Al-Mu'minun · Makki · ayah 63 of 118

Al-Mu'minun 23:63

بَلْ قُلُوبُهُمْ فِى غَمْرَةٍ مِّنْ هَـٰذَا وَلَهُمْ أَعْمَـٰلٌ مِّن دُونِ ذَٰلِكَ هُمْ لَهَا عَـٰمِلُونَ

“But their hearts are covered with confusion over this, and they have [evil] deeds besides that [i.e., disbelief] which they are doing,”

Saheeh International

Essence

Hearts sunk under a flood cannot see what the believers see, and they keep returning to habits they were never weaned from.

A reflection

Lost in the throng

A commuter steps onto a packed platform. The crowd sweeps him into the carriage and out again at the other end. He is three stops past his own before he looks up.

The ghamra returns here, but this time it is the hearts that are in it. One commentator explains it as a covering, heedlessness and blindness towards the Quran. Water ghamara a man when it covered him. A ghamr river covers whoever enters it.

He adds two usages that widen the image. A man was said to enter the ghimār of the people: their throng, the press of the crowd that covers him. And he records a description of a ghumr man as one covered over by other people's opinions.

That is a modern picture of heedlessness. Not wickedness so much as being carried. Swept along by what everyone around you thinks, says and buys. Never looking up long enough to ask where you are.

Another commentator says the ghamra covers their hearts from understanding what Allah placed in His Book: its counsel, its lessons, its proofs. The heart is present. It is simply submerged.

The word qalb, heart, adds its own warning. The lexicons say the heart was named for its turning. An old line of verse says the heart was only called qalb because it turns. A heart covered by the crowd cannot turn. It moves only where it is pushed.

So the remedy is small acts of standing still. Step off the platform. Let the train go. Five quiet minutes with the Book, away from the press of other voices. Ask what you think when nobody else is speaking.

The commuter was not lost because he was foolish. He was lost because he never looked up. Hearts drown the same way: not in one dramatic plunge, but in a crowd that never stops moving.

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.