ٱلْحَمْدُ لِلَّهِ ٱلَّذِىٓ أَنزَلَ عَلَىٰ عَبْدِهِ ٱلْكِتَٰبَ وَلَمْ يَجْعَل لَّهُۥ عِوَجًا · قَيِّمًا لِّيُنذِرَ بَأْسًا شَدِيدًا مِّن لَّدُنْهُ
"Praise belongs to God, who sent down the Book upon His servant and left in it no crookedness: a straight Book…"
عِوَجًا — root ع-و-ج: crookedness. The root was treated in al-Zumar at 39/28 (ghayra dhī ʿiwaj), and the distinction the lexicographers record was given there: ʿiwaj is crookedness that is not seen, ʿawaj is crookedness that is seen. I do not repeat it here.
And the two sūras may be compared: in al-Zumar ghayra dhī ʿiwaj (having no crookedness) came as an attribute; here it is wa lam yajʿal lahu ʿiwajā — as a verbal sentence. That is, the absence of crookedness is reported not as a quality but as the outcome of an act.
قَيِّمًا — root ق-و-م: standing straight, upright and in balance. The same root as Qayyūm (treated in al-Baqara at 2/255).
فَلَعَلَّكَ بَٰخِعٌ نَّفْسَكَ عَلَىٰٓ ءَاثَٰرِهِمْ إِن لَّمْ يُؤْمِنُوا۟ بِهَٰذَا ٱلْحَدِيثِ أَسَفًا (6)
ب-خ-ع root: to grieve to the point of destroying oneself. The lexicographers explain the word with the picture of "reaching as far as the vein in his neck".
This sentence occurs in al-Shuʿarāʾ at 26/3 as well, and the same limit was treated in Fāṭir 35/8, Luqmān 31/23 and al-Qaṣaṣ 28/56. I rely on that treatment.
Hādhā'l-ḥadīth — the Book's being called a "discourse" was treated in al-Jāthiya 45/6, al-Wāqiʿa 56/81, al-Zumar 39/23 and Luqmān 31/6. The same designation in five sūras.
إِنَّا جَعَلْنَا مَا عَلَى ٱلْأَرْضِ زِينَةً لَّهَا لِنَبْلُوَهُمْ أَيُّهُمْ أَحْسَنُ عَمَلًا · وَإِنَّا لَجَاعِلُونَ مَا عَلَيْهَا صَعِيدًا جُرُزًا
"We made what is on the earth an adornment for it, so that We might test which of them is best in deed. And We shall surely make what is upon it a bare, dry ground."
| Verse | What it reports |
|---|---|
| 7 | What is on the earth is adornment and an instrument of testing |
| 8 | The same things will become bare, dry ground |
جُرُز — land on which nothing grows, parched ground. The root was treated in al-Sajda at 32/27 (ila'l-arḍi'l-juruz) — there it occurred as dry ground onto which water is driven. Here the same word reports the outcome.
I record this as my own reading: before entering the four stories, the sūra states both what is in hand (adornment, testing) and its end (dry ground). And the story of the two gardens (32-44) and the parable of this world (45-46) will be the application of these two verses.