Al-Qasas · Makki · ayah 88 of 88

Al-Qasas 28:88

وَلَا تَدْعُ مَعَ ٱللَّهِ إِلَـٰهًا ءَاخَرَ ۘ لَآ إِلَـٰهَ إِلَّا هُوَ ۚ كُلُّ شَىْءٍ هَالِكٌ إِلَّا وَجْهَهُۥ ۚ لَهُ ٱلْحُكْمُ وَإِلَيْهِ تُرْجَعُونَ

“And do not invoke with Allāh another deity. There is no deity except Him. Everything will be destroyed except His Face.[1122] His is the judgement, and to Him you will be returned.”

Saheeh International

Essence

Call on no one beside Allah: everything is perishing except His Face, the judgement is His, and to Him you are all being brought back.

A reflection

Lit windows on a borrowed current

Picture a terraced street on a winter evening. Every window is lit. A television flickers in one, a kitchen glows in another, a child's lamp in a third. Each house seems to shine by itself.

Then the power fails. Every window goes dark at the same moment. Not one of them was ever a source. They were all running on a current from somewhere else.

One great commentator reads this ayah in exactly that direction. Everything other than Allah, he argues, is perishing even now, in itself. Its existence is not its own. It is like a borrowed robe on a poor man. The robe is fine, but the man underneath is still poor. Take the robe back and he stands as he was.

Another commentary puts it more starkly. Whatever exists apart from Allah depends on Him at every instant, so in itself it is as good as nothing.

This is where the ego shrinks. Pride is the window believing it is the light. My talent, my health, my reputation, my sharp mind: each is a lit window on a borrowed current. The glow is real. Its ownership is not.

And the ayah does not say 'everything will perish one day'. The word is hālik, a participle: perishing. Read this way, it describes the street with the lights still on.

Only one thing in the sentence is not borrowed. Except His Face. Everything else shines because He keeps it shining.

That is not a threat. It is a correction of where we stand. Humility is simply seeing the wiring.

The full entry has 7 more reflections, questions to sit with, and "Live it today" - with the words, the roots and the tafsir alongside. Free, no account, works offline.