Al-Anbya · Makki · ayah 15 of 112

Al-Anbya 21:15

فَمَا زَالَت تِّلْكَ دَعْوَىٰهُمْ حَتَّىٰ جَعَلْنَـٰهُمْ حَصِيدًا خَـٰمِدِينَ

“And that declaration of theirs did not cease until We made them [as] a harvest [mowed down], extinguished [like a fire].”

Saheeh International

Essence

Their one cry never stopped until they lay like cut corn and a fire gone cold: whole towns ended in two words.

A reflection

Cut corn, and a fire gone cold

The ayah ends a whole civilisation in two words: ḥaṣīdan khāmidīn. Harvested, extinguished.

The first word is farm language. A ḥaṣīd is standing corn that has been cut. A lexicon notes the root's other branch too: making firm, as a rope is twisted tight or a coat of mail is close-linked. Strength and cutting live in the same letters. The second word is fire language. One lexicon says khamadat al-nār is said of a fire whose flame has dropped. An early commentator glosses it simply: like fire when it is put out.

Two commentators note something about the grammar. The verb made takes two descriptions here, but they work as one. It is like saying something is sweet-and-sour: a single state that combines both. These people were made into one thing that was at once a cut field and a dead fire.

That is where human pride shrinks to its proper size. Picture a field of wheat in late summer. It took months to grow: ploughing, sowing, rain, sun, the slow thickening of the ears. It stands taller than a child, moving like water in the wind. Then a combine harvester comes through in a single afternoon. By evening there is only stubble and dust.

The towns had grown for generations. They had walls, wealth and a high opinion of themselves. They were ended in the time it takes to say two words. The ayah does not dwell on the details. It does not need to.

A sceptic may ask whether this is God glorying in destruction. The answer is in the word before: tilka daʿwāhum, that was their cry. They had been warned again and again and chose ruin. The harvesting was the end of a long patience, not the delight of a tyrant. And it is told to those still standing, while the field is still green.

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.