Ad-Dukhan · Makki · ayah 32 of 59

Ad-Dukhan 44:32

وَلَقَدِ ٱخْتَرْنَـٰهُمْ عَلَىٰ عِلْمٍ عَلَى ٱلْعَـٰلَمِينَ

“And We certainly chose them by knowledge over [all] the worlds.”

Saheeh International

Essence

Allah chose the Children of Israel above the people of their age, and He chose them knowing everything, including how they would later stumble.

A reflection

A choice made with nothing hidden

Wa-laqad ikhtarnāhum ʿalā ʿilm: and We certainly chose them, with knowledge.

Every human choice is made half-blind. The commentaries see something different in the words ʿalā ʿilm. They record two readings. One: Allah chose them knowing they were fit to be chosen. The other is more startling. He chose them knowing they would swerve, and that lapses would come from them at times. A later commentary adds a third shade. He knew, before they were created, everything that would make the choice right.

A hiring panel spends a month on one appointment. They read the CV, test the candidate and phone two referees. Six months later a newspaper reports what the CV had left out. The panel did their best. They simply could not see far enough.

Allah's choosing has no such blind spot. Nothing in the people He chose surprised Him later. Their crossing of the sea and their calf in the desert were both known to Him on the day of the choosing.

This is where the ego shrinks. We like to think that when good comes to us, it is because we earned it. The ayah moves the weight. The choice rests on His knowledge, not on the chosen people's opinion of themselves. Another surah says it plainly: your Lord creates what He wills and chooses, and the choice is not theirs (28:68).

So why does Allah announce it at all? Is it a boast, a need to be thanked? The surah's flow answers that. It is told to people in Makkah who were proud and denying, as a mirror. He has no need of their thanks. They have need of knowing who chooses, so they stop imagining it is them. Being chosen is never a reason for pride. It is a reason to wonder what He saw, and to try to live up to it.

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.