Ali 'Imran · Madani · ayah 27 of 200

Ali 'Imran 3:27

تُولِجُ ٱلَّيْلَ فِى ٱلنَّهَارِ وَتُولِجُ ٱلنَّهَارَ فِى ٱلَّيْلِ ۖ وَتُخْرِجُ ٱلْحَىَّ مِنَ ٱلْمَيِّتِ وَتُخْرِجُ ٱلْمَيِّتَ مِنَ ٱلْحَىِّ ۖ وَتَرْزُقُ مَن تَشَآءُ بِغَيْرِ حِسَابٍ

“You cause the night to enter the day, and You cause the day to enter the night; and You bring the living out of the dead, and You bring the dead out of the living. And You give provision to whom You will without account [i.e., limit or measure]."”

Saheeh International

Essence

The One who slips the night into the day a minute at a time, and draws life out of a dry seed, provides without counting.

A reflection

Chalk marks on a shed wall

On the shortest day of the year, a gardener chalks the sunset time on the inside of his shed door: 3.53. Three weeks later he notices he is still working at four. Nobody announced it. A few minutes of light have slipped back into the afternoon while he was busy.

Tūliju al-layla fī al-nahāri wa tūliju al-nahāra fī al-layl: You make the night enter the day and make the day enter the night. The root pictured entering a narrow place, like a camel through the eye of a needle. Night presses into the day's room a little at a time, and then the day presses back. One classical commentary describes the movement exactly. You take from the length of one and add it to the shortness of the other. They become equal, then unequal again, through the seasons.

No human being has ever added one minute to a day. We move the clocks forward and back and call it saving daylight. The light was never ours to save. The most powerful person on earth wakes in the same dark as everyone else in midwinter, and waits for the same slow return.

That is an ego lesson written across the sky. Our plans assume time is ours to spend. The ayah shows who is actually adjusting it, by minutes, for the whole planet at once.

Why would Allah point to this power? Not for applause; He is free of need of the worlds (29:6). It follows the previous ayah's 'You give dominion and pull it away'. The same hand that moves the minutes moves kingdoms, and both move gradually, while people are busy.

Chalk your own mark somewhere this winter. When you notice the light returning, say this ayah.

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.