عَلَىٰ سُرُرٍ مَّوْضُونَةٍ · مُّتَّكِـِٔينَ عَلَيْهَا مُتَقَٰبِلِينَ
ʿAlā sururin mawḍūna · Muttakiʾīna ʿalayhā mutaqābilīn "Upon couches interwoven; reclining upon them, face to face."
The first item in the table of the sābiqūn. And the table begins with a seating arrangement — not with food, not with drink.
Its singular is سَرِير. Root: س-ر-ر. This root was treated in the section on al-Inshiqāq, and what was recorded there was: surūr (joy, an inward ease), sirr (what is hidden), sarīr (a couch, a throne). And the explanation relayed by the lexicographers: surūr is the heart's secretly expanding within itself; joy, that is, is akin to the "hiddenness" branch of the root.
What is to be added here: sarīr in Arabic is not merely a place to sit; it is used for a ruler's throne as well. The word carries both "divan" and "throne", and the Qurʾān does not separate the two.
Root: و-ض-ن. And the concrete sense of the root is decisive: to weave tightly, to interlock, to work ring into ring.
- وَضِين (waḍīn) — the girth of plaited leather that fastens a camel's saddle. This is the most concrete use of the root.
- وَضَنَ — he wove by laying one over another, interlocking them.
The lexicographers record that the word is used especially of the weaving of mail: a fabric made by fitting rings into one another.
Woven with what? The verse does not say. In the classical exegeses it is transmitted that they are woven with gold and jewels. I mention this detail as a transmitted report; it has no support in the text and I do not present it as certain.
What is certain is what the word conveys: these couches are not of one piece but woven. Not cast from a mould, that is, but made by interlocking.
As a reading I record this, and state that it is not binding: a weave is made strong by the parts fitting into one another — a single ring is weak, rings fitted into one another become mail. And the next verse describes a togetherness too: mutaqābilīn, face to face. But to make such a link between the two verses is my own interpretation; it is not the claim of the text.
Root: و-ك-أ. To lean on something, to recline. Ittikāʾ — to lean. Muttakaʾ — a place to lean, a divan.
Pattern: Form VIII, a plural active participle. And it comes in the accusative: it is a circumstantial qualifier. "In the state of reclining."
The meaning of reclining in Arab culture matters and has been lost today. To sit reclining is the posture of one who is not in haste, is not under threat, has no need to rise. The one standing is ready; the one sitting waits; the one reclining has settled.
The Qurʾān uses this verb often in its descriptions of the Garden, and the same word occurs at al-Insān 76/13 (it was mentioned in the section on al-Muṭaffifīn).
Root: ق-ب-ل. The front, what is opposite. From the same root: qibla (the direction faced), qabūl (to receive), muqābala (a comparison), istiqbāl (a receiving; and "the future" — the time that lies ahead).
Pattern: تَفَاعُل (Form VI) — the form conveying reciprocity. In the section on al-Muṭaffifīn the value of this pattern was treated for yataghāmazūn: the verb requires at least two people.
To see what this word says one must think of its opposite. In every order in which a throne matters, seating is ranked: the highest at the head, the others behind or beside him. In ranked seating some people are behind others, and the one behind does not see the face of the one in front.
And this joins with the subject of the next block. In the twenty-fifth verse it will be said that these people hear from one another no idle talk and no wounding word. First the sūra sets the seating right, that is, and then the speaking.
I record this as my own reading; that the pattern conveys reciprocity is, for its part, a linguistic datum.
A note: when these two states (muttakiʾīn and mutaqābilīn) come together, a picture emerges in which ease and being face to face are present at once. In this world the two usually come apart: to be at ease one must be alone, and to be together one must be on guard. The verse joins them. This is a reading.