Al-Insan · Madani · ayah 22 of 31

Al-Insan 76:22

إِنَّ هَـٰذَا كَانَ لَكُمْ جَزَآءً وَكَانَ سَعْيُكُم مَّشْكُورًا

“[And it will be said], "Indeed, this is for you a reward, and your effort has been appreciated."”

Saheeh International

Essence

After all the silk and silver, the last word is not a wage but a thank-you: your striving, however small, was seen and received.

A reflection

Paid, and then thanked

Most of us hear this ayah as the closing line of a payslip. You worked, here is your wage, and the account is settled. Jazāʾ does carry that picture. Its root means a debt paid off in full, a return that matches the deed.

But the ayah does not stop at the wage. It adds a second sentence: wa kāna saʿyukum mashkūrā, and your striving has been thanked.

A railway signaller works his last night shift after thirty-four years. His pension statement came in the morning post, and the sums are correct. Then, at two in the morning, a train driver he has never met sounds the horn twice passing his box. Every driver on the line does the same, all night. The pension settled the account. The horns did something money cannot do.

The commentaries read the second sentence in that spirit. One early commentator, reciting it, simply said: Allah has thanked a small striving. Another explained it as Allah rewarding the little with much. His thanks, they say, is His accepting the deed, praising the one who did it, and rewarding beyond its size.

The Prophet ﷺ gave a picture of what that looks like. A man walking along a road found a thorny branch lying across it and moved it aside. 'So Allah thanked him, and forgave him' (Sahih al-Bukhari, Sahih Muslim). No crowd, no plaque, a few seconds' work. The verb is the same: shakara.

Wages are calculated. Thanks is given. If Paradise were only a wage, it would be measured to the deed and no further. The ayah says the deed was also seen, received and honoured by the One who owed nothing. The account was settled, and then He thanked you anyway.

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.