Taha · Makki · ayah 69 of 135

Taha 20:69

وَأَلْقِ مَا فِى يَمِينِكَ تَلْقَفْ مَا صَنَعُوٓا۟ ۖ إِنَّمَا صَنَعُوا۟ كَيْدُ سَـٰحِرٍ ۖ وَلَا يُفْلِحُ ٱلسَّاحِرُ حَيْثُ أَتَىٰ

“And throw what is in your right hand; it will swallow up what they have crafted. What they have crafted is but the trick of a magician, and the magician will not succeed wherever he is."”

Saheeh International

Essence

Allah does not even name the staff: throw what is in your right hand, and a valley of manufactured illusions is swallowed whole.

A reflection

Only what is in your hand

A storm cuts the power to a small hospital. The monitors go dark. The machines fall silent. In a delivery room, an old midwife who trained forty years ago takes a torch in one hand and kneels. With nothing but her two hands and what she knows, she brings a baby safely into the world.

Allah does not say: throw your staff. He says: alqi mā fī yamīnika, throw what is in your right hand. Two commentators explain the choice in two opposite ways, and both are moving.

The first reading belittles the staff. Do not mind how many ropes and staffs they have. Throw the single little stick in your hand. By the power of Allah it will swallow all of theirs. It is one and they are many; it is small and they are great.

The second reading magnifies it. Do not be impressed by these great masses. In your right hand is something greater than all of them. Next to it, their mountain of ropes is the smallest and slightest of things.

Either way, the ego is quietly put in its place. The power was never in the stick. It was not in Musa's arm. It was in the One who commanded the throw.

That is a humbling truth for anyone who relies on their own resources. Our skills, our money, our networks: they feel like great machines. They can go dark in an afternoon. And when they do, Allah can work through what looks like almost nothing.

A sceptic might ask why Allah keeps emphasising His power. Here the answer is obvious. It is said to a man standing with a stick against an army of illusions. Allah's power is not vanity. It is the frightened person's only real reassurance.

Look at what is in your own right hand today. Small, perhaps. Enough, if He commands it.

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.