Al-An'am · Makki · ayah 142 of 165

Al-An'am 6:142

وَمِنَ ٱلْأَنْعَـٰمِ حَمُولَةً وَفَرْشًا ۚ كُلُوا۟ مِمَّا رَزَقَكُمُ ٱللَّهُ وَلَا تَتَّبِعُوا۟ خُطُوَٰتِ ٱلشَّيْطَـٰنِ ۚ إِنَّهُۥ لَكُمْ عَدُوٌّ مُّبِينٌ

“And of the grazing livestock are carriers [of burdens] and those [too] small. Eat of what Allāh has provided for you and do not follow the footsteps of Satan.[356] Indeed, he is to you a clear enemy.”

Saheeh International

Essence

He made animals to carry you and animals near the ground to feed and clothe you; eat His gift, and refuse the enemy's steps.

A reflection

The giant that kneels for a child

The ayah continues the sentence of the one before. He who raised the gardens also produced, from the livestock, ḥamūla: animals built to carry.

The root pictures lifting a weight off the ground. A ḥiml is a load on the back. The ḥamūla are the camels strong enough to bear it. This is established in the lexicons.

Now picture a city child at a farm open day. A farmer hands her the rope of a shire horse, an animal many times her weight. One swing of its head could knock a grown man flat. Instead it lowers its head and walks beside her, slow and patient. Her parents take a photograph. The child thinks she is leading the horse.

One commentary on this passage recalls another ayah. 'Have they not seen that We created livestock for them?' it asks. 'We subdued them for them, so some they ride and some they eat' (36:71-72). The key word is subdued. The camel's strength was never ours. Its willingness to kneel was put there.

This is where the ego shrinks. We speak of our transport, our logistics, our reach. But for most of human history, every journey and every trade route rested on animals who could have refused. Their strength was lent, and so is the strength we lean on now.

The ayah does not ask Allah to be thanked for His sake. He needs no thanks. It asks us to see clearly who is really carrying whom. Pride cannot survive that seeing.

The full entry has 6 more reflections, questions to sit with, and "Live it today" - with the words, the roots and the tafsir alongside. Free, no account, works offline.