Ṭāhā 20:115-116

Wa laqad ʿahidnā ilā Ādama min qablu fa-nasiya wa lam najid lahu ʿazmā · Wa idh qulnā li'l-malāʾikati'sjudū li-Ādama fa-sajadū illā Iblīsa abā

"Indeed We made a covenant with Adam before; but he forgot, and We found in him no resolve. · And when We said to the angels, 'Prostrate to Adam', they all prostrated except Iblīs — he refused."

The story was treated in detail at al-Baqara on 2/30-38 and taken up a second time at Ṣād on 38/71-85. I rely on both and do not repeat them here.

A summary of what was treated at al-Baqara:

• That the prostration was not a prostration of worship is broadly agreed; the one who gave the command is God. "What Iblīs refused was not Adam but the command."
• Istikbār is not being great but reckoning oneself great — the istifʿāl form.
• "Unbelief is not a lack of knowledge; it is the covering over of what is known."
• The pattern of the prohibition: lā taqrabā (do not come near) — the boundary begins not from the act but from the distance that leads to the act.
• Azallahumā — zalla: a slip. "The story of the human being begins not with a rebellion but with a slip."
• That the verbs are in the dual: the text does not lay the responsibility on one side alone. Indeed in the discussion at al-Baqara this verse (Ṭāhā 20/120-121) was cited as evidence.

A summary of what was treated at Ṣād:

• Ṣād tells the story through Iblīs's error of reasoning: anā khayrun minh — an analogy.
• al-Baqara tells it through what the human being is (a vicegerent, one who knows the names), Ṣād through what Iblīs did.

Now I write what belongs here, and the table can be verified from the text:

Three sūras, three different namings of the same event. And this is a countable datum:

I record this as my own reading, and its ground is the three texts' own words: the three tellings do not conflict — they name three different layers of the same event. The slip tells the act, the analogy the other side's ground, the forgetting the state.

The root ن-س-ي is one of the spines of this sūra, and its four occurrences were tabulated in the discussion of 20/49-52. Here is the third link.

And two readings of the word's sense are transmitted:

Both readings are transmitted; I do not impose a preference. The ground of the second reading is that the same root is used in verse 126 in the form kadhālika'l-yawma tunsā ("so today are you left") — where the sense "to be left" fits better than "to be forgotten".

I record this as my own reading and give it as a proposal of a frame; it is not binding: the sūra names the human being's first story with forgetting; it ties the ground of the prayer to remembrance (14); and it describes turning away as turning away from remembrance (124). That is, the sūra's description of the human being is built upon memory. And in the fifty-second verse the opposite of this had already been set down: lā yaḍillu rabbī wa lā yansā.

The root ع-ز-م was treated at al-Aḥqāf on 46/35 (ulu'l-ʿazmi mina'r-rusul), and it was recorded there: to resolve definitely upon a matter, resolve; the sense "to cut off" is also recorded in the root. I rely on that treatment.

And the two verses can be set side by side; this is a countable overlap:

The same word: in one place the granting of a quality, in the other its absence.

A point of word order must be recorded: wa lam najid lahu ʿazmā — "We did not find in him". The sentence does not say "he had no resolve"; it says "We did not find". The verb is a verb of ascertainment.

I record this as my own reading, and its ground is the choice of verb: the sentence conveys not an accusation but a measurement. And ʿazm comes indefinite: "a resolve" — that is, resolve in a particular matter.

And the standing together of the two words is worth recording: nisyān and the lack of ʿazm.

I give this as my own reading, and its ground is that the two are ranged in the same sentence: forgetting and irresolution come from the same place — an inability to keep hold of something. And the sūra's remedy is given from the same place: remembrance (dhikr) and the binding of the prayer to fixed times (14, 130, 132).

The verb must be recorded: abā, standing alone. In al-Baqara it was abā wa'stakbara, in Ṣād istakbara; Ṭāhā says only abā.

And the same verb was used of Pharaoh in the fifty-sixth verse of this sūra — tabulated in the discussion of 20/56-59: fa-kadhdhaba wa abā.

This is a repetition that can be verified within the sūra, and it binds the sūra's two stories together with a single verb.