Al-Waqi'ah · Makki · ayah 43 of 96

Al-Waqi'ah 56:43

وَظِلٍّ مِّن يَحْمُومٍ

“And a shade of black smoke,”

Saheeh International

Essence

The word for protection and for a man's might is used of smoke, which is the cruellest word choice in the surah.

A reflection

Calling smoke a shade

In a reduction firing the potter does the opposite of everything you would expect. He starves the kiln of air on purpose, so that the fire, hungry for oxygen, pulls it out of the glazes themselves. The kiln fills with smoke that goes everywhere, into every crevice of every pot, and it blackens whatever it touches. The smoke is not a by-product. It is the agent.

Now read the ayah slowly and notice the word that should not be there. A shade. Of black smoke.

One commentary points to the device and names it. Allah called it a shade. Then He denied it the coolness and relief and benefit that shade has. The purpose is to wipe out the comfort that the word shade carries. That is the cruellest word choice in the surah, and it is deliberate.

And the comfort really is in the word. One lexicon gives the root one single sense, one thing screening another. A man's ẓill is his shade. Any place the sun has not reached is ẓill, while the afternoon's shadow has its own word. A ẓulla is the first cloud that shades you, or anything standing over you like a canopy. And to say that a man aẓalla you is to say he covered you with his shade, meaning with his might and his protection.

So in Arabic a shade is a shelter, a canopy, and a powerful man's protection, all in one word.

Here it is made of smoke. One commentary records a reading that this is the canopy of the Fire, rising from every side until it closes over them. Another says they flee to it as people in this world flee to shade, and find it this.

The word promises exactly what the thing withholds. That is the whole ayah.

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.