Al-Mu'minun · Makki · ayah 71 of 118

Al-Mu'minun 23:71

وَلَوِ ٱتَّبَعَ ٱلْحَقُّ أَهْوَآءَهُمْ لَفَسَدَتِ ٱلسَّمَـٰوَٰتُ وَٱلْأَرْضُ وَمَن فِيهِنَّ ۚ بَلْ أَتَيْنَـٰهُم بِذِكْرِهِمْ فَهُمْ عَن ذِكْرِهِم مُّعْرِضُونَ

“But if the Truth [i.e., Allāh] had followed their inclinations, the heavens and the earth and whoever is in them would have been ruined. Rather, We have brought them their message,[965] but they, from their message, are turning away.”

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Essence

Had the Real bent to their whims, heaven and earth would spoil; He sent them their honour instead, and they turned away.

A reflection

Wanting the pilot to fly by your mood

On a long flight, a passenger rings the call button again and again. He wants the plane to fly lower, then faster, then towards a city he has just thought of. The crew are polite. The pilot does not change course.

Wa law ittabaʿa al-ḥaqqu ahwāʾahum: if the truth followed their desires. Several early authorities, recorded by the commentators, say al-Ḥaqq here is Allah Himself, the Real. One commentator records that most hold this view.

So the ayah imagines something absurd. What if the Real, who holds the heavens and earth, followed what people happened to want? One commentator answers: the heavens and earth would not stand, because they stand by the truth. Another says the ayah shows how great the truth is. The heavens and earth, and everyone in them, stand by it alone.

That is a direct word to the ego. Pride quietly wants the universe to arrange itself around preferences. It wants the rules to change when they are inconvenient, the outcome to match the wish, God to approve what the self has already decided.

The commentators give the reason this would be ruin. Two say people do not know the outcomes of affairs, or which arrangements are sound and which are corrupt. A world steered by such knowledge would crash.

Allah does not need to refuse anyone's whim to prove a point. He needs nothing (35:15). The refusal is mercy. The pilot who ignores the call button keeps every passenger alive, including the one ringing it.

So the humbling is also a relief. You do not have to run the universe. You could not. The One who does is not swayed by your mood, and that is exactly why you can trust Him with your life.

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.