Al-Mu'minun · Makki · ayah 114 of 118

Al-Mu'minun 23:114

قَـٰلَ إِن لَّبِثْتُمْ إِلَّا قَلِيلًا ۖ لَّوْ أَنَّكُمْ كُنتُمْ تَعْلَمُونَ

“He will say, "You stayed not but a little - if only you had known.”

Saheeh International

Essence

Allah confirms their answer, you stayed only a little, and places the tragedy in the second half: if only you had known.

A reflection

A jar small enough to carry

The lexicons give an image for qalīl, little, that is almost tender. One explains that a qulla was a jar a person could lift by himself. It was named, the lexicon says, because it was small to him. Little, in this root, is not worthless. It is something light enough to be carried in your hands.

In labithtum illā qalīlan: you did not stay except a little. That is the reply to the people who said a day or part of a day. One classical commentator notices something striking. Allah does not correct them. In effect He says: you are right, you stayed only a little. Another says He confirmed what they said about the years of their stay, and rebuked them for their heedlessness.

So for once, in this whole passage, the people of the Fire say something that Allah confirms. Their estimate was accurate. Life on earth was little. The problem was never their arithmetic. It was that they discovered it too late.

One commentary adds: little, on every estimate. Whether you measure the stay by years lived or by time in the grave, it is little beside what follows. Another explains that even a long stay is finite, and so it is little beside what has no end.

Hold the jar image for a moment. A life is a small vessel you can carry. That makes it manageable. You do not need superhuman strength to fill it well. It is the right size for a human being to hold in their hands and offer back.

But a small jar also fills quickly and empties quickly. Every day is a noticeable fraction of it. So the ayah's 'little' is both a comfort and an urgency. Your life is not too big for you to handle. It is also not big enough to waste. Carry it carefully.

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.