al-Dukhān 44:10-11

Fa'rtaqib yawma taʾti's-samāʾu bi-dukhānin mubīn · Yaghsha'n-nāsa, hādhā ʿadhābun alīm

"So watch for the day when the sky will bring a manifest smoke. It will envelop the people. This is a painful punishment."

For nine verses the sūra gave no command. In the tenth the first command comes, and the sūra will close with this command (59).

Root: ر-ق-ب. It was treated in al-Balad and al-Mujādala, and summarised at Qāf 50/18. The summary of the record there:

"The original sense of the root is to watch, to keep an eye on, to wait. […] And from the same root raqaba — the neck. The connection is this: the neck is the axis on which the head turns and the gaze is directed. One who watches stretches his neck and turns it."

I do not repeat it. What is peculiar to al-Dukhān is the pattern.

The verb is in Form VIII: irtaqaba. The contribution of Form VIII (iftiʿāl) in Arabic is the taking of the work upon oneself, the making of an effort. Raqaba is to watch; irtaqaba is to make watching one's business.

And this pattern occurs in a countable number of places in the Qurʾān. One of them was treated in al-Qamar:

"al-Qamar 54/27 — fa'rtaqibhum wa'ṣṭabir. […] The order of the two commands is worth recording: first watch, then be patient. Patience here, that is, is not inactivity; it is patience while watching. The man does not withdraw, he goes on looking."

The use in al-Dukhān parts from that in al-Qamar at one point, and the difference matters:

In al-Qamar what is watched is people, in al-Dukhān a day. I record this as an observation about the wording.

And the particle fāʾ: fa'rtaqib. It attaches to the preceding verse. The command, that is, is given as the consequence of the finding "they are playing inside a doubt".

I record this as my own reading: what is proposed as the thing to do about a man at play is not argument but waiting. There is a moment when the play will end of itself; the command looks to that moment.

The verb is taʾtī — to come; and it has been made transitive with the particle bi-: atā bi- = to bring.

The sentence, that is, does not say "smoke comes from the sky". It says "the sky comes with a smoke". The sky is here the subject; the smoke is what the sky brings.

I record this as an observation about word order, and it has a consequence: the smoke is described not as a fault in the sky but as something the sky brings. When the subject of the verb is the sky, the event is built not as a breakdown but as a delivery.

Root: د-خ-ن. This root has not been treated anywhere else in this index; I give it here in full.

The concrete sense: the thick vapour that rises from something burning — smoke.

Its derivatives show the direction of the root:

• دَخَّنَ — it smoked, it gave off smoke.
• دُخْنَة — the colour of smoke: a dirty, sooty darkness. In Arabic it is the name of a colour.
• أَدْخَن — that which is of a smoky colour.
• دَخَن — a figurative use: a flaw within an affair, a hidden rancour in the heart, a murkiness behind a word. The lexicographers explain it by way of "something whose fire looks to have gone out but which still smoulders within".

The two ideas the root carries must be recorded together: the closing off of sight and the presence of a fire behind it. Smoke says both at once — it blocks seeing, and it is evidence of a burning.

The word occurs once more in the Qurʾān: at Fuṣṣilat 41/11 the first state of the heaven is called dukhān (thumma'stawā ila's-samāʾi wa hiya dukhān). The contrast between the two occurrences is worth recording: there the smoke is the beginning of the sky, here it is what the sky brings.

I give this as an observation; I make no claim that a pattern is set up between the two verses.

The root was treated in al-Layl, Nūḥ and al-Najm; the summary: to cover a thing, to overspread it, to envelop it. Ghishāwa — a veil that comes down over the eye. Ghāshiya — that which covers (the name of a sūra).

And the object of the verb must be recorded: al-nās — the people, with the definite article.

This word stands at the centre of the disagreement below. Al-nās in Arabic can mean both "the people" (a particular group) and "mankind" (the whole); the definite article can convey both ʿahd (a known group) and istighrāq (comprehensiveness). This is exactly where the two sides take their stand.

The sentence begins with a demonstrative and its speaker is not specified. Two readings are transmitted:

The second reading makes a smooth continuity with the twelfth verse: "This is a painful punishment! Our Lord, lift the punishment from us!" — two sentences from one mouth.

I do not impose a preference. But one datum of word order can be recorded: in the twelfth verse there is no "they said" at all. The speech begins directly. This makes easier the reading that the eleventh verse is from the same mouth — but it does not make it necessary.

عَذَابٌ أَلِيمٌ — alīm is on the faʿīl pattern and is here in the sense of an active participle: muʾlim — causing pain. The discussion of ḥakīm in the fourth verse should be recalled: the same pattern, working here in the other direction.

And a contrast is built within the sūra:

In the same sūra the punishment is named with two separate attributes — one promised to Mecca, the other the punishment from which the Children of Israel were delivered. I record this as a verifiable repetition; the difference between the two attributes will be taken up at the thirtieth verse.