16. The archaeological remains and historical records of the ancient nations testify to how they met their tragic ends for turning away from truth and honesty, and stubbornly persisting in their devotion to falsehood (Mawdudi).

17. The subtlety of this argument should not go unnoticed. The unbelievers are asked: to whom belongs whatever exists in either the heavens or on the earth. The inquirer then pauses to wait for the answer. Those questioned are themselves convinced that all belongs to God, yet while they dare not respond falsely, they are nevertheless not prepared to give the correct answer. Fearing that their response may be used in argument against their polytheistic beliefs, they keep quiet. At this, the inquirer is told to answer the question himself and to say that all belongs to God (Mawdudi).

18. In a hadith of the Sahihayn, Abu Hurayrah has reported the Prophet,

إِنَّ اللَّهَ لَمَّا قَضَى الْخَلْقَ كَتَبَ عِنْدَهُ فَوْقَ عَرْشِهِ إِنَّ رَحْمَتِي سَبَقَتْ غَضَبِي

"When Allah had created the creations He declared a law (unto Himself) which is with Him above the `Arsh (to the effect), ‘My mercy shall outstrip My anger'" (Ibn Kathir).

Muslim has another version by Salman al Farsi which says:

جَعَلَ اللَّهُ الرَّحْمَةَ مِائَةَ جُزْءٍ فَأَمْسَكَ عِنْدَهُ تِسْعَةً وَتِسْعِينَ وَأَنْزَلَ فِي الْأَرْضِ جُزْءًا وَاحِدًا فَمِنْ ذَلِكَ الْجُزْءِ تَتَرَاحَمُ الْخَلَائِقُ حَتَّى تَرْفَعَ الدَّابَّةُ حَافِرَهَا عَن وَلَدِهَا خَشْيَةَ أَنْ تُصِيبَهُ

"Allah has made a hundred parts of mercy. He has retained ninety nine of them with Himself and sent down to the earth a single part. It is by that part that the creations show mercy to each other, so that the mother-beast lifts her hoof off her young out of the fear of trampling it" (Sayyid).

Muslim and Ahmad have another version narrated by Salman al Farsi which reports the Prophet (saws) as having said:

إِنَّ اللَّهَ خَلَقَ يَوْمَ خَلَقَ السَّمَوَاتِ وَالأَرْضَ مِائَةَ رَحْمَةٍ كُلُّ رَحْمَةٍ طِبَاقَ مَا بَيْنَ السَّمَاءِ وَالأَرْضِ فَجَعَلَ مِنْهَا فِى الأَرْضِ رَحْمَةً فَبِهَا تَعْطِفُ الْوَالِدَةُ عَلَى وَلَدِهَا وَالْوَحْشُ وَالطَّيْرُ بَعْضُهَا عَلَى بَعْضٍ فَإِذَا كَانَ يَوْمُ الْقِيَامَةِ أَكْمَلَهَا بِهَذِهِالرَّحْمَةِ



"The day Allah created the heavens and the earth, He also created a hundred (parts of) mercy. Every part of this mercy covers the heaven and the earth. Of it He placed a single part on the earth. It is by it that the mother shows mercy to her child, and the beasts and birds show mercy to each other. When it is The of Judgment, He will complete it with this mercy" (Shawkani).

After re narrating the above ahadith Sayyid adds: "Apart from the above ahadith, the Prophet never failed to emphasize Allah's mercy whenever an occasion arose. When a woman was found searching for her child amongst a group of prisoners, picking up anyone she would come across, pressing it against her breast, the Prophet remarked:

« أَتَرَوْنَ هَذِهِ الْمَرْأَةَ طَارِحَةً وَلَدَهَا فِى النَّارِ ». قُلْنَا لاَ وَاللَّهِ وَهِىَ تَقْدِرُ عَلَى أَنْ لاَ تَطْرَحَهُ. فَقَالَ رَسُولُ اللَّهِ -صلى الله عليه وسلم- « لَلَّهُ أَرْحَمُ بِعِبَادِهِ مِنْ هَذِهِ بِوَلَدِهَا ».

