As-Sajdah · Makki · ayah 10 of 30

As-Sajdah 32:10

وَقَالُوٓا۟ أَءِذَا ضَلَلْنَا فِى ٱلْأَرْضِ أَءِنَّا لَفِى خَلْقٍ جَدِيدٍۭ ۚ بَلْ هُم بِلِقَآءِ رَبِّهِمْ كَـٰفِرُونَ

“And they say, "When we are lost [i.e., disintegrated] within the earth, will we indeed be [recreated] in a new creation?" Rather, they are, in the meeting with their Lord, disbelievers.”

Saheeh International

Essence

They asked how dust could live again; the ayah answers that the question was never about dust, but about not wanting to meet their Lord.

A reflection

The question behind the question

Most of us read this ayah as a record of an old intellectual objection. The ancients could not imagine how scattered dust could be reassembled. We, being modern, may think we would have asked the same thing, only more scientifically.

Read the second half. 'Rather, they are deniers of the meeting with their Lord'. The ayah does not argue with their chemistry. It tells us their question was a cover.

The commentaries say so plainly. They did not deny Allah's power to bring them back, one explains; they acknowledged His power. What they believed was that there would be no reckoning, and that they would never meet Him. An earlier commentator goes further. They denied the meeting out of wariness of His punishment, and fear of being repaid for their disobedience.

Picture a student the week before results day. Over lunch he announces that exams measure nothing, that the whole system is rigged, that grades are meaningless. His friends nod. Nobody says what everyone knows. He skipped half the revision, and he is frightened of Thursday.

That is not a mocking picture. It is a human one. We all build arguments in front of things we would rather not face. The ayah simply names what stands behind this particular argument.

So here is the uncomfortable mirror. When the thought of standing before Allah unsettles you, notice what your mind does next. Does it reach for an objection? A technicality? A reason the question does not apply to you? The honest move is not to argue with the meeting. It is to prepare for it, so that the meeting becomes something you can want.

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.