al-Nūr 24:39

Wa'lladhīna kafarū aʿmāluhum ka-sarābin bi-qīʿatin yaḥsabuhu'l-ẓamʾānu māʾan ḥattā idhā jāʾahū lam yajidhu shayʾan wa wajada'llāha ʿindahū fa-waffāhu ḥisābah, wa'llāhu sarīʿu'l-ḥisāb

"And the deeds of those who disbelieve are like a mirage on a level plain: the thirsty man takes it for water; when he comes to it he finds it nothing at all. But he finds God there, and God pays him his account in full. God is swift in reckoning."

In the thirty-fifth verse a parable of light was built. The thirty-ninth and fortieth verses build its counter-parables.

And the arrangement is worth noting: there are two counter-parables, not one.

Two distinct things, that is, are set against the light, and the two differ from each other. This is the most important observation about the arrangement in this section, and it will be taken up with a table at the fortieth verse.

Root: س-ر-ب. This root was analysed at al-Nabaʾ, 78/20 (fa-kānat sarābā); I rely on that treatment. The note there:

سَرَاب — Root: س-ر-ب. The concrete sense of the root is to flow, to go, to set out upon a road. … سَرَاب — a mirage: the appearance that looks like water from afar in the heat and vanishes when one draws near.

And the idea of "flowing" in the root of the word explains the look of the mirage: a mirage looks from a distance like running water.

The physical cause of a mirage is a known phenomenon: the layer of air above a heated ground surface bends the light and reflects the sky upon the ground. This is a note of information; no scientific claim is loaded onto the verse.

قِيعَة / قَاع — root ق-و-ع. The sense the lexicographers record: level, wide ground with no plants upon it. Qāʿ — a flat.

And the word occurs once more in the Qurʾān: fa-yadharuhā qāʿan ṣafṣafā (Ṭāhā 20/106) — "He will leave it a level plain".

The work of the word here is worth noting: a mirage is seen only on level and empty ground. It does not form on broken ground or where there are plants.

The verse, that is, does not merely say "a mirage" — it names the ground on which the mirage forms.

I record this as my own reading and add this: this element of the parable builds a contrast with the parable of the thirty-fifth verse. There the ground was an olive tree — rooted, long-lived, fruitful. Here the ground is a qīʿa — an empty flat.

Root: ظ-م-أ. Its concrete sense is thirst. Ẓamaʾ — thirst; ẓamʾān — one who is thirsty.

The word occurs in several places in the Qurʾān: lā taẓmaʾu fīhā wa lā taḍḥā (Ṭāhā 20/119) — "there you will neither thirst nor be exposed to the sun".

And the work of the word here is the most affecting side of the parable, which I record as my own reading:

The man who sees the mirage is a thirsty man. And thirst makes the deception both possible and intelligible. A man is inclined to see the thing he is looking for.

The parable, that is, names not the folly of the deceived but his need. This gives the parable not harshness but realism.

And the verb is worth noting: yaḥsabuhū — "he takes it for". The same verb occurred in the sūra at the eleventh verse (lā taḥsabūhu sharran) and at the fifteenth (taḥsabūnahū hayyinan).

The root four times in the sūra, and in every one of them it conveys a wrong appraisal.

I record this as an observation about the word order; the places of the words can be counted in the text. And the diagnosis of the fifteenth verse — the taking of a thing for hayyin — is here pictured in a parable.

The arrangement of the clause is worth noting: lam yajidhu shayʾan wa wajada'llāha ʿindah.

The same verb twice: lam yajid (he did not find) and wajada (he found).

What was sought was not there; but something not sought was.

This is the most unlooked-for move in the parable, and I record it as my own reading: the mirage was empty, but the place where the mirage was was not empty. The outcome of the deception is not a nothingness but an encounter.

وَفَّىٰ — root و-ف-ي: analysed at the twenty-fifth verse. To pay in full.

And the word occurred in the twenty-fifth verse too: yuwaffīhimu'llāhu dīnahumu'l-ḥaqq. In both places the same verb, in the same task.