Al-Qiyamah · Makki · ayah 15 of 40

Al-Qiyamah 75:15

وَلَوْ أَلْقَىٰ مَعَاذِيرَهُۥ

“Even if he presents his excuses.”

Saheeh International

Essence

However many excuses you throw down, like curtains drawn across a window, the one behind them still knows what is in the room.

A reflection

An excuse is a curtain

Most readers picture this ayah as a courtroom scene from a film. The guilty man, cornered, spins a desperate alibi. It is about criminals, we assume, and their lies.

The word is broader, and closer to home. Maʿādhīr are excuses of every kind. One classical lexicon defines an excuse as a person's attempt, with words, to repair what he is blamed for. Another sorts excuses into three. 'I didn't do it'. 'I did it, but because of this'. 'I did it, and I won't again'. The third, it says, is repentance. So every repentance is an excuse, but not every excuse is repentance.

Most of what we say for ourselves is the second kind. I was tired. Everyone does it. I didn't mean it like that. None of it is quite a lie. All of it is a screen.

Here an early reading adds a picture. Some commentators took maʿādhīr in this ayah as curtains. In the speech of Yemen, they said, a curtain was a miʿdhār. Even if he lets down the curtains and locks the doors, one early voice explained. A classical commentator joins the two senses neatly. A curtain stops others seeing, as an excuse stops the punishment.

A woman phones in sick on a sunny Tuesday. She spends the afternoon at home, and draws the front-room curtains so the neighbours won't see her. The excuse covers her with her manager. The curtain covers her from the street. Neither covers her from herself.

That is the ayah's point, following straight on from the last. The human being is clear evidence against himself, even if he throws down every excuse he has. Draw as many curtains as you like. The one who knows what is in the room is already inside 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.