al-Baqara 2:29 — Whom is the earth for?

"It is He who created for you everything on the earth. Then He turned to the sky and ordered it into seven heavens. He is the knower of all things."

These two letters are among the fundamental expressions that establish the human being's relation to nature, and they can be read in two directions:

• As a right of use: everything has been placed at your disposal.
• As a trust: everything has been handed over to you.

If we leave the verse on its own, the first comes forward. But the Qurʾān does not leave it on its own: in the very next verse the human being is called a "khalīfa" (2/30) — that is, a deputy, one who looks after in another's place. A deputy has no property of his own; he has an account to render.

The measure that emerges when the two verses are read together is this: the earth has been given over to the human being's use, not to his ownership. Elsewhere the Qurʾān attaches corruption directly to human action: "Corruption has appeared on land and sea because of what people's hands have earned" (al-Rūm 30/41).

The weight this distinction carries today is plain. The sentence "everything was created for me", on its own, legitimises unlimited use; together with the clause "I shall render an account for it", it produces a responsibility. The Qurʾān has set the two side by side.

The number "seven" must be dwelt on, because this is very fertile ground for forced interpretations.

There are two readings, and both are present in the classical sources:

• Seven as a count. Seven distinct layers are meant; their natures have not been made known to us.
• Seven as conveying multitude. In Arabic — and in the Semitic languages generally — the numbers seven, seventy and seven hundred are often used not for a particular count but in the sense of "very many". The Qurʾān itself makes this use: "Even if you were to ask forgiveness for them seventy times…" (al-Tawba 9/80) — what is meant here is not exactly seventy but "however many times".

Which is meant is not certain. To close off this uncertainty and produce a modern list saying "the seven heavens are such and such layers" is not exegesis but forcing; that road is not taken in this text.

This verse brings the human being onto the stage by saying "everything on the earth is for you". The section that follows immediately — the creation of Adam (Ādam), the question of the angels, the teaching of the names, the prostration and Iblīs — will unfold at length what this sentence means. The sūra first states what has been given to the human being, then begins to tell who that human being is.

Here the Qurʾān moves into narrative. Up to this point there was description, proof and command; now a scene is set. And the scene that is set is the answer to the question of what the human being is.