Saba · Makki · ayah 26 of 54

Saba 34:26

قُلْ يَجْمَعُ بَيْنَنَا رَبُّنَا ثُمَّ يَفْتَحُ بَيْنَنَا بِٱلْحَقِّ وَهُوَ ٱلْفَتَّاحُ ٱلْعَلِيمُ

“Say, "Our Lord will bring us together; then He will judge between us in truth. And He is the Knowing Judge."[1232]”

Saheeh International

Essence

Every argument that cannot be settled here will be gathered before one Lord, who opens it with truth and needs no witness to know.

A reflection

The speech you rehearse will not be needed

There is a man who has argued the same case for ten years. It is a family quarrel over a house, or a slight at a wedding. He rehearses it in the shower. He wins every time. In his head the relatives nod, and the other side finally admits it.

This ayah ends with two names that make that rehearsal unnecessary. Al-Fattāḥ: the One who opens and decides. Al-ʿAlīm: the One who knows. An early commentator draws the consequence. He is the Judge from whom nothing hidden is hidden. He needs no witnesses to tell Him who is truthful and who is false.

That should humble us more than it does. Our pride runs on being heard and believed. We gather allies, we tell our version first, we polish the phrasing. Before a Judge who already knows, all of that campaigning is noise. The ego's best speech is not wanted. Only the truth of what happened is wanted, and He has it already.

Some hear a God who names Himself Judge and All-Knowing as one who needs to be praised. Consider instead a court. When a judge's competence is announced, it is not for the judge's vanity. It is for the litigants, especially the one who was wronged and cannot prove it. Those names are a comfort addressed to them.

Allah gains nothing from the title. The quiet woman who was lied about, with no witness on her side, gains everything. Her case will not be lost for lack of evidence, because the Judge does not depend on evidence.

So the shower speech can stop. The case is in better hands than ours.

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.