Maryam · Makki · ayah 38 of 98

Maryam 19:38

أَسْمِعْ بِهِمْ وَأَبْصِرْ يَوْمَ يَأْتُونَنَا ۖ لَـٰكِنِ ٱلظَّـٰلِمُونَ ٱلْيَوْمَ فِى ضَلَـٰلٍ مُّبِينٍ

“How [clearly] they will hear and see the Day they come to Us, but the wrongdoers today are in clear error.”

Saheeh International

Essence

On the Day they meet Him, the deniers will hear and see perfectly; today, when hearing and seeing could still help, they are lost.

A reflection

Perfect hearing, arriving too late

Many readers picture the Day of Judgement as confusion: crowds, noise, people unsure what is happening. This ayah describes the opposite. On that Day the deniers will be the sharpest listeners and the clearest seers in creation.

Asmiʿ bihim wa-abṣir: how well they will hear, how well they will see. It is an exclamation of astonishment. One early commentator put it bluntly. By Allah, that is the Day of Resurrection: they heard when hearing no longer helped them, and saw when seeing no longer helped them.

One commentary sets beside it another ayah, where the guilty stand with heads bowed before their Lord. 'Our Lord, we have seen and we have heard, so send us back and we will do good' (32:12). Had that sight and hearing come before they saw the punishment, the commentary says, it would have saved them.

Then the ayah turns on a single word: lākin, but. But the wrongdoers today are in clear error. Two days sit in one sentence. On that Day, perfect senses and no use for them. Today, every use for them, and the senses switched off.

The first hearers in Makka were being told something precise about themselves. You will hear this very clearly one day. The only question is whether you hear it while it can still change anything.

The lexicons give a picture for baṣar, sight, that fits the word 'today'. At dusk the Arabs said they met baṣaran: while there was still light enough to tell one shape from another. Today is that dusk. The light is fading, but it is enough.

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.