Al-Qasas · Makki · ayah 19 of 88

Al-Qasas 28:19

فَلَمَّآ أَنْ أَرَادَ أَن يَبْطِشَ بِٱلَّذِى هُوَ عَدُوٌّ لَّهُمَا قَالَ يَـٰمُوسَىٰٓ أَتُرِيدُ أَن تَقْتُلَنِى كَمَا قَتَلْتَ نَفْسًۢا بِٱلْأَمْسِ ۖ إِن تُرِيدُ إِلَّآ أَن تَكُونَ جَبَّارًا فِى ٱلْأَرْضِ وَمَا تُرِيدُ أَن تَكُونَ مِنَ ٱلْمُصْلِحِينَ

“And when he wanted to strike the one who was an enemy to both of them, he[1098] said, "O Moses, do you intend to kill me as you killed someone yesterday? You only want to be a tyrant in the land and do not want to be of the amenders."”

Saheeh International

Essence

Reaching to strike again, Musa hears the charge that stops his hand: you want to be a tyrant, not one who mends.

A reflection

Setting the bone, or breaking it

The accusation sets two words side by side, and each carries a picture. Jabbār: a tyrant. Muṣliḥ: one who puts things right.

The root of jabbār begins in a surprising place. The lexicons record jabartu al-ʿaẓm: I set the broken bone so that it knits. The wooden splint bound round it was the jibāra. A palm grown so tall that no picker's hand could reach it was also called jabbār. One lexicon joins the strands: jabr is putting a thing right by a degree of force.

So the same letters hold both the healer and the bully. The difference is whom the force serves. A bone-setter uses force for the patient. A jabbār among men uses it for himself, towering out of reach, answerable to no one.

Muṣliḥ stands on the other side. Its root is the opposite of spoiling. The Arabs used the verb for mending a thing after it broke, for seasoning a cooking pot, for tending an animal until it thrived. Ṣulḥ is the removal of the aversion between people.

Picture the plaster room of a children's hospital. A nurse holds a seven-year-old's wrist in both hands. She pulls firmly, the child yelps, and the bone slides back into line. Then she wraps it in a cast. That pull was force. Nobody in the room calls it violence, because every ounce of it served the child.

Now the man in the street. He sees Musa's hand coming and reads it the other way: force that serves only the one who wields it. A tyrant 'in the land', with the whole earth as his stage.

One classical commentator defines the tyrant in exactly these terms. He strikes and kills unjustly, does not weigh the consequences, and does not repel harm with what is better.

The question this ayah leaves is not whether you have strength. Most people have some: a sharp tongue, a job title, a louder voice, a stronger body. The question is which picture your strength belongs to. Does it set bones, or break them?

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.