al-Muʾminūn 23:14

thumma khalaqnā'l-nuṭfata ʿalaqatan fa-khalaqnā'l-ʿalaqata muḍghatan fa-khalaqnā'l-muḍghata ʿiẓāman fa-kasawnā'l-ʿiẓāma laḥman thumma anshaʾnāhu khalqan ākhar, fa-tabāraka'llāhu aḥsanu'l-khāliqīn

"Then We made that drop an ʿalaqa, and made the ʿalaqa a morsel, and made the morsel bones, and clothed the bones with flesh. Then We built him up as another creation. How exalted is God, the best of creators!"

The limit set above holds for all three of these words.

The section written on the word ʿalaq in al-ʿAlaq holds here too, and I do not repeat it here. The conclusion there was this: the sense of the word — "hanging, holding on, clinging" — is given and not cut short; but it cannot be presented as the claim of the verse and cannot be turned into a proof of miracle.

An addition on مُضْغَة: the word reports a measure — the amount taken into the mouth at one time. The picture in the word, that is, is of size, not of shape. I give this as an entry about the language.

The verse tells the forming with seven verbs, and the verbs are not the same. This is a fact that can be counted directly from the text:

Three regularities can be counted:

One. Thumma occurs three times, fa three times. In Arabic fa reports succession without a gap, thumma succession with a gap; this is the lexicographers' common entry.

I give this as my own reading, its ground being this distinction between the two particles: the three occurrences of thumma stand at three points — human being→drop, drop→ʿalaqa, and after the flesh has been put on→another creation. The text, that is, sets a gap at three places; the steps in between are given joined to one another with fa. Three thresholds, four adjoining steps.

Two. The verb is khalaqnā four times, then once kasawnā, then once anshaʾnā. That is, the verb changes in the last two steps.

Three. Each time, the object is the object of the preceding sentence, and it comes definite with the article alif-lām: al-nuṭfata → al-ʿalaqata → al-muḍghata → al-ʿiẓāma. The chain is built at the level of the words as well: each sentence makes the product of the one before it its own material. This is a form of takrīr that the lexicographers record.

The root ك-س-و is worked out here for the first time in this series. The concrete sense of the root: to clothe with a garment. Kiswa — clothing; kisāʾ — a wrap taken over oneself; iksāʾ — the act of clothing.

And the choice of verb must be recorded: the verse does not say khalaqnā here. While "We created" is said at five steps, at the sixth "We clothed" is said.

I give this as my own reading, its ground being this single change of verb: at the other steps one thing turned into another — the drop became an ʿalaqa, the ʿalaqa became a morsel. Here there is no turning: the bone remains bone, and something else is put over it. The verb carries this difference. To clothe does not require the disappearance of what is clothed.

And a link between words is worth recording: the same idea is used in the Qurʾān for a garment as well — wa jaʿalnā'l-layla libāsā (al-Nabaʾ 78/10; treated in al-Nabaʾ and at al-Furqān 25/47). The root is different (ل-ب-س / ك-س-و) and I build no derivational link between them; what is shared is the idea that a covering does not do away with what lies beneath it.

This sentence deserves separate and detailed treatment.

The root was worked out at al-Wāqiʿa 56/35 (innā anshaʾnāhunna inshāʾā) and at 56/62 (wa laqad ʿalimtumu'l-nashʾata'l-ūlā). I do not repeat it here. In summary, what was recorded there is this:

The verb is anshaʾnā — not "We created" but "We built up". The verse reports a rebuilding. And the same root is used at 56/62 for birth in this world: al-nashʾata'l-ūlā — "the first building up".

And the following point recorded in al-Wāqiʿa attaches directly here: al-Wāqiʿa used the verb it applies to the garden, twenty-seven verses later, for the forming in this world. al-Muʾminūn, for its part, uses the same verb for the last step of the forming in this world.

The other links of the root across this series: al-Mulk 67/23 (alladhī anshaʾakum), al-Wāqiʿa 56/72 (am naḥnu'l-munshiʾūn).

Three details must be recorded:

One. The particle is thumma — that is, a gap is set between this and what precedes. The largest gap among the seven steps is here, because after this thumma the verb changes as well.

Two. The object pronoun is هُ — "him". That is, the same being continues. The sentence does not say "We created something else"; it says "We built him up as another creation". The continuity of the subject is preserved by the pronoun.

Three. Khalqan ākhar — the lexicographers differ over its parsing:

All three are transmitted; I do not impose a preference. What is common to all three is this: what is new is not the material but the kind.

The verse does not say what it is. This is a silence of the text, and it must be recorded.

The explanations widely transmitted in the classical exegetical tradition are these:

I pass the disagreement on; I do not impose a preference. And an entry, per the method (Method): since the verse gives no modality, no modality is produced here. The entry set for the construction min rūḥihī at al-Sajda 32/9 holds here as well.

The only thing I record as my own reading is this, and its ground is the change of verb: after steps that can be counted, the verse sets a step that cannot be counted. The preceding six steps change the object; the seventh changes the kind. And the text does not give the name of that kind. This silence can be read as a part of the structure of the verse: after the part that can be told has been told, a threshold is set.

تَبَارَكَ — the root ب-ر-ك was worked out at al-Mulk 67/1 and treated again at al-Furqān 25/1. I do not repeat it here. In summary: the core of the root is baraka — the kneeling of the camel, settling in a place and staying fixed; and from this, a good that lasts and increases.

And the word order must be recorded: the sentence begins with fa. The praise, that is, comes as the outcome of the process described — it is not an independent sentence.

أَحْسَنُ ٱلْخَٰلِقِين — "the best of creators". The lexicographers dwell on the construction, because the elative is built with a plural.

All three are transmitted; I do not impose a preference. And I do not enter a theological dispute: no ruling about the existence of other creators is drawn from the construction — indeed the ninety-first verse of the sūra will establish exactly the opposite.

A link within the sūra must be recorded: this is the first of the five superlative constructions in the sūra. The others: khayru'l-munzilīn (29), khayru'l-rāziqīn (72), khayru'l-rāḥimīn (109 and 118). All five of the five constructions are built on the agent of a verb — creating, sending down, providing, showing mercy. This is a pattern that can be verified within the sūra.