Al-Mu'minun · Makki · ayah 26 of 118

Al-Mu'minun 23:26

قَالَ رَبِّ ٱنصُرْنِى بِمَا كَذَّبُونِ

“[Noah] said, "My Lord, support me because they have denied me."”

Saheeh International

Essence

Called a madman and told to wait, Nuh answers no one in the crowd; his next sentence goes upward, to the One who can settle it.

A reflection

The reply that went upward

A man has run a free kitchen in his neighbourhood for years. At a residents' meeting, someone says he cannot be right in the head, giving food away like that. A few people nod. He walks home rehearsing replies. At his door he stops. He says them to Allah instead, and goes in.

The ayah before this one gives the insult in full. There is nothing in him but madness, the chiefs said, so wait on him a while. Then comes Nuh's answer, and it is not addressed to them at all. It opens qāla rabbi: he said, my Lord.

One commentator reads the opening as the reply to a question the listener is bound to ask. After hearing all that falsehood, what did he say? The answer is quietly surprising. He said nothing more to the crowd. He spoke to his Lord.

The timing matters too. The same commentator places this prayer at the end of a long road. Nuh's people had persisted until he despaired of their faith entirely. It had been revealed to him that none of them would believe beyond those who already had (11:36). Elsewhere the Quran says he stayed among them a thousand years less fifty (29:14). This is not a man snapping at the first insult. It is the last word of a lifetime of patient argument.

First the message is delivered fully, again and again. Only when there is nothing left to say to people does the next sentence turn upward. Most of us do it the other way round. We pray little, and argue in the comments for days.

The next time you are written off, notice where your next sentence wants to go. Send it to Allah first.

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.