Al-Anbya · Makki · ayah 35 of 112

Al-Anbya 21:35

كُلُّ نَفْسٍ ذَآئِقَةُ ٱلْمَوْتِ ۗ وَنَبْلُوكُم بِٱلشَّرِّ وَٱلْخَيْرِ فِتْنَةً ۖ وَإِلَيْنَا تُرْجَعُونَ

“Every soul will taste death. And We test you with evil and with good as trial; and to Us you will be returned.”

Saheeh International

Essence

Every soul will taste death; in between, both the hard days and the good ones are the test, and then we return.

A reflection

The good days are the test too

The opening words also open 3:185, where they are explored at length. What this ayah adds is the sentence in the middle. Wa nablūkum bil-sharri wal-khayri fitnah: and We test you with bad and with good, as a trial.

Many people hear "test" and think only of hardship: illness, loss, debt. The early commentators read it far wider. One reported list includes hardship and ease, health and sickness, wealth and poverty. Another early scholar said: with what you love and what you dislike, to see how you thank in the one and endure in the other.

The word fitnah carried a picture for the first hearers. They put gold into the goldsmith's fire, and the good metal separated from the dross. That is an established sense. The heat does not make the gold; it shows it.

A classical commentator quotes a striking judgement. Ease and hardship are both tests. But fulfilling the duty of patience is easier than fulfilling the duty of gratitude. So the gift is the greater of the two tests.

Picture a young couple who struggled for years, praying together most nights through two redundancies. Then one of them lands a well-paid job. The struggle ends. Within a year the night prayers have quietly stopped. Nothing went wrong. Everything went right, and that was the test they did not see coming.

The full entry has 2 more reflections, questions to sit with, and "Live it today" - with the words, the roots and the tafsir alongside. Free, no account, works offline.