إِنَّهُۥ هُوَ يُبْدِئُ وَيُعِيدُ · وَهُوَ ٱلْغَفُورُ ٱلْوَدُودُ · ذُو ٱلْعَرْشِ ٱلْمَجِيدُ · فَعَّالٌ لِّمَا يُرِيدُ
Innahū huwa yubdiʾu wa yuʿīd · Wa huwa'l-Ghafūru'l-Wadūd · Dhu'l-ʿarshi'l-Majīd · Faʿʿālun limā yurīd "Surely it is He who originates and repeats. He is the Forgiving, the Loving. Owner of the Throne, the Glorious. Doer of what He wills."
Four verses, six names and verbs one after another. The densest part of the sūra, and the arrangement is not accidental.
بَدَأَ — Root: ب-د-أ. To begin, to do for the first time. Badʾ — a beginning; badīʿ — one who makes something first, in a way never seen before.
عَادَ — Root: ع-و-د. To return, to repeat. Iʿāda — bringing back, repeating; ʿāda — a custom, the thing repeated; maʿād — the place to which one returns.
"It is He who originates creation, then repeats it; and that is easier for Him." (al-Rūm 30/27)
Because what the sūra is relating is people who were burned. Fire does away with a body; ash is what is left. And this is the objection deniers make most often against resurrection: how is what has been scattered to be gathered?
The verse does not answer this directly; it lays down a principle: the one who originates repeats. It cannot be said of one who can do a thing a first time that he cannot do it a second.
And this is the counterpart of the diagnosis in Sūrat al-Inshiqāq, "he supposed he would not return": the return is the work of the one who originates.
ٱلْغَفُور — Root: غ-ف-ر. The concrete sense of the root is to cover, to close over. Mighfar — the war-helmet that covers the head. Ghufrān — covering.
Forgiveness, that is, is in Arabic an act of covering: the offence is not annihilated, it is covered over. The faʿūl pattern conveys intensity: covering much and continually.
The sense of the root: to love. But between ḥubb (love) and wudd there is in Arabic a difference the lexicographers record: wudd is love in its outwardly expressed, behaviour-become state. Not merely an inclination felt within; a nearness that reaches the other side.
- وُدّ (wudd) — love, affection.
- مَوَدَّة (mawadda) — mutual love. The Qurʾān: "He put love and mercy between you" (al-Rūm 30/21).
- وَدُود — on the faʿūl pattern.
"Surely my Lord is most merciful, most loving." (Hūd 11/90)
"He is the Forgiving, the Loving." (al-Burūj 85/14)
The sūra is relating a massacre. The twelfth verse said "the seizing of your Lord is severe". And two verses later: "He is the Forgiving, the Loving."
The first reading: the two names look to two sides. Ghafūr and Wadūd to the believers; shadīd al-baṭsh to the wrongdoers. The sūra had already separated the two groups in the tenth and eleventh verses.
The second reading: the two names look to the same side. The tenth verse had said "and then did not repent" — that is, the door of repentance stood open to the wrongdoers. The name Ghafūr is exactly the name of that door. And Wadūd says what the one who enters by the door will find: not only to be forgiven, but to be loved.
This second reading is more in keeping with the arrangement of the verses. For Ghafūr and Wadūd stand side by side in the same verse, and they are in the same section as the baṭsh of the twelfth verse. The sūra says three things one after another: His seizing is severe — He originates and repeats — He is forgiving, He is loving.
And there is this: Ghafūr speaks of pardon; but pardon contains a distance as well. The one pardoned knows he has been pardoned, and a debt stands between. Wadūd removes that distance.
I record this as my own reading; the standing of the two names side by side, however, is a datum of the text.
The faʿūl pattern can carry both an active and a passive sense in Arabic. Accordingly there are two readings:
| Reading | Sense |
|---|---|
| Active | Most loving — loving His servants |
| Passive (in the sense of mafʿūl) | Much loved — loved by His servants |
Both have been defended in the classical sources. The majority prefer the first, and the context in Hūd 11/90 (Shuʿayb's address to his people, raḥīmun wadūd) supports it: there it is paired with raḥīm, and raḥīm is active.
