فِى عَمَدٍ مُّمَدَّدَةٍۭ
The word has been read in two ways, and both readings are transmitted among the imāms of the readings:
Both are plurals of the word عمود (ʿamūd — pole, column). Among the lexicographers it is disputed which of them is a plural and which a collective noun, but in point of meaning there is no difference: both mean "poles, columns".
I do not give the names of the imāms of the readings; the existence of the difference of reading is certain, its distribution I cannot give with certainty.
Root: م-د-د. To stretch, to draw, to extend, to grant a span of time. Madd — extension. Midād — ink (that which runs on and on). Imdād — to send support, to keep a thing going.
Mumaddada is the passive participle of the tafʿīl form: outstretched. And here too the tafʿīl pattern conveys takthīr — not an ordinary stretching, but stretched right out.
A comparison is instructive: mamdūd, from the same root, also means "extended", and it is used in al-Muddaththir 74/12 to qualify wealth. The mumaddada here, though, is in the doubled pattern — that is, more intense.
| View | What it means | Its ground |
|---|---|---|
| The bolts of the door | The doors of the fire have been shut and long poles, or bolts, drawn across them | It connects directly with the preceding verse: "it is closed" + "with columns". The two verses become a single scene |
| Poles of binding | Outstretched poles to which the people of the Fire are bound | The particle fī, in the sense of "within", conveys a place or a position |
| The columns of the fire | The fire itself is in the form of outstretched columns | A depiction describing the vertical rising of the flame |
The first view appears to be the one that sits best with the flow of the sūra, because the eighth verse had already described the closing, and the ninth verse is joined to it without a connective. I state this as a preference; it is not binding, and we have no proof for counting the other views weak.
The name of the thing the man wanted was خلود — permanence, continuance. In the third verse, akhladah: he supposed that "it made him immortal".
A span has been granted — but not to the thing he wanted. The demand for permanence is met, but with its object changed. He will find the continuance he sought; the thing that continues will not be the wealth.
I must state that this reading is my own inference. That the choice of word carries such an echo stands in the text; but I do not ascribe it to any classical exegete.