al-Zukhruf 43:40-45

A-fa-anta tusmiʿu'ṣ-ṣumma aw tahdi'l-ʿumya wa man kāna fī ḍalālin mubīn · Fa-immā nadhhabanna bika fa-innā minhum muntaqimūn · Aw nuriyannaka'lladhī waʿadnāhum fa-innā ʿalayhim muqtadirūn · Fa'stamsik bi'lladhī ūḥiya ilayk · Innaka ʿalā ṣirāṭin mustaqīm · Wa innahu la-dhikrun laka wa li-qawmik · Wa sawfa tusʾalūn · Wa'sʾal man arsalnā min qablika min rusulinā a-jaʿalnā min dūni'r-Raḥmāni ālihatan yuʿbadūn

"Is it you who will make the deaf hear, or guide the blind and one who is in plain error? Even if We take you away, We shall take retribution from them. Or We shall show you what We promised them; We have power over them. So hold fast to what has been revealed to you. You are on a straight path. It is a reminder for you and for your people; you will be questioned before long. Ask those of Our messengers whom We sent before you: did We ever appoint gods to be served besides al-Raḥmān?"

Once again the subject stands before the verb: a-fa-anta tusmiʿu. The same structure was in the thirty-second verse (a-hum yaqsimūn).

The fronted subject sets the direction of the question: the issue is not whether making them hear is possible but whether you can do it.

I record this as an observation about the arrangement, and I link it with the finding recorded in al-Aḥqāf at 46/35: there the sūra confined its own task to a single word — balāgh (conveying). Here the same limit is drawn by a question.

And the two defects chosen must be recorded: deafness and blindness.

Both attach to what the sūra has already set up: in the thirty-sixth verse there was yaʿshu (blurred sight) — a partial defect of vision. Here there is ʿumy (blindness) — the complete one. Two degrees in the same field.

And the finding recorded in al-Aḥqāf at 46/26 attaches here: there it was recounted that the people of ʿĀd were given hearing, sight and heart, but that these were of no use, and this was recorded: "the verse is not speaking of an impossibility; it is speaking of a possibility left unused."

I keep the same distinction here: the Qurʾān uses these words not for physical impairment but for an unused sense. Per the method (Method) I write this out plainly: the verse issues no ruling about people with impaired hearing or sight; it uses a figure, and the subject of the figure is the person whose senses work but who does not use them.

Two verses enumerate two possibilities, and both are tied to the same outcome:

The structure is worth recording, and I give it as my own reading: both possibilities concern whether the Prophet sees it or not. The outcome does not change in either.

The verse, that is, says this: the coming to pass of the outcome does not depend on your witnessing it.

Muqtadirūn — an active participle of Form VIII from the root ق-د-ر. And the root occurred in the eleventh verse as bi-qadarin (by a measure). The same root: in one place the measure of water, in another having power.

And the word of the twenty-first verse returns: istamsaka (Form X — to hold on tightly).

I set out this ring above (in the discussion of 43/21); here I complete it:

The difference is not only in content but in mood: one is the statement of a state (inside a question), the other a command. I record this as a datum of the text.

إِنَّكَ عَلَىٰ صِرَٰطٍ مُّسْتَقِيمٍ — and the expression will occur three times in the sūra: 43, 61, 64. Two of them are in the block about Jesus.

The root ص-ر-ط: the core the lexicographers give is a wide, open road; the word's relation to sariṭa (to swallow) is recorded — the road's taking into itself the one who travels on it. The root was treated in al-Fātiḥa.

The root ق-و-م and istiqāma were treated in al-Aḥqāf at 46/13: to continue without swerving.

This verse needs to be dwelt on, because it is open to two different readings.

In what sense is the word dhikr used here?

Both are transmitted in the classical commentaries, and I do not impose a preference.

But if the second reading is taken, the verse's place in the sūra is striking, and I record this as my own reading: in the thirty-first verse a measure of honour was put forward — "the great man of the two towns". The forty-fourth verse can be read as saying where honour lies: in what is carried.

And the note that follows the sentence balances this: wa sawfa tusʾalūn — "you will be questioned before long."

What is given, that is, is not left as a privilege; it is tied to a responsibility. I record this as an observation about the arrangement: between the two sentences there is only a wāw, and the second qualifies the first.

The root س-ء-ل occurs three times in the sūra, and this is a pattern:

The same root in three positions: the one questioned, the one who will be questioned, and the one who asks.

How this verse is to be understood has been debated in the classical commentaries, because its wording commands the asking of a question and those addressed are not alive.

The chief readings transmitted are these:

I do not report in detail the account named in the fourth row, because it is recorded as disputed even in its sources and I cannot give it as certain knowledge.

The reading of the majority is the third: the question is framed as a question whose answer is already settled. I transmit this as it has been transmitted.

And the content of the question must be recorded: a-jaʿalnā min dūni'r-Raḥmāni ālihatan yuʿbadūn — "did We ever appoint gods to be served besides al-Raḥmān?"

The verb is again jaʿala, and it comes for the fifth time in the sūra. This time in the interrogative, and expecting a negative answer.

I record this as my own reading, and its ground is the repetition of the verb within the sūra: the sūra uses the verb jaʿala like a register. Who made what? The text: the Qurʾān Arabic, the earth a cradle, the animal a mount. The other side: the angels female, a part assigned to God. And now the question: did We ever make a god?

ٱلرَّحْمَٰن — and this name occurs densely in the sūra: 17, 19, 20, 33, 36, 45, 81. Seven occurrences.

I record this as a datum of the text and add this as an observation: most of the places where the name occurs are places where something is ascribed to Him (17, 19, 20, 81) or where He is turned away from (36). The sūra, that is, uses the name that most conveys mercy in the sentences that most recount refusal.

The root ر-ح-م has been treated in the corpus (al-Mumtaḥana, al-Balad, al-Ḥujurāt and others); its core is bound up with raḥim (the womb): what encloses and grows something within itself.