25. [al-Furqan, Mecca 42]

The Quranic Text & Ali’s Version:

أَلَمْ تَرَ إِلَى رَبِّكَ ...

25: 45. Hast thou not turned thy vision to thy Lord? --

C3098. We saw in 24:35 that Allah is the Light of the heavens and the earth.

We have now another sublime passage, in which we are asked to contemplate the Glory of Allah by a parable of the subtle play of Light and Shade in Allah's creation. (R).

... كَيْفَ مَدَّ الظِّلَّ...

how He doth prolong the Shadow!

C3099. In our artificial fife and surroundings we fail to see some of the finest mysteries of Light and Shade.

We praise, and rightly, the wonderful colours of sunset. We see, particularly in climates more northerly than that of India, the subtle play of Light and Shade in the twilight succeeding sunsets.

If we were as assiduous in seeing sunrises and the play of Light and Shade preceding them, we should see phenomena even more impressive, as the early morning seems to us more holy than any other time in the twenty-four hours of the sun's daily journey.

- There is first the false dawn, with its curious uncertain light and the curious long uncertain shadows which it casts.

• Then there are the streaks of black in the East, succeeded by the true dawn, with its delicate tones of colours and light and shade.

The fight of this true or false Dawn is not given by the direct rays of the sun. In a sense it is not light, but the shadows or reflections of light. And they gradually merge into actual sunrise, with its more substantial or more defined shadows, which we can definitely connect with the sun.

... وَلَوْ شَاء لَجَعَلَهُ سَاكِنًا...

If He willed, He could make it stationary!

... ثُمَّ جَعَلْنَا الشَّمْسَ عَلَيْهِ دَلِيلًا ﴿٤٥﴾

Then do We make the sun its guide:

C3100. The morning shadows are long but more definite, and their length and direction are seen to be guided by the sun. But they change insensibly every second or fraction of a second.

ثُمَّ قَبَضْنَاهُ إِلَيْنَا ...

25: 46. Then We draw it in towards Ourselves --

C3101. As the sun rises higher and higher, the shadows contract. In regions where the sun gets actually to the zenith at noon, there is no shadow left at that time.

Where does it go to?

It was but a shadow cast by a substance and it gets absorbed by the substance which produced it. (R).

... قَبْضًا يَسِيرًا ﴿٤٦﴾

a contraction by easy stages.

C3102. Let us now reverently turn our vision (as far as we are able) to the symbolic meaning.

Allah is the Light. All things in creation – whether concrete or abstract – are but shadows, depending on His Light. All shadows are not equal. He gives length or size of substance to such as He pleases. And some shadows almost become reflected lights, like the light of the false or the true Dawn. Such are holy men, in all kinds of gradations.

The shadows are constantly in a state of flux; so are all things in Creation, all things we see or covet in this life. Allah, if He wills, can give some of them greater fixity or comparative stability. (R).

Asad’s Version:

25:45) ART THOU NOT aware of thy Sustainer (through His works]? - how He causes the

shadow to lengthen [towards the night] when, had He so willed, He could indeed have made it stand still: but then, We have made the sun its guide;

(25:46) and then, [after having caused it to lengthen,] We draw it in towards Ourselves 38 with a gradual drawing-in.

[[ Asad’s notes - 38 I.e., "We cause it to contract in accordance with the 'laws of nature' which We Ourselves have instituted." As in so many other instances in the Qur'an, the abrupt change from the third-person pronoun "He" to "We" is meant to illustrate the fact that God is undefinable, and that it is only the inadequacy of human speech - and, hence, of the human mind - that makes it necessary to refer to the Supreme Being by pronouns which in reality are applicable only to finite-created "persons" (cf. Foreword,note 2). ]]