Al-Waqi'ah · Makki · ayah 63 of 96

Al-Waqi'ah 56:63

أَفَرَءَيْتُم مَّا تَحْرُثُونَ

“And have you seen that [seed] which you sow?”

Saheeh International

Essence

The verb names only the beginnings of farming: breaking the ground, casting the seed, watering it, and nothing after that.

A reflection

Where your part of the work ends

A seed drill is set to a depth and a spacing, and then it is driven up and down a field. That is the whole of the operation. Depth, spacing, the right week. After the last pass the drillman washes the hopper and puts the machine away. He has nothing further to do with the crop until a combine comes.

One commentary draws the line in this ayah with real precision, and the distinction is the point of the whole challenge.

The difference between tilling and growing, it says, is this. Tilling is the beginnings of the crop: breaking up the ground, casting the seed, watering what has been sown. Growing is the end of the tilling: the plant coming out, thickening, and standing up on its stalk.

So it reads the ayah this way. Have you considered what you begin by your own actions? And do you bring it to its purpose, or does Allah?

And it adds the sentence that makes argument unnecessary. Nobody doubts that bringing the grain into the ear is not the work of people. Their work in it is nothing beyond casting the seed and watering.

That is an unusually honest division of labour, and it is worth transferring, because the same line runs through every kind of work.

You can prepare a lesson. You cannot make a child understand. You can set out the argument. You cannot make the man see it. You can do the work, send the application, be at the bedside, say the words, keep the appointment, raise the child well. In every one of those the preparatory act is wholly yours and the outcome is wholly not.

Most of our exhaustion comes from refusing that line. We take responsibility for the swelling of the grain, lie awake about it, and call the anxiety conscientiousness.

The drill is set. The field is done. Put the machine away.

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.