An-Naba · Makki · ayah 8 of 40

An-Naba 78:8

وَخَلَقْنَـٰكُمْ أَزْوَٰجًا

“And We created you in pairs”

Saheeh International

Essence

You were made in pairs and kinds, each of you half of something; only the One who made you has no pair.

A reflection

The glove on the railing

Walk through a park in January and you will often see it. A single child's glove sits on top of a railing, placed there by a stranger. It is a small, lonely thing. It is useless on its own. Its whole meaning is the other glove, somewhere in a coat pocket across town.

The Arabs heard exactly that in zawj. The lexicons say two sandals, the right and the left, were a pair, zawjān. So were a cock and hen pigeon. Each one alone was a zawj: a single thing that has its counterpart. Opposites paired as well, black with white and sweet with sour. This is the established sense of the root.

Now the ayah turns and speaks to its listeners directly: 'And We created you in pairs.' One commentator notes the sudden 'you'. It presses the point home more sharply than 'they' ever could. You, the scoffers asking about the great news, are yourselves a piece of evidence. Every one of you is half of something.

This is where the ego meets its limit. Much of our pride is a quiet claim to be complete in ourselves: I need no one, I made myself, I answer to nobody. Yet the body, the family and the heart all tell the same story. We are made to need our other. We are born from two, we live leaning on others, and we are incomplete alone.

Against all these pairs, the Quran sets one sentence: 'There is nothing like Him' (42:11). The Prophet ﷺ said that Allah is witr, single and odd, and loves what is odd (Sahih al-Bukhari). Everything made comes as one of a pair. Only the Maker has no counterpart and needs none.

So the doubt about arrogance answers itself here. Allah's greatness is not a claim that needs our applause. It is simply the truth of the only One who is not half of anything. The humbling is for the glove on the railing, which had begun to think it was a whole hand.

The full entry has 4 more reflections, questions to sit with, and "Live it today" - with the words, the roots and the tafsir alongside. Free, no account, works offline.