Al-Kahf · Makki · ayah 66 of 110

Al-Kahf 18:66

قَالَ لَهُۥ مُوسَىٰ هَلْ أَتَّبِعُكَ عَلَىٰٓ أَن تُعَلِّمَنِ مِمَّا عُلِّمْتَ رُشْدًا

“Moses said to him, "May I follow you on [the condition] that you teach me from what you have been taught of sound judgement?"”

Saheeh International

Essence

He does not ask for a lesson but for permission to walk behind a man, with the teaching named as the reason.

A reflection

He asked to walk behind, not to be taught

The verse is usually summarised as a request for knowledge. Read the verb he actually uses.

The request is to follow. The teaching comes afterwards, in a purpose clause.

So the thing he asks permission for is not a lesson. It is a place: behind this man, on whatever road he is taking.

That distinction is the whole of what goes wrong next. A lesson has a start and a finish, and a student who has been given one can leave. Following has neither, and a man who is following cannot ask for the syllabus.

There is a cabinetmaker who had been working on his own for thirty years and good at it. He asked a man in another county whether he might sweep his workshop for a month.

He did not ask to be taught joints. He asked for the broom, and a place in the room.

His reason was simple and slightly embarrassing to say out loud. He wanted to see the decisions, and the decisions are not in the finished work.

That is the shape of this request, and most of us make the other one. We ask for the lesson, the course, the summary, the answer. Each of those is a transaction we can terminate.

The teaching he is about to receive could not have been delivered any other way. It consists of three acts and their explanations, in a sequence he does not control.

And the verse quietly admits what following costs, by putting the asking in the form of a question. He does not say: I will come with you.

He asks whether he may.

The full entry has 5 more reflections, questions to sit with, and "Live it today" - with the words, the roots and the tafsir alongside. Free, no account, works offline.