يَخْرُجُ مِنْهُمَا ٱللُّؤْلُؤُ وَٱلْمَرْجَانُ
And this word has raised a question in the classical commentaries: pearl and coral come out of salt water; they do not come out of fresh water. Yet the verse says "from the two".
| Answer | What it says |
|---|---|
| Ascription to the whole | In Arabic a thing may be ascribed to a whole by a property belonging to its part. To say "it comes out of the two seas" is to say "it comes out of the water the two seas make up" |
| The meeting point | The extraction is done in the zone where the two waters meet; it therefore counts as coming out of both |
| Pearls are found in fresh water too | It is recorded that some freshwater shellfish produce pearls |
"Yet from each of them you eat fresh meat and bring out ornaments to wear." (Fāṭir 35/12) — wa min kullin taʾkulūna laḥman ṭariyyan wa tastakhrijūna ḥilyatan talbasūnahā
The verse of Fāṭir uses the same expression: min kullin — "from each". The Qurʾān's own usage is thus consistent, and the matter is a choice of word order, not an error of fact.
I do not impose a preference. The first answer is the soundest, since it rests on a settled usage in Arabic.
The lexicographers do not speak with certainty about the origin of the word. It occurs in several places in the Qurʾān and almost every time in a context of ornament.
And there is a nicety in the place of the word in this verse: the pearl is the one thing coming out of the sea that is not eaten. In the preceding group of verses rayḥān (scent) did the same work: an item beyond need enters the list.
The origin of the word is disputed. Some lexicographers say it entered Arabic from outside; others count it Arabic. I do not speak with certainty.
| View | Sense |
|---|---|
| Coral | The red, branching growth in the sea |
| Small pearl | Luʾluʾ the large pearl, marjān the small one |
Both are transmitted and I do not impose a preference. The second view takes the occurrence of the two words in the same sentence as a gradation; the first takes them as two distinct objects.
A note on sound. The word begins with the same consonants as the verb three verses earlier (maraja): م-ر-ج. I do not claim that there is an etymological link between them — the origin of the word is disputed in any case. But the repetition of the sound is something audible in the text: maraja'l-baḥrayn … al-marjān. I record this as an observation about the sound.
And an internal ring: the word marjān will come once more in the sūra, at verse 58 — ka-annahunna'l-yāqūtu wa'l-marjān. What comes out of the sea returns in the description of the garden as a comparison.