"Do you think this woman will throw her child into fire?" They said: "No, O Messenger of Allah, if she has the choice not to." He rejoined: "Allah is kinder toward His creations than this woman toward her child." On another occasion he said, as reported by `Amr b. al As:

الرَّاحِمُونَ يَرْحَمُهُمُ الرَّحْمَنُ ارْحَمُوا مَنْ فِى الأَرْضِ يَرْحَمْكُمْ مَنْ فِى السَّمَاءِ

"The merciful are shown mercy by Allah. Show mercy to those on the earth, He who is in the heavens will show mercy to you" (Abu Da'ud, Tirmidhi).

Jarir has reported the Prophet as saying:

إِنَّ مَنْ لاَ يَرْحَمُ لاَ يُرْحَمُ

"He is not shown mercy who does not show mercy" (The Sahihayn and Tirmidhi). It so happened once that the Prophet was kissing Ali's son Hasan. Al Aqra` b. Habis happened to be around. He remarked: "I have ten children. Yet, I never kiss them." The Prophet eyed him for a while and then said: "He who does not show mercy is not shown mercy" (Abu Hurayrah: the Sahihayn). Abu Hurayrah has also reported the Prophet in a report preserved by Malik and the Sheikhayn that a man was forgiven because he gave some water to a thirsty dog saying: ‘This dog is going through what I was going through of the thirst.' Allah accepted his good deed." )The text is as follows: Au):

بَيْنَا رَجُلٌ بِطَرِيقٍ اشْتَدَّ عَلَيْهِ الْعَطَشُ فَوَجَدَ بِئْرًا فَنَزَلَ فِيهَا فَشَرِبَ ثُمَّ خَرَجَ فَإِذَا كَلْبٌ يَلْهَثُ يَأْكُلُ الثَّرَى مِنْ الْعَطَشِ فَقَالَ الرَّجُلُ لَقَدْ بَلَغَ هَذَا الْكَلْبَ مِنْ الْعَطَشِ مِثْلُ الَّذِي كَانَ بَلَغَ مِنِّي فَنَزَلَ الْبِئْرَ فَمَلَا خُفَّهُ مَاءً فَسَقَى الْكَلْبَ فَشَكَرَ اللَّهُ لَهُ فَغَفَرَ لَهُ

During a campaign, Sayyid continues, when someone brought down young chicks from a nest and their mother began to encircle over their heads, the Prophet enquired: "Who disturbed the peace of this bird? Return her chicks to her."

Sayyid concludes: "We could have passed over the above verse lightly. But it is necessary for a Muslim to realize the greatness of kindness and the kindness of the Kindest. Resting in his heart, this truth has deep spiritual ramifications for him. He rests in peace that whatever happens to him, good or bad, is out of mercy of His creator. If he is tested with some hardships, it is for his good, it is not a sign of Allah's rejection. Allah does not deny His mercy to anyone. It is the people who deny His mercy to themselves by disbelieving in Him."

Asad adds: "The expression "God has willed upon Himself as a law" (kataba `ala nafsihi) occurs in the Qur'an only twice here and in verse 54 of this surah itself and in both instances with reference to His grace and mercy (rahmah); none of the other divine attributes has been similarly described. This exceptional quality of God's grace and mercy is further stressed in 7: 156 "My grace overspreads everything" and finds an echo in the authentic Traditions in which, according to the Prophet, God says of Himself, "Verily, My grace and mercy outstrip My wrath".

19. Because of the use of the preposition "ila", it has been suggested that it could mean: He will assemble you in your graves until the Day of Judgment, when you will be brought out (Qurtubi).

20. What the verse means to say is that even though your own speculations over who possesses the universe leads you to the conclusion that it can only belong to One God, yet, despite that, if you suggest other deities besides Him, then, as a people, you ought to be destroyed. But it is Allah's mercy which He has prescribed unto Himself as a Law that saves you from immediate extinction. This respite however is to allow you time for re consideration of the issue. It should not be imagined that, acceptance or rejection, destruction or no destruction, the matter will rest there. Rather, there will be a next life in which you will be questioned and punished for your dishonesty. As to why some people refuse to heed despite the warning delivered by the irrefutable message, the answer is, it is because they have lost their souls to other causes. Consequently, they removed the issue of reconsideration from their minds altogether; and that is so perhaps, because the message tends to question the causes to which they are presently devoted (Au.).

