Qaf · Makki · ayah 12 of 45

Qaf 50:12

كَذَّبَتْ قَبْلَهُمْ قَوْمُ نُوحٍ وَأَصْحَـٰبُ ٱلرَّسِّ وَثَمُودُ

“The people of Noah denied before them,[1526] and the companions of the well[1527] and Thamūd”

Saheeh International

Essence

Long before Makkah doubted the return, Nūḥ's people, the Well's people and Thamūd had called it a lie; only their names remain.

A reflection

Named after a well

In some old towns a square is still called Well Square. The well was capped and paved over generations ago. Nobody draws water there now. The name stayed because the well was the one thing everybody once gathered round.

One people in this ayah is remembered in the same way. Not by a prophet's name, nor by a tribe's, but by a hole in the ground. Aṣḥāb al-rass: the companions of the well.

The lexicons give the root one core idea: being fixed and firm. A thing rassa when it settled and stayed put. The first touch of a fever, before it takes hold of the bones, was its rass. To bury the dead was to rass them. And a rass was an old well, sunk deep into the ground. The image is established.

The commentaries differ over who these people were. A concise commentary says they lived beside a well with their herds and worshipped idols. A narration-based commentary records an early view that they thrust their prophet down a well. Another early report names the well as the place where a believer was killed. A theological commentary lists further opinions and settles none of them.

Now hold the root and the reports side by side. A picture forms, offered as reflection rather than fact. If that early report is right, they buried the voice that came to them. They meant it to stay down there, fixed and silent. Instead, the well became their name. The thing they did to the message is the thing the Quran calls them by.

That is worth sitting with. What people do with the truth tends to become how they are remembered. Wealth fades from memory. Buildings are paved over. But the moment someone was offered the truth and pushed it down a hole stays fixed, like stone in the ground.

So the ayah leaves a quiet question. What am I gathered around? And what have I tried to bury, hoping it would stay down? Whatever the answer, it may become my name.

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.