al-Aʿrāf 7:40-41

Inna'lladhīna kadhdhabū bi-āyātinā wa'stakbarū ʿanhā lā tufattaḥu lahum abwābu's-samāʾi wa lā yadkhulūna'l-jannata ḥattā yalija'l-jamalu fī sammi'l-khiyāṭ, wa kadhālika najzi'l-mujrimīn · Lahum min jahannama mihādun wa min fawqihim ghawāsh, wa kadhālika najzi'ẓ-ẓālimīn

"As for those who called Our signs lies and were too great for them: the gates of heaven will not be opened for them, and they will not enter the Garden until the camel passes through the eye of the needle. Thus do We recompense the guilty. · For them there is a bed of Hell and coverings above them. Thus do We recompense the wrongdoers."

A point of word order must be recorded: the verb is the passive of Form II (tufattaḥu), not tuftaḥu. Form II here carries the sense of multiplicity and of one by one: "the gates are not opened one by one."

And the same pattern occurs in this sūra in the affirmative as well:

The same root (ف-ت-ح), in two directions. And verse 96 is the counterpart of this passage: there, on the condition of faith and God-fearing, blessings will be opened from heaven and earth. I record this as an observation, and the two verses can be verified from the text.

Two readings are transmitted about what the expression "the gates of heaven are not opened" refers to:

Both readings are transmitted; I do not impose a preference. And the Qurʾān gives no detail here; I invent no detail.

This is one of the best-known expressions of impossibility in the Qurʾān.

Ḥattā here means "until", and in Arabic, used together with a condition impossible of fulfilment, it gives the sense "never". This is a known pattern in the language (taʿlīq bi'l-muḥāl).

The root و-ل-ج: to enter a narrow place. Wulūj is "to be thrust inside". The root was treated in Luqmān 31/29 and al-Ḥadīd 57/6 (yūliju'l-layla fi'n-nahār), where the sense "to pass one thing inside another" was recorded. I rely on those treatments.

I record this as an observation: the choice of the verb is worth recording — not yadkhulu (to enter) but yaliju (to be thrust into a narrow place). That is, the verb already carries narrowness, and it joins with the narrowness of the hole.

The root س-م-م was undone at 52/27 in al-Ṭūr (ʿadhāba's-samūm) and at 56/42 in al-Wāqiʿa. I rely on those treatments. A summary of what was recorded there:

• The root carries two branches: pore/hole, and poison.
• Samūm is "the scorching hot wind that works into the pores".
• Masāmm — the pores of the body; the relation with samm (poison) was conveyed as a relation drawn by the lexicographers, not as a settled etymological ruling.

What belongs here is this: the same root comes here with its first branch. Sammu'l-khiyāṭ — "the hole of the needle".

The root خ-ي-ط: to sew. Khiyāṭ is the sewing needle; khayṭ is thread. And the same root occurs at al-Baqara 2/187: al-khayṭu'l-abyaḍu mina'l-khayṭi'l-aswad — "the white thread, the black thread". It was treated at 2/187 in al-Baqara; I rely on that treatment.

I record this as an observation, and the two verses can be verified from the text: the same root gives the thread in al-Baqara and the needle in al-Aʿrāf. Both come from the picture of sewing.

There is a variant reading in this word that changes the meaning, and it must be given in a table.

The widespread reading, transmitted by mass transmission, is the first: al-jamal — camel. The other readings have been transmitted and are held to be anomalous (shādhdh). I do not impose a preference; both have been transmitted.

The effect of the two readings on the meaning must be recorded:

I record this as an observation: the second reading has an inner consistency — needle and cable are the two ends of one work (sewing); thread passes through the needle, a cable does not. But the first reading is both the widespread one and the one transmitted by mass transmission, and it builds the likeness more sharply. I do not impose a preference.

One further note: the lexicographers record that the words jamal and jummal are from the same root (ج-م-ل: to gather together, to amass — jumla, ijmāl are from the same root). A cable is threads twisted together; and the camel is the animal that gathers up a load and carries it. This is a relation drawn by the lexicographers; I do not give it as a settled etymological ruling.

The forty-first verse builds the picture of a bed with two words:

The root م-ه-د was treated at 20/53 in Ṭāhā (jaʿala lakumu'l-arḍa mahdā) and at 78/6 in al-Nabaʾ (a-lam najʿali'l-arḍa mihādā). I rely on those treatments. And the difference must be recorded: there the mihād was the earth's being spread out for man; here it is Hell's being spread out.

The root غ-ش-و: to cover, to envelop. The root was treated in al-Ghāshiya (al-ghāshiya) and at 45/23 in al-Jāthiya (ghishāwatan). I rely on those treatments. And the same root will occur in the fifty-fourth verse of this sūra: yughshi'l-layla'n-nahār.

I record this as an observation: the verse counts below and above — and these were exactly the two directions Iblīs did not count in the seventeenth verse (fawq and taḥt). There is an overlap between the two verses, and I give it as a possible reading, not as a certainty.

A point of word order must be recorded: both verses end with the same pattern but with a different word.

The root ج-ر-م: to cut, to sever — hence jurm, "the evil act one earns". The root ظ-ل-م: to put a thing somewhere other than its place (treated at 8-9).

The two words come one after another and name the same group by two different attributes. This accords with the sūra's manner, sustained from the beginning, of defining by attribute (Method: "it is the attributes the verse describes").