21. The best that has been said about the connection between verse 12 (Say, ‘To whom belongs what is the heavens and in the earth?') and verse 13 (‘To Him belongs whatever takes rest in the night and in the day’) is by Abu Muslim. He said: First Allah spoke of the heavens and the earth (in verse 12) because there is no Space but within these two. Then He spoke about the night and the day (verse 13) because there is no Time save encompassed by these two. Thus, Allah informed us that to Him belong both Space and Time. Further, with regard to the use of the word sakana, there are two opinions. First, it implies that what takes rest is necessarily that which moves. So when it is said "ma sakana" both are automatically included and both belong to Him. Second, and the weightier interpretation is that sakana is in the sense of taking up residence. In other words, whatever takes up residence within Time and Space belongs to Him. Also, the word sakana is all inclusive, for, those that are at rest, are greater in numbers than those that move (Razi).

22. Ibn `Abbas is reported as having said: "I did not know the meaning of "fatara" until I came across two bedouins quarrelling over a well. One of them said: Ana Fatartuha [i.e., "I originated it]'" (Zamakhshari, Razi, Shawkani).

Razi adds some points that seem to agree with the modern cosmological speculations. He says that the word fatara has, as Ibn al Anbari pointed out, the connotation in its root of the beginning of a thing by tearing it apart from another. It leads us to believe that "the act of creation involved in its process a tearing open (or tearing apart) and then subsequent coalescing of some materials with the others." His original words are:

فقوله فاطر السموات والأرض يريد خالقهما ومنشئهما بالتركيب الذي سبيله أن يحصل فيه الشق والتأليف عند ضم الأشياء إلى بعض

Thus he comes close to describing an explosion and then coalescing of elements giving rise to heavenly bodies. He further adds a brilliant point by saying that an act of tearing apart can have two consequences: (i) leading to an improvement, as, e.g., Allah's words (67: 3),

هَلْ تَرَى مِنْ فُطُورٍ [الملك : 3]

"Do you see any crack?"

Or (ii) leading to destruction, as in (82: 1):

إِذَا السَّمَاءُ انْفَطَرَتْ [الإنفطار : 1]

"When the heavens will be torn open."

It might also be of interest to note that all acts of creation involve a tearing open; whether it is a plant out of a seed, a flower out of a bud, a chicken out of an egg, or anything else that we can think of. They all involve a tearing open of some sort or the other. Thus fatir has a greater depth of meaning that what might be suspected (Au.).

23. Majid writes: "Frazer, in his voluminous work, gives minute and accurate details of ‘sky worship' in Vedic India, Iran, Greece, Rome, Babylonia, Egypt, China, Korea, Western Africa, Congo, Southern Africa and Eastern Africa, and of Earth worship in Vedic India, Greece, Rome, Babylonia, Assyria, China, Modern India, and in various parts of Africa and America."

The present Pope’s act of kissing the earth first thing upon landing in a country, suggests, in the least, veneration of the "mother earth" (Au.).

24. Majid comments: "According to the crudities of the polytheistic people, the gods actually consume the food and drink that are offered to them. The Babylonian gods, for instance, ‘conceived of in such human wise, knew thirst and hunger as did men, and had to be propitiated by drink and food' (Woolley, Abraham, p. 157)."

As for the Christians, Majid wonders if they are any better than the ancient pagans in celebrating the festival of Eucharist during which they proceed to eat bread and drink wine, in the belief that they are the flesh and blood of Jesus Christ. It is openly taught in the approved and authorized Catholic Catechism:

Q. What is the Blessed Eucharist?

A. The sacrament of the body and blood, soul and divinity, of Jesus Christ, under the appearance of bread and wine.

Q. Are both the body and blood of Christ under the appearance of bread and under the appearance of wine?

A. Yes; Christ is whole and entire, true God and true man, under the appearance of each.

Q. Are we to believe that the God of all Glory is under the appearance of our corporeal food?

A. Yes; as we must also believe that the same God of all Glory suffered death under the appearance of a criminal on the cross.

