أَوَلَمْ يَرَ ٱلَّذِينَ كَفَرُوٓا۟ أَنَّ ٱلسَّمَٰوَٰتِ وَٱلْأَرْضَ كَانَتَا رَتْقًا فَفَتَقْنَٰهُمَا وَجَعَلْنَا مِنَ ٱلْمَآءِ كُلَّ شَىْءٍ حَىٍّ أَفَلَا يُؤْمِنُونَ
Awalam yara'lladhīna kafarū anna's-samāwāti wa'l-arḍa kānatā ratqan fa-fataqnāhumā, wa jaʿalnā mina'l-māʾi kulla shayʾin ḥayy, a-fa-lā yuʾminūn
"Have those who deny not seen that the heavens and the earth were sewn together, and We tore them apart? And We made every living thing from water. Will they still not believe?"
First the boundary — per the method (Method)
This verse is among the Qurʾānic verses most forced in the modern period. So I draw the boundary first and then pass to the words.
"I do not dress the verses in modern cosmology; I neither derive a model of the universe from the word 'smoke' nor equate the days with geological ages. Such an equation would be making the text say what it does not say."
I do the same here: from this verse I derive no model of the universe, no cosmogony and no biology. I give my reasons below under a separate heading; first the text.
And the two words are exact opposites of one another. The lexicographers define them as a pair: al-ratqu ḍiddu'l-fatq.
| Word | Root | Lexical sense | Concrete picture |
|---|---|---|---|
| رَتْق | ر-ت-ق | To be joined, to be closed, to have no opening between | Rataqa'th-thawb — to sew up a tear and close it |
| فَتْق | ف-ت-ق | To split apart, to unpick a seam, to open | Fataqa'th-thawb — to unpick the seam, to separate the cloth |
The field shared by the two words is stitching. Ratq is to join two pieces and leave no opening between them; fatq is to unpick and part what has been joined. The Turkish word fıtık ("hernia") comes from this root (fatq) as well: the opening of the abdominal wall.
A point of grammar must be recorded: the subject is dual (al-samāwāti wa'l-arḍa … kānatā) but the predicate is singular: ratqan, not ratqayni.
The grammarians' explanation: ratq here is a verbal noun, and a verbal noun used as an attribute is not made dual or plural. A construction like "the two of them were a being-joined".
And the verb that follows is dual: fa-fataqnāhumā — "We tore the two apart". That is, the sentence counts one while they are joined and two after they are parted. This is an observation about the structure.
When the root shaqq was treated at al-Qamar on 54/1, a threefold distinction was set up, and it was recorded there:
"Falq opens what is closed; faṭr splits from nothing and establishes; shaqq divides what has been established."
I rely on that treatment and add this verse's word to that list. All four are roots that occur in the Qurʾān:
| Root | What it does | Its opposite |
|---|---|---|
| ف-ل-ق | Opens what is closed (a seed, the daybreak) | — |
| ف-ط-ر | Splits from nothing and establishes | — |
| ش-ق-ق | Divides what has been established | — |
| ف-ت-ق | Unpicks the seam | ر-ت-ق — sews / closes |
And this is what sets the fourth apart: only fatq has an opposite, and that opposite occurs in the same verse. That is, the verse names both states: the former state and the latter.
One further note: in the fifty-sixth verse of this same sūra faṭarahunna will occur in Abraham's mouth. Two roots in the same sūra on the same subject — one conveying the establishing, the other the parting. This is a fact that can be verified within the sūra.
The classical commentaries differ on what the verse tells, and the disagreement is real. I give the principal explanations in a table.
| # | Explanation | Its ground |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | The sky did not send rain and the earth did not bring forth plants; then the sky was "split" with rain and the earth with vegetation. | The rest of the verse names water (wa jaʿalnā mina'l-māʾi kulla shayʾin ḥayy); and the verb awalam yara points to something that can be seen |
| 2 | The heaven and the earth were joined together, and then they were parted. | That the pronouns fīhimā/humā are dual; the sense of "joinedness" that first comes to mind |
| 3 | The heavens were a single whole and were divided into seven heavens; the earth too was a single whole and was divided. | That the heavens are named as seven elsewhere in the Qurʾān |
All three explanations are transmitted in the classical exegetical tradition. I do not impose a preference.
I enter only a note belonging to the context — and it is not a preference: the second half of the verse speaks of water and the verb is awalam yara (have they not seen). The first explanation connects directly with these two elements. I give this as a note about the context; I do not use it to eliminate the other two explanations.
In the modern period this verse has been matched with physical models of the beginning of the universe. I do not make that match in this commentary, and I write my reasons openly, because an unreasoned rejection is itself an imposition.
1. The verb asks the addressee for a seeing. Awalam yara — "have they not seen?" The addressee is the person listening to this verse in the seventh century. What is asked of him can only be something open to him. A model of the universe is not open to that addressee; rain splitting the soil is.
2. The words are words of stitching, not words of physics. Ratq and fatq speak in Arabic with the language of cloth and hide. The concrete picture of a word shows what it is used for.
3. The match makes the verse's truth depend on a model. Models in physics change. If you tie the verse to a model, the verse is shaken when the model changes. This is no kindness to the verse.
4. The verse's own aim is not a piece of knowledge but a stance. The sentence does not end with a-fa-lā yaʿlamūn (do they not know) — it ends with a-fa-lā yuʾminūn (do they not believe). What is asked is not the assent to a fact but a trust.
These are my reasons, and I record them as my own reading. I issue no ruling about what modern science says; the ruling I issue is that the verse does not speak in that field.
| Reading | What min is | Sense |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Inceptive (of beginning) | "We made every living thing from water" — it conveys a source |
| 2 | Partitive | "We made every living thing from a part of water" |
And disagreement is transmitted about the scope of the term kulla shayʾin ḥayy as well: whether the expression covers all living things or a particular class has been disputed. I transmit the disagreement and do not impose a preference.
And here too I repeat the boundary: from this sentence I derive no biology, no cell chemistry and no definition of life. What the verse gives is a relation: the dependence of the living upon water. For an addressee living in the desert this is the plainest observation there is, and that observation is what the verse asks for.