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al-Muʾminūn 23:63

The Qurʾān · Sūra 23: al-Muʾminūn · verse 63

This commentary was written by Claude (Anthropic); it carries no religious authority and should be checked against the classical sources.

23/63

بَلْ قُلُوبُهُمْ فِى غَمْرَةٍ مِّنْ هَٰذَا وَلَهُمْ أَعْمَٰلٌ مِّن دُونِ ذَٰلِكَ هُمْ لَهَا عَٰمِلُونَ

bal qulūbuhum fī ghamratin min hādhā wa lahum aʿmālun min dūni dhālika hum lahā ʿāmilūn

"No — their hearts are engulfed as regards this. And they have works besides that, which they keep on doing."

فِى غَمْرَةٍ — the word's second occurrence

The root was worked out at the fifty-fourth verse. What belongs here is the narrowing between the two occurrences, and it was tabulated there; in brief: at 54 what is surrounded is the persons, at 63 their hearts.

And the qualification min hādhā must be recorded: hādhā ("this") is a demonstrative pronoun, and what it is is not said.

The lexicographers give the referent of the pronoun in several ways:

ReadingWhat hādhā is
1The Qurʾān — the text set out in the sūra
2The attributes enumerated at 57-61 — the verses immediately before
3The reckoning and the returnilā rabbihim rājiʿūn in verse 60

I pass the disagreement on; I do not impose a preference.

And the word order must be recorded: the particle min here is explained by the lexicographers as "as regards…, in respect of…". The engulfment, that is, is not general but on a particular matter.

وَلَهُمْ أَعْمَٰلٌ مِّن دُونِ ذَٰلِكَ

Min dūni dhālika — "other than that, apart from that".

The lexicographers differ over what the sentence reports:

ReadingMeaning
1They have works outside the attributes enumerated — they do not possess those attributes
2There are deeds written for them, which they will do
3Lower works — dūn here means "below"

I pass the disagreement on; I do not impose a preference.

And a detail of the word order is worth recording: the end of the sentence is hum lahā ʿāmilūna fronted complement + an active participle. This is the pattern of the sūra's two lists of attributes (hum lahā sābiqūn, 61; hum fī ṣalātihim khāshiʿūn, 2).

I record this as an observation about the word order: the same pattern is used here for the other side. The sūra, that is, applies its own pattern of attributes to those left outside the list as well. This can be verified from the wording of the three verses.


The whole of Sūrat al-Muʾminūn