Az-Zukhruf · Makki · ayah 9 of 89

Az-Zukhruf 43:9

وَلَئِن سَأَلْتَهُم مَّنْ خَلَقَ ٱلسَّمَـٰوَٰتِ وَٱلْأَرْضَ لَيَقُولُنَّ خَلَقَهُنَّ ٱلْعَزِيزُ ٱلْعَلِيمُ

“And if you should ask them, "Who has created the heavens and the earth?" they would surely say, "They were created by the Exalted in Might, the Knowing,"”

Saheeh International

Essence

Ask who made the heavens and the earth and they name the Mighty, the Knowing: the problem was never the answer, but living by it.

A reflection

The Mighty and the Knowing, and the small things we serve

The two names in the people's answer are not decoration. One classical commentary takes them in turn. Al-ʿAzīz is the One who overcomes, and what gives the power to overcome is might; so the name points to perfect power. Al-ʿAlīm points to perfect knowledge. Where perfect power and perfect knowledge meet, the commentary says, there is the ability to create everything that can be.

The root of ʿazīz pictured hard ground, ʿazāz, where rain ran off and hooves could not sink in. A poet called the eagle ʿazīza because she nests on the highest peaks, out of reach. Might, in this word, is what cannot be got at.

Picture a satellite engineer on the night of a launch. For two years she has built one instrument, tested it, worried over it. Tonight it is in orbit, and the control room cheers. She walks out to the car park after midnight, still shaking with the day. Above her, away from the lights, the sky is thick with stars. Her satellite is up there somewhere, too small to see. She stands for a long time.

That is the right size for the ego to be. Everything we build is real and good, and it sits inside a sky we did not make.

Someone may ask: why does Allah want people to acknowledge Him as Creator? Does He need the credit? He needs nothing. The ayah records an admission the hearers already made. Its purpose is to hold that admission up beside their lives. If you know the heavens were made by the Mighty and the Knowing, why bow to things that are neither?

The humbling question is ours, not theirs alone. What do we serve, in practice, that could not make a single star?

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.