As-Saffat · Makki · ayah 64 of 182

As-Saffat 37:64

إِنَّهَا شَجَرَةٌ تَخْرُجُ فِىٓ أَصْلِ ٱلْجَحِيمِ

“Indeed, it is a tree issuing from the bottom of the Hellfire,”

Saheeh International

Essence

A tree is known by its soil; this one comes up from the very root of the Fire, fed by what would burn any other.

A reflection

Rooted at the root

A gardener kneels at a patch of weeds. She does not pull at the leaves. She works her fingers down into the soil, finds where the stem meets the root, and lifts. The whole clump comes up at once, leaves and all.

The word aṣl carries that picture, and the lexicons record it as established. The aṣl is the base of a thing. Lift it in your mind, one lexicon says, and everything above it lifts too.

The ayah places the tree fī aṣli al-jaḥīm, in the root of the Fire. The commentaries explain it as the bottom, the deepest floor of Hell. One early authority adds a picture: its root is in the depth of Hell, and its branches rise up through its levels. Another commentary describes the people of the Fire coming to it from above and below to eat.

So the tree is not growing at the edge of the Fire, where its heat might be less. It grows from the deepest point, where everything else in the Fire is anchored. Its root is the root.

There is a stark logic to this. A tree is fed by what its roots touch. Most trees draw water and minerals from the earth. One commentary records an early explanation of this one: it was fed by the fire, and created from it. Its nourishment is the very thing that destroys every other tree.

In this world, too, what we are rooted in decides what we bear. A life anchored in gratitude bears one kind of fruit. A life anchored in contempt bears another. The ayah shows the extreme case. Roots in the Fire, fruit for the Fire.

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.