Maryam · Makki · ayah 83 of 98

Maryam 19:83

أَلَمْ تَرَ أَنَّآ أَرْسَلْنَا ٱلشَّيَـٰطِينَ عَلَى ٱلْكَـٰفِرِينَ تَؤُزُّهُمْ أَزًّا

“Do you not see that We have sent the devils upon the disbelievers, inciting them [to evil] with [constant] incitement?”

Saheeh International

Essence

Behind the restless drive towards wrong is a fire laid under a pot, and the devils who stoke it are sent, not sovereign.

A reflection

Even the devils are sent

Many people carry a picture of Satan as God's opposite number. A dark power on the other side of the board, nearly as strong, playing a long game of its own. That picture is closer to the old dualisms than to the Qur'an.

This ayah does not allow it. We sent the devils upon the disbelievers. The devils are the object of a verb whose subject is Allah. A classical spiritual writer is precise about the kind of sending meant. It is a sending of decree, like the sending of the winds, not a sending of guidance or command. Allah does not instruct the devils to do evil. He sets them loose within limits He has drawn, and they cannot cross them.

The word shayṭān carries its own picture in the lexicons. The root means distance: a far-off home, a deep crooked well. The shaṭan was the long, hard-twisted rope let down a well, or used to tether a strong horse. So the far one is also, in the root, the one on a rope.

That should humble two kinds of pride at once. The first belongs to the person who thinks his rebellion is his own bold invention. He is being pushed by a creature, under a decree, towards an end he did not choose. The second belongs to anyone who thinks evil is a rival kingdom able to defeat Allah's plan. It is not. It is a tethered thing doing what tethered things do.

No devil has ever acted outside his Lord's knowledge. That is why a believer can be afraid of temptation, and never afraid of Satan as though he were a god.

The full entry has 6 more reflections, questions to sit with, and "Live it today" - with the words, the roots and the tafsir alongside. Free, no account, works offline.