As-Saffat · Makki · ayah 70 of 182

As-Saffat 37:70

فَهُمْ عَلَىٰٓ ءَاثَـٰرِهِمْ يُهْرَعُونَ

“So they hastened [to follow] in their footsteps.”

Saheeh International

Essence

They did not walk in their fathers' footsteps; they were rushed along them, trembling, without once stopping to ask where the tracks led.

A reflection

Pushed from behind, not walking

The verb at the end of this ayah is in a form that should stop you. Yuhraʿūn is passive. They are not simply hurrying. They are being hurried.

The first hearers knew this word from the camp and the road. The lexicons use it for captives herded along and for camels crowding to the trough. It is rushing with a tremble in it, from fear, greed or anger. One early grammarian defined it as hurrying with a shiver. Another said it meant urging on whoever is behind you. A third gave the picture of a man driven towards a fire by the cold.

So the image is not a thoughtful walk in a family's footsteps. It is a crowd moving at a jog, half-trembling, pushed by something it has not named. One classical commentary notes that the passive shows how badly they wanted it. They rushed as though someone were shoving them, though nobody was.

Picture a ferry docking at night. Three passengers stand up early and head for a door at the stern. Others see them and follow. Within a minute sixty people are pressed against a door that opens onto the car deck. The foot-passenger exit, clearly signed, is on the other side. No one read the sign. Each person's only evidence was the back of the person in front.

That is how inherited error usually moves. Not through argument, but through momentum. Nobody decides. Everybody follows the movement.

The word puts a simple question to you. Where in your life are you moving fast without having chosen the direction? The hurry itself is the warning sign. Truth can survive a pause. A stampede cannot. So when you feel yourself carried along, the first act of faith may be simply to stop, and read the sign.

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.