Al-Ghashiyah · Makki · ayah 16 of 26

Al-Ghashiyah 88:16

وَزَرَابِىُّ مَبْثُوثَةٌ

“And carpets spread around.”

Saheeh International

Essence

Fine carpets spread everywhere, named with the word the Quran uses for grief poured out: in the Garden, only comfort is scattered.

A reflection

Grief spread out, carpets spread out

Mabthūtha comes from a root about scattering a thing and bringing it into view. Raiders spread their horses out across the land. A hunter loosed his dogs. Carpets were spread through a tent. And spilling a secret was bathth, as was grief too heavy to keep inside, poured out to a friend.

The Quran uses that last sense in one of its most tender scenes. Yaʿqūb has lost Yūsuf, and now a second son. His sons tell him he will waste away with grieving. He answers: I only complain of my bathth and my sorrow to Allah, and I know from Allah what you do not know (12:86). His grief was not hidden or managed. It was spread out, all of it, before the One who could hold it.

Picture a man whose small business has just gone under after twenty years. He has kept a brave face for his wife and children for a month. One evening he goes down to his allotment shed, closes the door, and says it all aloud to Allah. The debts. The shame. The fear for his son's university place. Nothing tidied, nothing rehearsed. He comes back up the path an hour later, not fixed, but lighter.

That is bathth in its most healing form. The Quran does not ask the grieving to swallow their sorrow. It asks them to spread it out before Allah.

Now read the ayah. In the Garden, the thing that is mabthūth, spread everywhere, is fine carpets. The same word that once described grief poured out now describes comfort poured out. The floor of that place is covered with what the hard years never had.

If you are carrying something too heavy to keep, spread it out tonight, in words, before your Lord. The same root promises that one day only softness will be scattered.

The full entry has 5 more reflections, questions to sit with, and "Live it today" - with the words, the roots and the tafsir alongside. Free, no account, works offline.