Ali 'Imran · Madani · ayah 101 of 200

Ali 'Imran 3:101

وَكَيْفَ تَكْفُرُونَ وَأَنتُمْ تُتْلَىٰ عَلَيْكُمْ ءَايَـٰتُ ٱللَّهِ وَفِيكُمْ رَسُولُهُۥ ۗ وَمَن يَعْتَصِم بِٱللَّهِ فَقَدْ هُدِىَ إِلَىٰ صِرَٰطٍ مُّسْتَقِيمٍ

“And how could you disbelieve while to you are being recited the verses of Allāh and among you is His Messenger? And whoever holds firmly to Allāh[141] has [indeed] been guided to a straight path.”

Saheeh International

Essence

How could you disbelieve, with Allah's signs recited to you and His Messenger among you, when whoever takes hold of Allah is already guided?

A reflection

Holding on to something that is also moving

A man crossing a swollen river grabs a branch and feels the relief of having something in his hand. It takes him a few seconds to understand that the branch is not attached to anything. It is travelling downstream at exactly the speed he is.

That is almost everything we hold on to.

The ayah's verb is yaʿtaṣim, and the lexicons reduce the whole root to one idea in three words: holding fast, preventing, clinging. What is striking is that every picture inside it is of something weaker keeping hold of something that holds. The miʿṣam is the wrist, named for keeping the bracelet on, and it stays a miʿṣam even with no bracelet there. The ʿiṣma is a necklace, named for clinging to the neck. The ʿiṣām is the cord threaded through a waterskin's eyelets to draw its edges together. And there is one scene of plain fear in the lexicons: a sailor in a storm, clinging to the rudder-pole. All of this is established.

Notice what the root does not contain. Not one of those images is about the strength of the one holding on. The wrist does not make the bracelet. The sailor does not calm the storm. He keeps both hands on the pole.

A classical commentator traces the word to ʿiṣma, which in Arab speech means prevention. A man iʿtaṣama with a thing when he held on to keep himself from harm.

So here is where the ego should quietly let go of something. We speak of our resilience, our discipline, our ability to hold it together, and we assess other people by the same measure. The ayah does not deny that we hold on. It relocates all the strength to the other end of the grip.

And it asks a question that costs something to answer honestly. What are you actually gripping? A salary that exists because one client has not yet left. A reputation that holds until one conversation goes badly. A body that is cooperating at the moment. Your own willpower, which has a documented history.

Every one of those is a branch in the water. Not useless, and not sinful to hold, and not anchored to anything.

There is only one handhold in the ayah, and it is not a quality you have to generate. It is a Someone you take hold of. Which is why the promise after it is in the past tense: whoever takes hold of Allah has already been guided.

So tonight, name the one thing you have been gripping as though it were fixed. Then put one hand, deliberately, somewhere else.

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.