2/107-108 — Sovereignty and "as Moses was questioned"
"Do you not know that to God belongs the sovereignty of the heavens and the earth? And you have, besides God, neither protector nor helper. Or do you wish to question your messenger as Moses was questioned before? Whoever exchanges faith for unbelief has strayed from the level road."
At 106 a change of ruling was spoken of. The lifting of a ruling and the putting of another in its place is possible only for one who is the owner of what is set down. Verse 107 says exactly this: لَهُۥ مُلْكُ ٱلسَّمَٰوَٰتِ وَٱلْأَرْضِ.
The answer, that is, is given not by a theoretical argument but by a declaration of ownership. The same structure will be repeated in the later parts of the sūra: at verse 255 it will be said lahū mā fi's-samāwāti wa mā fi'l-arḍ, and at verse 284 the same sentence will close the section on property. Each time it comes after a question of authority.
أَلَمْ تَعْلَمْ — "do you not know?" The interrogative is used not to give information but to recall something already known. In this use, called istifhām taqrīrī in Arabic, the answer expected from the hearer is "yes".
Two words come side by side, and they often occur together in the Qurʾān. They have a distinguishing side:
| Word | Root | What it conveys |
|---|---|---|
| walī | و-ل-ي | Continuity — a nearness with no gap in between, a relation of taking charge |
| naṣīr | ن-ص-ر | The moment — help that arrives at the point of pressure |
The root و-ل-ي was treated in detail in the discussion of al-Mumtaḥina; the summary of the finding there: at the centre of the root are nearness and leaving no gap in between — two things being adjacent in such a way that no third can come between them.
The negation of the two words together leaves no gap: neither a lasting back nor a passing rescue. And this is not a sentence of threat but a description of position; the verse takes as its subject what a person leans on.
Both are of the same kind: instead of accepting the command or the report, producing a condition to be met before it. In the story of the cow the result of this had been recorded — the obligation had grown heavier.
And now the measure is applied to the new addressee. The sūra does not content itself with recounting the story of past communities; each time it turns back to the reader. At verse 118 this work will be summed up in a sentence: "their hearts have become alike."
A boundary has to be drawn here. The verse does not forbid asking questions; indeed the same sūra is full of the question-and-answer pattern: "they ask you about the new moons" (189), "they ask you what they should spend" (215), "they ask you about wine and gambling" (219). None of these is condemned, all are answered.
The difference is the same as the difference recorded in the story of the cow: the question that seeks knowledge and the question that postpones an obligation. What the verse opposes is not the question itself but the work the question is made to do.
تَبَدُّل — root ب-د-ل: to exchange one thing for another. Form V (tafaʿʿul) adds an element of intention and effort here: not a change that happens of itself but an exchange that is made.
The language of trade is a language repeated in this part of the sūra: at verse 16 those who buy straying with guidance, at verse 86 those who exchange the hereafter for this world, at verse 90 those who sell themselves, at verse 175 those who buy straying at the price of guidance. Each time a picture of an exchange is set up — and each time what is given is worth more than what is taken.
سَوَآءَ ٱلسَّبِيلِ — root س-و-ي: to be level, equal, balanced. Sawāʾ al-sabīl is the level middle of the road: the line where there is no swerving. The word pictures going astray not as "entering a wrong road" but as slipping from the middle of the right one.
The same root had been used for a different work at verse 6 of the sūra: sawāʾun ʿalayhim — "it is the same for them". The two uses show the centre of the root: an equality that leaves no difference.