Ya-Sin · Makki · ayah 22 of 83

Ya-Sin 36:22

وَمَا لِىَ لَآ أَعْبُدُ ٱلَّذِى فَطَرَنِى وَإِلَيْهِ تُرْجَعُونَ

“And why should I not worship He who created me and to whom you will be returned?”

Saheeh International

Essence

'Why should I not worship the One who first broke ground on me' is asked of himself, and put to everyone listening.

A reflection

The One who dug the first spade

On a visit to his family's village, an old man walks to the well at the edge of the fields. His grandfather dug it, by hand, the year the old man's father was born. He runs his palm over the top stones. Three generations have drunk from it. Not one of them could have drawn a cup if one man had not first broken the ground.

There is a famous report about the word in this ayah. One of the Companions most learned in the Quran said he did not know what fāṭir, the Originator of the heavens, meant. Then two Bedouins came to him quarrelling over a well. One of them said: anā faṭartuhā. I began it. I was the first to dig it.

The lexicons say the root means splitting open. A camel's tooth faṭara when it split the gum. The earth cracks with sprouting plants; trees burst into leaf. So faṭara is to originate: to split something out into being where there was nothing.

That is the man's question. Wa mā liya lā aʿbudu alladhī faṭaranī: why should I not worship the One who dug me first? A classical commentator draws out what follows. The one who originates a thing owns it, and the owner is owed honour. The one who gives existence is the first benefactor, and the benefactor is owed thanks.

That is the shrinking of the ego in this ayah. Pride speaks as if we dug our own well. Our talents, our health, our very being, as if they began with us. The man in Ya-Sin starts at the true beginning. Someone else broke the ground.

Someone may ask: does the Creator need to be worshipped? He does not. Another commentator explains that minds are made to thank the one who gives and love the one who does good. Worship is that gratitude, given its proper object. It changes nothing in Him. It sets everything in us 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.