Al-Qiyamah · Makki · ayah 16 of 40

Al-Qiyamah 75:16

لَا تُحَرِّكْ بِهِۦ لِسَانَكَ لِتَعْجَلَ بِهِۦٓ

“Move not your tongue with it, [O Muḥammad], to hasten with it [i.e., recitation of the Qur’ān].”

Saheeh International

Essence

Even the Prophet ﷺ, racing out of love to hold on to revelation, was told to stop and listen: the keeping was not his burden.

A reflection

Not a reprimand: a burden lifted

Many readers take this ayah as a mild rebuke. The Prophet ﷺ was impatient, the reasoning goes, and was corrected. Others assume it is a rule of recitation: don't read the Quran too fast. Both readings miss the scene, and the scene is the point.

Both Sahihs record it from a Companion who described it. Revelation came with great weight, and the Prophet ﷺ struggled with it. As the angel recited, his lips and tongue moved along with the words. He was trying to hold each word before the next arrived. The strain showed on him.

The verb the ayah uses is tuḥarrik, to set something moving. Its root's pictures are restless ones. The lexicons name an animal's withers ḥārik, because they never stop moving. A stick for stirring a fire is a miḥrāk.

Why the movement? The early commentators give two answers, and they sit well together. He feared the words would slip away before the angel finished. Or, in another early explanation, he hurried with it out of love for it. A later commentary adds: and for its sweetness on his tongue.

So picture the first hearing. The surah has just shown the human being throwing down excuses on the Day. Then, in the middle of the revelation, a sentence turns to the Messenger himself. It names what his lips are doing at that very moment.

A nine-year-old in a Saturday Quran class mouths each verse along with her teacher, half a beat behind. She is terrified of losing it before she has it. The teacher stops, smiles and touches a finger to her own lips. 'Just listen this time. I'll say it again. It won't run away'.

That is the tone of this ayah. It is not a reprimand of a fault. It is a burden being lifted from a man carrying too much. The next ayah gives the reason: the keeping is not his job.

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.