al-Zukhruf 43:22

Bal qālū innā wajadnā ābāʾanā ʿalā ummatin wa innā ʿalā āthārihim muhtadūn

"No! They said: We found our forefathers on a way, and in their tracks we are guided."

This is the argument at the centre of the sūra, and it needs to be treated in detail.

The twenty-first verse had asked "or did We give them a Book?" The twenty-second begins with bal: "no, it is not that — what they actually say is this."

Bal (the particle of iḍrāb) was treated in Qāf at 50/2; I rely on that treatment. Two functions were recorded there: cancelling what precedes, or leaving what precedes and leaping to the real matter. Here it is the second.

The arrangement has proceeded thus:

The sūra, that is, asked the question of evidence twice and received no answer; then it stated the real ground itself. I record this as an observation about the structure.

In the sense in which it has settled into English usage, the word means "community, nation". But that sense does not sit in the sentence here — because it comes with the preposition ʿalā: "upon an umma".

Here the lexicographers and the exegetes record another sense of the word, and this sense follows from the root.

The root أ-م-م — as recorded in al-Qiyāma, its family is: umm (mother, origin), umma (community), imām (the one who stands in front), amām (the front). The shared idea: priority, being in front, being at the source.

And starting from the word imām, the word umma takes on the sense of "the road that is followed, the line that is held to, the method". The lexicographers record it thus: umma — the state a person is upon, the road he keeps to, the order he follows.

The renderings given for this verse in the classical commentaries are these:

All three come out at the same place, and I do not impose a preference. What is to be recorded is this: the word here conveys not a body of people but a line — and the preposition (ʿalā) confirms it: one stands upon a road, not upon a community.

And the word's three occurrences within the sūra must be compared:

The same root, in three distinct senses, in one sūra. I record this as a datum of the text.

And I add this observation as my own reading: in the fourth verse the origin of the Book was named — the source to which it is referred back. In the twenty-second verse the other side also points to an origin: their forefathers. Both sides rest on a source; the dispute is over what the source is.

The root was analysed in al-Aḥqāf at 46/4 (athārata min ʿilm — a remnant of knowledge); I rely on that treatment and do not repeat it. What was recorded there was this:

"The root أ-ث-ر: a trace, a sign left behind. Athar — a footprint, a remnant, a report that has been transmitted."

The root also occurred in al-Nāziʿāt, al-Aʿlā and al-Ḥashr; in al-Nāziʿāt this verse was already cited.

What is to be added here is that the word stays concrete in this verse — and this matters.

In al-Aḥqāf, athāra was a remnant of knowledge: something transmitted, and therefore something with content. In al-Zukhruf, āthār is plural and stands in the concrete sense that looks to footprints: innā ʿalā āthārihim muhtadūn — "in their tracks we find our way."

I set the difference out in a table:

I record this as my own reading, and its ground is the difference of pattern and context between the two words: what was asked for in al-Aḥqāf was a scrap of knowledge; what is put forward in al-Zukhruf is a trace — a sign with no content, only a direction.

A footprint tells you who passed; it does not tell you where he was going.

The word is an active participle of Form VIII from the root ه-د-ي: "those who have found the way".

And this word is the very word the text uses of itself in the tenth verse of the sūra: wa jaʿala lakum fīhā subulan laʿallakum tahtadūn.

The two occurrences side by side:

I record this as a pattern: the same word, once as a possibility, once as a claim. And in the thirty-seventh verse the text will pass its verdict on that claim: wa yaḥsabūna annahum muhtadūn — "and they suppose themselves to be guided".

The sūra thus works the word in three stages: the possibility given (10), the claim advanced (22), and the name of the claim (37).