Al-'Ankabut · Makki · ayah 19 of 69

Al-'Ankabut 29:19

أَوَلَمْ يَرَوْا۟ كَيْفَ يُبْدِئُ ٱللَّهُ ٱلْخَلْقَ ثُمَّ يُعِيدُهُۥٓ ۚ إِنَّ ذَٰلِكَ عَلَى ٱللَّهِ يَسِيرٌ

“Have they not considered how Allāh begins creation and then repeats it? Indeed that, for Allāh, is easy.”

Saheeh International

Essence

Everyone has watched Allah begin creation, in themselves and around them; the One who began it will bring it back, easily.

A reflection

Three years in the garage, and one word: easy

The ayah ends on a single word: yasīr, easy. Raising every human being who ever lived, from dust scattered across the earth, is easy for Allah.

The root gives the word a picture, and the lexicons hold it as established. A good mare had light legs that stepped without strain. Flocks gave birth easily, with none lost. Yusr is a thing opening up and becoming light. That is the word chosen for the return of all creation.

Now set beside it something we call an achievement. Picture a retired engineer who spends three years restoring a vintage car. He hunts down parts, rebuilds the engine, sands the body back to bare metal. At last he drives it to a rally and stands beside it, glowing. He has earned his pride. Yet the car was already designed. He only put back what another had made.

Allah began the car's designer, and the steel, and the hands that held the spanner. He will bring all of them back. And the ayah does not say this is a great labour for Him. It says it is light.

One early commentator adds a quiet phrase: easy, just as the beginning was easy for Him. Neither end of the road strains Him. What is heavy for us is no measure of what is heavy for Him.

Is this a boast? A boast is a creature puffing itself up to seem bigger than it is. Allah is not making Himself seem bigger. He is telling us the truth so that our ego can stop inflating its own. Our three-year projects are real and good. They are also small, and seeing that is a relief.

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.