Ad-Duhaa · Makki · ayah 10 of 11

Ad-Duhaa 93:10

وَأَمَّا ٱلسَّآئِلَ فَلَا تَنْهَرْ

“And as for the petitioner,[1942] do not repel [him].”

Saheeh International

Essence

You were once in need and not turned away; so never drive off the one at your door, asking for bread or an answer.

A reflection

You were the one asking

Most of us file this ayah under charity etiquette: do not shoo away beggars. A good rule for the supermarket door.

Read it inside its surah and it grows. Three gifts were named: sheltered, guided, enriched. Three commands answer them. The commentaries match this one two ways. Many hear the one asking for help, since he ﷺ had known want. Others hear the one asking to learn, since he had been guided. One classical commentator takes the second reading and shows the order lining up. The orphan answers the orphan, the seeker answers the guided, the blessing answers the enriched.

Now hear it as its first listener might have. He had just spent days asking. Sahih al-Bukhari records him once saying to Jibrīl (as): what keeps you from visiting us more often? He had been the one at the door, waiting for an answer that would not come. The answer, when it came, was not a rebuke. It was this surah.

So the command has a mirror in it. You know what it is to ask and wait. Do not be the closed door to someone else.

Picture a seven-year-old asking her father, who is lying under the car with oil on his hands, why the moon follows them on the motorway. He could grunt. He slides out, wipes his hands, and answers properly. She will remember the sliding out long after the answer.

The asker at your door may want bread, or may want to know. Either way, the ayah asks you to remember being the one who asked.

The full entry has 7 more reflections, questions to sit with, and "Live it today" - with the words, the roots and the tafsir alongside. Free, no account, works offline.