Al-Mu'minun · Makki · ayah 87 of 118

Al-Mu'minun 23:87

سَيَقُولُونَ لِلَّهِ ۚ قُلْ أَفَلَا تَتَّقُونَ

“They will say, "[They belong] to Allāh." Say, "Then will you not fear Him?"”

Saheeh International

Essence

Once you admit who owns the heavens and the Throne, the next step is a shield: walking carefully in a world that is His.

A reflection

Afraid of the email, unafraid of the Lord

A man reads a two-line email from his manager at nine at night. 'Can we talk first thing tomorrow?' He reads it six times. He cannot sleep. He drafts three replies and deletes them. The same night, he lets the last prayer slip past without a second thought.

He is not short of fear. He has simply pointed it at the wrong height.

The passage climbs. First the earth was named, and the response asked for was tadhakkarūn, remembering. Now the seven heavens and the Mighty Throne are named. The response rises to tattaqūn: will you not be mindful, will you not guard yourselves? The larger the dominion shown, the weightier the response it calls for.

One major commentator explains why taqwā comes at this rung. It is a warning that protection from Allah's punishment comes only by abandoning the idols and accepting the resurrection. Two concise commentaries frame it simply: will you not fear His punishment if you worship another? Will you not guard yourselves by obeying His commands and avoiding what He forbids?

The ego is very selective in what it fears. It trembles before a manager, a bank, a social-media pile-on. It is casual about the Lord of the seven heavens. That is a strange arrogance: treating the smallest powers as enormous and the greatest as negligible.

Allah does not need our wariness. Nothing we do adds to His Throne or subtracts from it. The call to taqwā is for our protection.

So try an honest inventory. What do you fear most this week? Now set it beside the question of this ayah: who is Lord of the seven heavens and the Mighty Throne? Let the fear find its proper size, and its proper Object.

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.