And this note as well: وَدّ (Wadd) is the name of an idol known in the pre-Islamic Arabian Peninsula, and it is mentioned in the Qurʾān (Nūḥ 71/23). The root of the word is the same. Whether this is a coincidence, or the trace within the language of an older notion of a "god of love" — on this I issue no firm ruling. That the two words are from the same root is a datum of the language.
ٱلْعَرْش — Root: ع-ر-ش. The concrete sense of the root: an arbour, a covered structure, a vine-trellis. ʿArsh is what is raised up and roofed over; from there it comes to mean "throne". The Qurʾān: "…gardens trellised and untrellised" (al-Anʿām 6/141).
The question of the Throne is among the most disputed headings in the history of kalām. That debate is not entered into in this commentary; I content myself with recording the root sense of the word.
Its function in the verse is plain from the context: the sūra had been speaking of a sovereignty. Those seated at the edge of the fire had a throne. The verse says to whom the real throne belongs.
And note: in the sixth verse the wrongdoers were sitting (quʿūd). In the fifteenth verse the owner of the Throne is mentioned. Two sittings, two scales.
Root: م-ج-د. The sense of the root: honour, loftiness, and abundance. The lexicographers describe majd as "the breadth and abundance of honour". Of a pasture's being abundant for a camel it is also said majudat; in the root there is breadth and plenty.
| Reading | Grammar | Sense |
|---|---|---|
| ٱلْمَجِيدُ (with ḍamma) | An attribute of the word Dhū | "Owner of the Throne, the Majīd" — the attribute belongs to God |
| ٱلْمَجِيدِ (with kasra) | An attribute of the word al-ʿarsh | "Owner of the glorious Throne" — the attribute belongs to the Throne |
Both readings are transmitted in the sources of the variant readings. I give no firm ascription as to which imām held which reading.
The difference in sense is real, but neither is contrary to the text: in the first the loftiness is given to the owner, in the second to the throne; and in the second case too the loftiness of the throne comes from its owner.
There is an indication within the sūra, and it is important: the word will occur once more in the twenty-first verse — قُرْءَانٌ مَّجِيدٌ. The sūra, that is, uses this attribute of two things: the Throne (or the owner of the Throne) and the Qurʾān.
فَعَّال — the faʿʿāl pattern. In Arabic this pattern conveys frequency and continuity: one who does a thing much, who does it continually. Names of trades are on this pattern (najjār — carpenter, khayyāṭ — tailor).
لِمَا يُرِيدُ — "what He wills". إِرَادَة — Root: ر-و-د. The concrete sense of the root is curious: rāda — to go back and forth in search of a place, to survey. Rāʾid — the scout who looks for pasture and water for the tribe. From here irāda: turning towards a thing, wanting it.
What the sentence does in the sūra. This is the close of the four-verse series of names, and it serves as a seal.
The things counted through the sūra — the severe seizing, the originating and repeating, the forgiving, the loving — are all acts. The last verse says that all those acts are bound to a single source: He does what He wills.
And this sentence has a sharp side in the context of the sūra too. Those seated at the edge of the fire supposed that they were doing what they willed — this is the most defining attribute of a sovereign. The verse takes that attribute from his hand and gives it to its real owner.
1. Severe in seizing (12) — power. 2. Originating and repeating (13) — creation. 3. Ghafūr (14) — forgiveness. 4. Wadūd (14) — love. 5. Owner of the Throne / Majīd (15) — sovereignty. 6. Doer of what He wills (16) — will.
The arrangement begins hard and softens, then hardens again: baṭsh → ghafūr, wadūd → faʿʿālun limā yurīd.
This is an arrangement in keeping with the main question of the sūra: the sūra is relating a tyranny, and against that tyranny it opens both a reckoning and a door. The names too carry those two things at once.