Fussilat · Makki · ayah 29 of 54

Fussilat 41:29

وَقَالَ ٱلَّذِينَ كَفَرُوا۟ رَبَّنَآ أَرِنَا ٱلَّذَيْنِ أَضَلَّانَا مِنَ ٱلْجِنِّ وَٱلْإِنسِ نَجْعَلْهُمَا تَحْتَ أَقْدَامِنَا لِيَكُونَا مِنَ ٱلْأَسْفَلِينَ

“And those who disbelieved will [then] say, "Our Lord, show us those who misled us of the jinn and men [so] we may put them under our feet[1392] that they will be among the lowest."”

Saheeh International

Essence

In the Fire the followers finally say "Our Lord", only to ask that their misleaders be trampled: loyalty turned to blame, too late.

A reflection

Lost like milk in water

Aḍallānā: they led us astray. The lexicons give the root a picture from the traveller's world. Ḍalāl is going off the course of your aim, finding no road to your goal at all. And they give one from the kitchen: ḍalla al-laban fī al-māʾ, the milk was lost in the water. Pour one into the other and it is swallowed up. It cannot be found again.

That second picture is the frightening one. Being led astray is not only taking a wrong turning that can be retraced. It can be dissolving into something until you can no longer tell where you end and it begins. The person who was misled no longer quite remembers who they were before.

The lexicons add that at the root lies bewilderment. Lost, vanished, bewildered: one experience seen from three sides.

Picture a young woman who joins a high-pressure sales company straight out of university. At first she is uneasy with the tactics: the fake deadlines, the pressure on elderly customers. Her manager reassures her; the team is warm and generous. Two years later she is training new recruits in the same tactics and cannot remember why she ever hesitated. She has not taken one wrong turn. She has been poured, slowly, into something, and dissolved.

In this ayah, the dissolved realise at last what happened to them. They look for the ones who poured them out. But the milk cannot be taken out of the water by blaming the jug.

The lesson for the living is about vigilance while separation is still possible. When you sense yourself being absorbed into a group, a culture or a habit that is changing who you are, step back early. Check that you can still tell yourself apart from the water. Once dissolved, a person can only be retrieved by Allah's mercy, and the time to ask for it is now.

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.