is found in two places.

Two verbs must be recorded, and the difference between them is the whole point of the verse:

The concrete sense of the root ح-ص-ي is worth recording: ḥaṣā — a pebble. The Arabs used pebbles when counting; from this the word passed to the sense "to count out, to keep the reckoning of". The root was treated at al-Jinn 72/28 and at al-Kahf 18/49 (lā yughādiru ṣaghīratan wa lā kabīratan illā aḥṣāhā). I rely on those treatments.

And the logic of the sentence lies in this distinction: the verse does not say "you cannot count them" — it says "were you to set about counting them you could not finish." The conditional sentence grants that counting is possible; what is negated is the completing of the count.

I record this as my own reading, and its ground is the difference between the two verbs: the verse does not forbid the counting of favours; it says that the count has no end. And this joins with the sūra's theme of thanksgiving: the subject of thanks is not what can be counted but what cannot.

Two intensive forms side by side: ẓalūm (faʿūl) and kaffār (faʿʿāl).

And their order must be recorded: ẓalūm — much given to wrong; kaffār — much given to covering over. The opposition of the sūra's seventh verse (thanks / denial) returns here in the second word.

I record this as an observation: the block begins with a counting of favours and ends with an attribute of man. And the attribute is not "unbelieving" but "covering over" — that is, making invisible what he has seen. The core of the root ك-ف-ر was analysed in al-Baqara; I do not repeat it.

And the verdict is given not to a community but to al-insān. Per the method (Method) I record it: the verse gives no name of a group, it describes a human tendency — and other instances of this pattern have been treated in the series (al-ʿĀdiyāt 100/6, al-Maʿārij 70/19, al-Fajr 89/15-16). I rely on those treatments.