al-Aʿrāf 7:16-17

Qāla fa-bimā aghwaytanī la-aqʿudanna lahum ṣirāṭaka'l-mustaqīm · Thumma la-ātiyannahum min bayni aydīhim wa min khalfihim wa ʿan aymānihim wa ʿan shamāʾilihim, wa lā tajidu aktharahum shākirīn

"He said: 'For Your having led me astray, I shall certainly sit for them upon Your straight path. · Then I shall come at them from before them and from behind them and from their right and from their left. And You will not find most of them thankful.'"

This sentence is peculiar to al-Aʿrāf, and it is treated in this index here for the first time.

The root غ-و-ي: to stray from the right path, to go astray, to miss the mark. The lexicographers define ghayy as the opposite of rushd (rightness). The root was treated at 20/121 in Ṭāhā (wa ʿaṣā Ādamu rabbahū fa-ghawā); I rely on that treatment.

And this root has four occurrences in this sūra:

Four occurrences; the first in verse 16, the last in verse 202. The sūra uses the root both at its beginning and at its end.

Two readings are transmitted of the bāʾ in the phrase fa-bimā aghwaytanī, and each changes the meaning:

The ground of the second reading is that the answer comes as la-aqʿudanna, with the lām and the emphatic nūn; this is the pattern of the response to an oath in Arabic. Both readings have been voiced by the classical lexicographers; I do not impose a preference.

And the comparison recorded at 2/37 in al-Baqara is completed here: there Adam's prayer (rabbanā ẓalamnā anfusanā) was compared with Iblīs's sentence, and it was recorded that "Iblīs too spoke, but he gave a ground and laid the blame on God (al-Aʿrāf 7/16)". I rely on that treatment.

What belongs here is this, and I give it as an observation: Iblīs's first sentence (12) put forward his own superiority; his second sentence (16) hands off his own responsibility. There is an inconsistency between the two sentences, and the text leaves it without repair: the superiority is his own, the going astray another's.

The root ق-ع-د: to sit. That this verb is the one chosen here must be recorded: not "I shall attack" or "I shall obstruct", but "I shall sit".

A point of word order: la-aqʿudanna lahum ṣirāṭaka'l-mustaqīm — ṣirāṭ comes in the accusative, that is, in the position of an adverbial: "upon the path / along the path". In Arabic a noun of place put in the accusative without fī gives the sense "in that place, along that place".

I record this as my own reading, and its ground is the choice of the verb and of the position: sitting is an act of waiting and of cutting off the road; it is an act not of moving but of taking up a position. And the place chosen is not a crooked road — it is ṣirāṭaka'l-mustaqīm, "Your straight path".

And this overlaps with verse 86 of the same sūra: Shuʿayb says to his people wa lā taqʿudū bi-kulli ṣirāṭin tūʿidūna wa taṣuddūna ʿan sabīli'llāh — word for word the same verb, word for word the same work.

I record this as an observation, and the table can be verified from the text: the sūra shows in the eighty-sixth verse the threat uttered in the sixteenth carried out by human hands. There are seventy verses between the two; but the verb and the object are the same.

This is the most distinctive sentence of al-Aʿrāf, and it is treated in full in this index here for the first time.

Three things must be recorded.

One — the particle changes. In the first two directions min comes, in the last two ʿan. In Arabic min states a starting point, "out of / from the side of"; ʿan states moving away and lateral position, "over, alongside". This is a datum of word order. The lexicographers have recorded this difference and given various explanations for it; I am not in a position to transmit any of them as certain, so I record only the datum.

Two — the pair bayna yadayh / khalfah was treated earlier in the index. At 41/25 in Fuṣṣilat this pair occurred as the extent of the adorning done by the qarīns, and at 41/42 as the extent of the Book's being guarded, and it was recorded there: "in Arabic this pair is used to cover all the sides of a thing." I rely on that treatment.

And the difference of al-Aʿrāf becomes visible here:

In two places two directions suffice for "all directions"; al-Aʿrāf counts four.

Three — and this must be recorded: up and down are not counted.

I record this as an observation. The text counts four directions and does not complete the six: fawq (above) and taḥt (below) are not in the sentence. And this is not a claim of deficiency; it is the datum of the text.

Explanations of this gap are transmitted in the classical commentaries — it is widely said that "above was not counted because it is the direction from which mercy comes". This is a transmitted view; I make no firm preference and do not use it as a proof. All I record is this: the text counts four directions, not six.

And two verses can be set side by side; this is a verifiable overlap:

I record this as my own reading and it is not binding; its ground is the comparison of the three verses: the Qurʾān uses the directions above and below in other contexts — there the agent is God. In al-Aʿrāf 7/17 the agent is Iblīs, and the directions he counts are man's horizontal surroundings. This is an explanation, not a ruling.

The last part of the sentence must be recorded, and it establishes a link that can be verified within the sūra.

The tenth verse ended with qalīlan mā tashkurūn. The seventeenth ends with wa lā tajidu aktharahum shākirīn.

I record this as an observation: there are seven verses between the two, and both end with the same root (ش-ك-ر). One is a finding, the other a forecast. And the text does not correct Iblīs's forecast — as was also recorded at 38/82-85 of Ṣād (Ṣād), the judgement is tied not to who Iblīs is but to who follows him. I rely on that treatment.

And the choice of the word is worth recording: Iblīs does not say "they will not believe", he says "they will not give thanks". I record this as my own reading, and its ground is the word itself: shukr is the noticing of what has been given. The tenth verse had counted what was given (the earth, the means of livelihood); the seventeenth says that what was given will not be noticed.