Q. How can the bread and wine become the body and blood of Christ?

A. By the goodness and power of God, with whom no work shall be impossible.

25. Hence we have `Umar ibn al Khattab's statement: "Enough for me, if (on the Day of Judgment), there is nothing for me and nothing against me" (Shabbir).

26. Ibn `Abbas has narrated the famous hadith in Tirmidhi. He says:

عَنِ ابْنِ عَبَّاسٍ أَنَّهُ كَانَ خَلْفَ رَسُولِ اللَّهِ صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ , فَقَالَ لِي وَأَنَا رَدِيفٌ خَلْفَهُ: يَا غُلامُ إِنِّي مُعَلِّمُكُ كَلِمَاتٍ فَاحْفَظْهُنَّ ,احْفَظِ اللَّهَ يَحْفَظْكَ احْفَظِ اللَّهَ تَجِدْهُ تُجَاهَكَ , وَإِذَا سَأَلْتَ فَاسْأَلِ اللَّهَ , وَإِذَا اسْتَعَنْتَ فَاسْتَعِنْ بِاللَّهِ , وَاعْلَمْ أَنَّ الأُمَّةَ لَوِ اجْتَمَعُوا عَلَى أَنْ يَنْفَعُوكَ لَمْ يَنْفَعُوكَ إِلا بِشَيْءٍ قَدْ كَتَبَهُ اللَّهُ لَكَ وَلَوْ اجْتَمَعُوا عَلَى أَنْ يَضُرُّوكَ لَمْ يَضُرُّوكَ إِلَّا بِشَيْءٍ قَدْ كَتَبَهُ اللَّهُ عَلَيْكَ , جَفَّتِ الأَقْلامُ وَطُوِيَتِ الصُّحُفُ

"One day I shared a ride with the Prophet on the same beast. He addressed me: ‘My boy. I will teach you a few words, remember them: Be mindful of Allah, He will protect you. Be mindful of Allah, you will find Him before you. When you ask, ask Allah. When you seek help, seek Allah's help. Remember, if the peoples of the world decide to do you a good, they would not be able to do you good in the least, save for what Allah has decreed for you. And, if they were to be unanimous over doing you a harm, they would not be able to do anything, save for what Allah has decreed for you. The pens have dried, and the scriptures have been folded" (Qurtubi).

Alusi adds: This verse forbids that someone should seek removal of an affliction by anyone other than Allah.

He also writes: As if expounding the above hadith, Sheikh `Abdul Qadir Jilani wrote in Futuh al Ghayb what can be summarized as the following: ‘Whosoever desires peace in this life and in the Hereafter may observe sabr and rida, give up complaining to others of his kind, presenting his needs to his Lord alone. He should apply himself to His obedience, wait for an opening from Him, and cut himself off from all else save Him. He should understand that His withholding is bestowal, His punishment a reward, tribulations from Him a cure, His promises a kind of trance and His words, acts. All His acts are good, wise and in keeping with the greater needs, except that He has kept the knowledge of the wisdom behind them unto Himself, leaving no recourse for His slaves except to the acts of devotion, staying away from what is forbidden, graceful acceptance of His decree, and avoiding to ask "why," "how" and "when."'

Every Muslim then, Alusi concludes, should keep the above quoted hadith of Tirmidhi constantly in sight.

27. Hence the Prophet's famous oft repeated prayer words:

لاَ مَانِعَ لِمَا أَعْطَيْتَ ، وَلاَ مُعْطِىَ لِمَا مَنَعْتَ ، وَلاَ يَنْفَعُ ذَا الْجَدِّ مِنْكَ الْجَدُّ

“O Allah. There is none to withhold what You bestow, none to bestow what You withhold, and of no profit any one of power and possession against You” (Ibn Kathir).

28. Qahir is someone who subdues the rebellious and humiliates the arrogant.

29. The meaning of "wa huwa al Qahiru fawqa `ibadihi" is: "Allah is predominant over His slaves, He who humbles them, overpowering them through subjugation, by virtue of His creation of them. Thus He is above them in His irresistible power over them, and they are under Him. And He is the Wise... He is Wise: in His overpowering of His slaves, in His irresistibility over them by His power and in all His acts. He is the Knower of the benefits of a thing or its harms, from Whom neither the ends are hidden nor their beginning, whose management of affairs carries no blemish nor has He an associate in His commands" (Ibn Jarir).

