al-Aʿrāf 7:26

Yā banī Ādama qad anzalnā ʿalaykum libāsan yuwārī sawʾātikum wa rīshā, wa libāsu't-taqwā dhālika khayr, dhālika min āyāti'llāhi laʿallahum yadhdhakkarūn

"O children of Adam! We have sent down upon you clothing to cover your shameful parts, and adornment as well. But the clothing of God-fearing is better. That is among the signs of God; perhaps they will take it to heart."

The root ل-ب-س and the likeness of libās were treated at 2/187 in al-Baqara (hunna libāsun lakum wa antum libāsun lahunn). I rely on that treatment. Five functions of clothing were counted there:

1. It covers — it does not show the flaw to the outside 2. It protects 3. It is the nearest thing — nothing stands in between 4. It adorns 5. It takes shape according to the wearer — it is not a ready-made mould

And the negative branch of the same root was recorded there too: talbīs at 2/42 — "to dress falsehood in the clothing of truth". The root states both covering and confusing.

What belongs here is this: al-Aʿrāf uses the word libās in three different senses within three verses.

Three uses, two verses. And if the fourth use in al-Baqara (spouses are clothing to one another) is added to these three, the four distinct works of the root in the Qurʾān are complete.

A point of word order must be recorded, and this is the place the lexicographers have dwelt on: the verb used for clothing is anzalnā (We sent down).

Clothing does not come down from the sky. The Qurʾān uses the same verb elsewhere too for material things:

This usage was treated at 57/25 in al-Ḥadīd; I rely on that treatment. A summary of the explanations recorded there: the verb is also used in the sense "to be given as apportioned from a source", not "physical descent from above to below". The classical commentaries further transmit the explanation that "the raw material of clothing (plants that grow with the rain, the wool of animals) depends on water that comes from above". This is a transmitted explanation; I make no firm preference.

I record this as my own reading and it is not binding: in the twenty-second verse the covering had been patched together by their own hands (yakhṣifāni); here the covering is sent down. The choice of the verb carries the difference between the two verses.

The concrete sense of the root: the feather of a bird. Rīsh is the feather and the wing of a bird. From this the senses of adornment, beauty, well-being, abundance of livelihood derive; when the Arabs said rāshahū they meant "he equipped him, he bettered his condition".

The word occurs only in this verse in the Qurʾān.

A variant reading must be recorded:

The second reading is also transmitted; it does not change the meaning in any essential way (a plural, or the sense "wealth and clothing"). I do not impose a preference.

And the choice of the word is worth recording: a bird's feather covers, adorns and lifts into flight all at once. I give this as an observation and build no firm claim of meaning on it: the verse counts two things — that which covers (libāsan yuwārī) and that which adorns (rīshā). And in the thirty-second verse the lawfulness of adornment will be expressly defended (qul man ḥarrama zīnata'llāhi'llatī akhraja li-ʿibādih). That is, adornment is named in the twenty-sixth verse and defended in the thirty-second.

The phrase occurs only here in the Qurʾān.

The root و-ق-ي: to guard, to be guarded. Taqwā is to take up a barrier that will guard a thing from harm. The root was treated at 2/2 in al-Baqara and in al-Layl; I rely on those treatments.

I record this as an observation, and its ground is the root itself: libās covers and guards; taqwā guards too. That is, the likeness is built on the function the two words share. This is a datum of word order showing at which point the likeness works.

A point of word order: wa libāsu't-taqwā dhālika khayr — the subject is named again by a demonstrative. In Arabic this serves for emphasis and for drawing attention: "the clothing of God-fearing — that is better."

And khayr here is an elative ("better"), and the side of the comparison is not stated. The sentence does not say "better than that"; it says only "better". I record this as an observation; what is understood from the context is the two garments named in the preceding sentence.

One further note: two readings are transmitted of the phrase libāsu't-taqwā — libās as nominative (subject) or as accusative (as the second object of anzalnā: "and We sent down the clothing of God-fearing too"). The second reading is also reported. I do not impose a preference; but one consequence of the second reading is worth recording: on that reading the clothing of God-fearing enters among the things "sent down".

A point of word order must be recorded: the verse begins in the second person plural (yā banī Ādam, ʿalaykum, sawʾātikum) and ends in the third person plural (laʿallahum yadhdhakkarūn).

This is iltifāt (a shift in the direction of address), and it was treated in many places in the index (al-Fātiḥa, the sections of Yūnus; al-Shuʿarāʾ). I rely on those treatments.

I record this as an observation: while the address is "you", the judgement is delivered about "them". And the same shift was present in the third verse too (ittabiʿū… qalīlan mā tadhakkarūn — there it remained in the second person). Here it passes to the third person.

The verse divides dressing into two functions: covering and adorning. It counts both as lawful. Then it names a third thing and calls it "better".

What must be recorded is this: the verse does not exalt the third by rejecting the first two. All three are in the same sentence. And the thirty-second verse will expressly question the attitude that sets out to forbid adornment. When these two verses of the sūra are read together, what is given is not the rejection of adornment but its ordering. This is something that can be read off the arrangement of the two verses themselves.