An-Nazi'at · Makki · ayah 5 of 46

An-Nazi'at 79:5

فَٱلْمُدَبِّرَٰتِ أَمْرًا

“And those who arrange [each] matter,[1837]”

Saheeh International

Essence

Rain, wind, wombs and souls are all being arranged right now by His command, and the word for their arranging shares a root with pondering.

A reflection

The surge nobody sees coming

In the national grid control room on the night of a big televised final, the engineers watch the clock, not the match. They know what happens at the final whistle. Millions of people stand up at once and switch on the kettle. Demand leaps in seconds. So the engineers arrange extra power in advance, timed to the minute. When it works, nobody at home notices anything at all. The team is rightly proud: they managed one surge, for one night, in one country.

Now read the fifth oath. Al-mudabbirāt amran: those who arrange an affair. The sources are unusually united here. These are angels. One report lists some of their work. One is entrusted with winds, another with rain and plants, another with taking souls. Others guard people and record their deeds. A classical scholar extends the list: angels over the clouds, the mountains, the womb, the grave, the Garden and the Fire. Every movement in the world, he says, traces back to angels carrying out their Lord's command.

Then comes the sentence that puts everything in its place. 'The whole affair belongs to Allah' (3:154). How, one scholar asks, can the arranging be credited to angels? Because they carry it out, it is spoken of as theirs. In the same way the Quran says Jibril 'brought it down' (26:193), though Allah sent it.

Here the ego has nowhere to stand. We are proud of managing a household budget, a project, a team of twelve. Every one of those rests on rain we did not arrange and breath we did not schedule. Pride is taking credit for the kettle surge while forgetting who arranges the weather.

A doubt follows. If Allah is all-powerful, why does He work through angels at all? Does He need staff? The sources answer that He does not. The command is wholly His; the angels are His messengers, and even their name, one scholar notes, comes from a word for message. Their work shows His order, not His need. 'Allah is free of need of the worlds' (29:6).

Tonight, somewhere, a cloud is being steered to a field. You will not notice. That is the point.

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.