Abee Lahab

In the Name of Allah, the Gracious, the Merciful

Extract from QUR’AANIC STUDIES -A Modern Tafsir PART II:

1. Tabbat yada abee lahabin watabba

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111:1. Abee Lahab’s¹ hands are perished; and he too is!

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1. Abee Lahab was the Prophet’s own uncle; and he was his immediate neighbour at Makkah. But the man was deadly against the nephew for preaching the religion of Islam. His wife used to lay thorns at the Prophet’s door; the enmity they both felt against him was so intense! This Verse predicted Abee Lahab’s pathetic end some years later. He died of a disease considered malignant; and he was left by his own family to die alone. He was one of the richest in Makkah, but his wealth was of no avail to him at the time of his death. Although this was to happen some years later, the Verse is in the perfect tense; for Allah Almighty could see it happening in advance.

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Mohammad Shafi

Friday, the 9^th of November 2018.

The Perishing Star

In the Name of Allah, the Gracious, the Merciful

The Perishing Star

Extract from Chapter 53 of QUR’AANIC STUDIES – A Modern Tafsir PART II:

 53:1. By the star when it perishes!¹

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1. The Arabic word hawa has been used in Verse 20:81 in the sense of something getting perished. But, here, the people living at the time the Qur’aan was revealed – and for centuries thereafter – had difficulty in understanding a star getting perished or destroyed. So those people rendered the said Arabic word as ‘sets’ or ‘disappears’. And they understood the Verse as alluding to a star that disappears from the sky as day breaks. But this obviously is a contrived rendering. At day-break, not one, but all stars [other than the Sun of course] disappear to the naked human eye. It is but an illusion. Now, when human knowledge has taken a quantum jump, we know for a fact that stars do get destroyed! Watch this video! Qur’aan is a living Book valid for all times till the Last Day. We cannot hold it hostage to the limited understanding of any people in the past.

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Mohammad Shafi

Friday, the 13^th of July 2018.