Kashshaf also agrees that the word "fawqa `ibadihi" implies Allah's predominance over the people and His absolute power over everything that one can imagine as of existence besides Him. Therefore, he adds, it is right to say that He is "a Thing, but unlike anything," or to say He is, "Known but unlike anything that is known." But it is not right to say He has "a Body but unlike any other body."

Imam Razi builds up a long argument against those who take "fawqa" in the literal sense of Allah being "above," and denies that Allah is in any specific direction. One of his arguments is that the universe is spherical in which space is neither filled nor void. He concludes that imagining the Divinity in any specific direction or occupying a particular position would amount to either declaring Him below some of His creations, or imposing limits on Him.

Alusi reacts to this kind of reasoning. He asserts that the belief of the Muslims, as stated clearly by Tahawi, is that Allah is "fawqa," without the suggestion of a direction. In fact, Alusi adds most brilliantly, that directions have no existence. They are merely convenient points of reference. They are a notion, an idea, and not concrete things. Imam Ahmad has a hadith in which the Prophet said:

الله تبارك وتعالى فوق ذلك فوق العرش

"Allah Most High is is above that, (that is), above the `Arsh."

Another hadith of Abu Da'ud says:

إِنَّ اللَّهَ فَوْقَ عَرْشِهِ وَعَرْشُهُ فَوْقَ سَمَوَاتِهِ

"Allah is above His `Arsh. His `Arsh is above His heavens." While saying that he made a circle with his finger. Then he added, "And it creaks as a new saddle creaks under the weight of a rider." Another sahih hadith of the Prophet narrated by Umawi in his Maghazi tells us that when Sa`d ibn Mu`adh had given his verdict about Banu Qurayzah, the Prophet remarked:

لقد حكمت فيهم بحكم الله من فوق سبع سماوات

"You have given a verdict that is in line with the verdict He who is ‘above' the seven heavens."

Ibn Majah has another hadith which says:

بَيْنَا أَهْلُ الْجَنَّةِ فِي نَعِيمِهِمْ إِذْ سَطَعَ لَهُمْ نُورٌ فَرَفَعُوا رُءُوسَهُمْ فَإِذَا الرَّبُّ قَدْ أَشْرَفَ عَلَيْهِمْ مِنْ فَوْقِهِمْ فَقَالَ السَّلَامُ عَلَيْكُمْ يَا أَهْلَ الْجَنَّةِ قَالَ وَذَلِكَ قَوْلُ اللَّهِ سَلَامٌ قَوْلًا مِنْ رَبٍّ رَحِيمٍ قَالَ فَيَنْظُرُ إِلَيْهِمْ وَيَنْظُرُونَ إِلَيْهِ فَلَا يَلْتَفِتُونَ إِلَى شَيْءٍ مِنْ النَّعِيمِ مَا دَامُوا يَنْظُرُونَ إِلَيْهِ حَتَّى يَحْتَجِبَ عَنْهُمْ وَيَبْقَى نُورُهُ وَبَرَكَتُهُ عَلَيْهِمْ فِي دِيَارِهِمْ

"While the people of Paradise would be in their pleasures, they would be engulfed by a nur. They will raise their heads and lo, it will be Allah Most High looking down on them from above them. He will say, ‘People of Paradise, Al-salamun `Alaykum O dwellers of Paradise. The Prophet recited the verse (36: 58), ‘Salam will be the word from a Kind Lord.' He will look down upon them and they will look up at Him. So long as He is in sight, they will not look at anything else until He veils Himself from them after which His nur and barakah – on them and on their dwellings – will remain."

Alusi presents some other arguments to prove the "fawqiyyah" of Allah, but we drop them for purposes of brevity.

Rashid Rida interjects that perhaps this verse is not the perfect point to argue about the divinity in being or not in a particular direction. The meaning is clear and has been lucidly explained by Ibn Jarir. The position of the Salaf, vis a vis the divinity, is also clear. They liked to pass over the verses discussing the Person of the divinity with silence. They said that Allah is over the `Arsh, over the seven heavens, and above the whole created world. He is "apart" from His creations. He is not limited, nor circumscribed. There is nothing like unto Him. His Attributes are described with the help of words understood by the humans, but He cannot be defined with those words. It would be better, concludes Rashid Rida, if we remained within this.

