Al-Mu'minun · Makki · ayah 25 of 118

Al-Mu'minun 23:25

إِنْ هُوَ إِلَّا رَجُلٌۢ بِهِۦ جِنَّةٌ فَتَرَبَّصُوا۟ بِهِۦ حَتَّىٰ حِينٍ

“He is not but a man possessed with madness, so wait concerning him for a time."”

Saheeh International

Essence

When arguments run out, the chiefs call Nuh mad and settle on the oldest tactic against a messenger: wait him out until time silences him.

A reflection

Whose mind was really covered?

In huwa illā rajulun bihi jinnatun: he is nothing but a man with madness in him. The word jinna comes from a root the lexicons tie to covering. Janna is to cover a thing. The jinn are named for being hidden from human eyes; the unborn child, janīn, for being hidden in the womb; a shield, junna, for hiding the one who carries it. Madness, in this vocabulary, is a mind that has been covered over. The commentators note that jinna here can mean madness or the jinn, as people then thought madness came from jinn confusing a man.

The charge turns back on those who make it. Two classical commentators say the chiefs knew perfectly well that Nuh was the most sound of mind among them and the most weighty in speech. A third says simply: they lied, for they knew his complete intelligence by plain experience.

So who was covered? The man calling people to their Creator with patience and tenderness, or the men who could see his clarity and chose to call it madness? The covering lay over their hearts, not over his mind.

Picture a young player who beats a respected chess master at a local tournament. The master, shaken, tells the organisers the boy must have cheated. Everyone who watched the game knows he did not. The accusation says nothing about the boy. It says everything about the man who cannot bear to lose.

That is a mirror worth holding up. When faced with a truth that would cost us something, it is tempting to find something wrong with the messenger rather than face the message. The ayah shows where that leads: the clear-sighted called mad by those who have covered their own eyes.

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.