Al-Mutaffifin · Makki · ayah 30 of 36

Al-Mutaffifin 83:30

وَإِذَا مَرُّوا۟ بِهِمْ يَتَغَامَزُونَ

“And when they passed by them, they would exchange derisive glances.”

Saheeh International

Essence

The wink says what the mocker would not dare to say aloud: a whole verdict passed in the flick of an eyelid.

A reflection

Weighing someone with a wink

Ghamz began as a herdsman's gesture. He pressed a ram's or a camel's back with his hand to feel whether it carried fat, to judge its worth. From there the word came to mean a sign made with the eye or the eyebrow, pointing out a flaw. A ghamīza is a fault that others can point at. To say there is no ghamīza in someone is to say there is nothing to mock.

So yataghāmazūn is people appraising someone's worth with a flick of the eye, and finding him wanting. The form of the verb is mutual. They wink at one another, sharing the verdict.

One classical commentator spells out what the winks meant. Look at these people, the mockers were saying. They tire themselves out. They deny themselves pleasures. They risk everything for a reward they cannot even be sure of.

Picture a new graduate on her first week at a firm. At lunch someone offers her a sandwich, and she says she is fasting. Two colleagues across the table exchange a look. Nobody says anything unkind. Nobody needs to. She sees the look, and she knows exactly what it meant.

The wink is cowardly and efficient. It passes a sentence without the risk of saying it. It builds a little club at someone else's expense.

The ayah does something the winkers never expected. It puts their silent gesture into words, and preserves it in a book recited for fourteen centuries. What they thought was private and deniable is recorded exactly.

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.