Nonetheless, without any comment on what has been stated above, one might warn that this is an extremely difficult and delicate subject. Neither science nor revelation offer us a definitive knowledge of the created world. So far as scientific knowledge is concerned the information given about the state of the universe is far from clear. Indeed, it is to be understood in terms of mathematical equations alone. To convey in words what those equations mean, is to be trying to give a concrete shape to an abstract idea. It is said that the universe is "edgeless and boundary less," while space is thought to be probably "curved" and not "flat" and that it is expanding at a feverish pace and accelerating, so that it will keep on expanding for ever and ever. The cosmologists also assert that on the large scale the universe is homogenous and isotropic. That is, looked at from any angle, it is just the same in appearance and physical properties. But that does not mean the earth is in the center. They give the example of equidistant dots on a balloon in which every dot can be said to have a central position. The balloon example implies that we are at the edge of the universe and that the universe has a center. But, that is not correct, for, it is also asserted that there is no center to the universe. Further, there is no answer to the question, what is the nature of that which lies beyond the edge? One answer is that there is no beyond, and so the question may not be asked. Again, there are a few scientists who speculate that there might be an infinite number of universes. They are known as inflatory universes – millions of them. There are good scientific reasons to believe in their existence. None the less, humans might never come into contact with those universes because of dimensional problem. There could be eight, eleven or twenty three dimensions in those universes. Indeed our universe might have more than four dimensions, but others might be tucked away in matter and so invisible to us. What's more, some of those universes might be overlapping ours. But, when not overlapping, what's between these multiple universes? These few random points demonstrate that human knowledge is incomplete and inadequate to work out a satisfactory theory about the physical world itself. It is pointless, therefore, and even audacious to talk of a subject that involves the divinity. And hence the wise policy of silence adopted by the Salaf. We cannot say any more than that Allah is apart from His creations (Au.).

30. It is said (as reported by Kalbi: Alusi) that (whenever the Quraysh enquired the Jews and Christians about the Prophet, they received the answer that there was nothing in their Scriptures to suggest that he was a Messenger: Alusi), the Quraysh demanded on the Prophet that he produce witnesses to his claim. In response Allah revealed this verse (Qurtubi).

In the use of the word "thing" (in "what thing can be greater in testimony") is the hint that all else are "things" when compared to the only truly Existent Allah. Another connotation is that all "things" testify to the Oneness of Allah (Au.).

31. Hence the Prophet has said:

بَلِّغُوا عَنِّي وَلَوْ آيَةً

"Transmit from me, even if it be a verse."

In another hadith he said:

نَضَّرَ اللَّهُ عَبْدًا سَمِعَ مَقَالَتِي فَحَفِظَها وَوَعَاهَا وَبَلَّغَهَا مَنْ لَمْ يَسْمَعْهَا فَرُبَّ حَامِلِ فِقْهٍ لا فِقْهَ لَهُ وَرُبُّ حَامِلِ فِقْهٍ ، إِلَى مَنْ هُوَ أَفْقَهُ مِنْهُ

"May Allah keep the face of him bright and happy who heard something from me, remembered it and then passed it on to others. For, sometimes, the carrier of a point has no understanding himself, while, at other times, the carrier understands better than he to whom he passed on " (Shafi`).

32. Qatadah and Ibn Jurayj have said that the allusion is to the Prophet. Nevertheless, a second opinion of Qatadah is that the allusion is to Islam (Ibn Jarir).

Also see note 298 under surah Al Baqarah of this work.

This is the answer to the Jewish and Christian claim that they did not have anything in their scriptures to suggest that Muhammad was a Messenger of God. The fact is, those who were vouchsafed the Book earlier, possess such unambiguous criteria that they can spot a Prophet among countless million other mortals just as easily as they can pick out their sons (Au.).

Majid wrote: "There is little doubt, says a Christian biographer of the holy Prophet, that some at least among the Jews assured him that he might be, ‘or even affirmed that he was that Prophet whom the Lord their God should raise up unto them of their brothers' (Muir, p. 98)."