'Abasa · Makki · ayah 42 of 42

'Abasa 80:42

أُو۟لَـٰٓئِكَ هُمُ ٱلْكَفَرَةُ ٱلْفَجَرَةُ

“Those are the disbelievers, the wicked ones.”

Saheeh International

Essence

Those faces belong to people who covered the truth within and burst its banks without; the root of their breach also names the dawn.

A reflection

The dam that bursts, and the dawn that breaks

Al-fajara, 'the wicked', is the plural of fājir. The lexicons give the root a vivid first picture, and it is well established. A farmer has built an earth dam to hold back water. Fajara al-sukr is to breach it: to cut a wide gap so the water bursts through. From this came springs and rivers bursting out of the ground. And from this came fajr, the dawn: the darkness split open by light.

Fujūr, wickedness, grew from the same picture. It is not a small crack. It is a breach in the covering of faith so wide that the soul floods out into sin. The lexicons add another sense: leaning away, like a rider slipping sideways out of the saddle. One commentator explains the fājir here as a liar who invents lies about Allah, or one who openly breaks His limits. He gives the root's original meaning as leaning away.

So the surah ends with a word that shares its root with the dawn. The same splitting that lets light break across the sky can let the soul burst out of its banks. The difference is what breaks through.

Picture a village downstream from a small reservoir. For years the dam has held. People fish in the lake, children swim in summer. Then one wet winter the owners, who have ignored every warning about repairs, find a crack. By morning it has become a breach, and the water tears through the lower fields. The same water that was a blessing behind the wall becomes a flood when the wall gives way.

That is the picture of fujūr: good things out of their limits. Desire, anger, ambition, appetite: all are gifts within their banks, and destruction when the banks burst.

But the root also holds hope. Every night ends in fajr. The same splitting can be the arrival of light. A life that has burst its banks can still see the dawn break through, if its owner turns to Allah before the last night ends.

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.