Az-Zumar · Makki · ayah 28 of 75
Az-Zumar 39:28
قُرْءَانًا عَرَبِيًّا غَيْرَ ذِى عِوَجٍ لَّعَلَّهُمْ يَتَّقُونَ
“[It is] an Arabic Qur’ān, without any deviance[1349] that they might become righteous.[1350]”
Saheeh International
Essence
A Quran in a plain Arabic tongue, with no bend in it that even insight could find, given so that people might become mindful.
A reflection
No bend even the mind can find
The ayah could have said the Quran is straight. Instead it says ghayra dhī ʿiwaj: not possessed of any crookedness. One commentary explains why that is stronger. 'Crookedness' is an indefinite noun in a negative frame, so it denies every kind and every degree. Straightness might hold in one respect and not another. A complete absence of crookedness leaves no respect in which it fails.
The lexicons add a fine distinction. The root means a lean in something that should stand straight. Pronounced ʿawaj, it is a bend the eye can see, in a spear or a wall. Pronounced ʿiwaj, it is a bend that only insight can find: in a plain, a road, a religion, a way of living. The ayah uses ʿiwaj. One commentary concludes that it has reached the point where the mind can find no bend in it, let alone the senses.
That is a large claim, and it is Allah's own. It humbles the pride of every reader who comes to the Quran expecting to correct it. Our ego is used to being the critic. The ayah says that here the critic will find nothing to straighten.
Picture an apprentice carpenter who holds every plank up to a steel straightedge before he cuts it. Most planks show a slight bow when he looks closely. One day his master hands him a piece of seasoned oak, and the straightedge sits flush along its whole length. He turns it over, checks again, and finds nothing.
Is this self-praise? It gains Him nothing. It tells the reader he can rest his weight on this Book without fear of it bending under him.
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