As-Sajdah · Makki · ayah 28 of 30

As-Sajdah 32:28

وَيَقُولُونَ مَتَىٰ هَـٰذَا ٱلْفَتْحُ إِن كُنتُمْ صَـٰدِقِينَ

“And they say, "When will be this conquest,[1177] if you should be truthful?"”

Saheeh International

Essence

The deniers mock the day of decision by asking when; the Quran keeps their words, and teaches believers to hold a promise without a date.

A reflection

A door opening, not only a conquest

Many Muslims hear al-fatḥ and think of conquest: Sūrat al-Fatḥ, the taking of Makkah, armies and gates. That worn-smooth association makes this ayah sound like a question about military victory.

The root is simpler and wider. Fatḥ is the opposite of locking: a door swung open. The lexicons follow it outward. Water breaking from a spring is fatḥ. So is relief from grief, and knowledge that was locked away. Victory is one kind of opening, a way forced through a closed door. And a judge's ruling is another, separating two sides so that what lies behind them shows. One commentary notes that a judge is called fātiḥ or fattāḥ because matters open and come apart at his hands.

Most commentaries take the word here in that last sense: the decision between the believers and those who mocked them. One early voice says the fatḥ is the judgement; another says the Day of Resurrection. The Quran uses the word this way itself: 'Our Lord, open between us and our people with the truth' (7:89). And Allah names Himself al-Fattāḥ, who 'will open between us with the truth' (34:26).

Two major commentators reject the reading that this means the conquest of Makkah, with a sharp argument. The next ayah says that on the day of the fatḥ, belief will not benefit those who disbelieved. Yet on the day Makkah was taken, the Prophet ﷺ accepted the Islam of about two thousand people who had opposed him. Their faith benefited them. So that cannot be the day meant.

A bank vault has a time lock. Once it is set, nobody can open the door early: not the cashier, not the manager, not a robber with a gun. At the set hour the bolts draw back by themselves. That is closer to this ayah's fatḥ than any battle. It is a door that opens at its appointed time, by a hand other than ours.

So the mockers' question is not 'when will you win?' It is 'when will the door open, and show who was right?'

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.