al-Ṭūr 52:19-20

Kulū wa'shrabū hanīʾan bimā kuntum taʿmalūn · Muttakiʾīna ʿalā sururin maṣfūfa; wa zawwajnāhum bi-ḥūrin ʿīn "Eat and drink with relish, for what you used to do. Reclining on couches ranged in rows. And We paired them with wide-eyed companions."

When the two commands are set side by side the picture is plain:

16: iṣlawhā fa'ṣbirū aw lā taṣbirū — "enter it; whether you are patient or not, it is one." 19: kulū wa'shrabū hanīʾan — "eat and drink with relish."

Both are in the imperative, and neither is a real command. One is the carrying out of a sentence, the other a hospitality.

And the ground of both is given with the same words:

• 16: innamā tujzawna mā kuntum taʿmalūn
• 19: hanīʾan bimā kuntum taʿmalūn

Word for word the same expression. The same sentence becomes the ground of two opposite tableaux.

This is one of the Qurʾān's most economical moves: the measure of the two outcomes is one and the same. The difference is not in the outcome but in what enters the measure.

I record this as an observation about word order.

And this verse was cited in the section on al-Mursalāt: it was recorded there that al-Mursalāt 77/43 (kulū wa'shrabū hanīʾan bimā kuntum taʿmalūn) is word for word the same expression.

I do not repeat it here. What is to be added: the same sentence occurs in two neighbouring sūras and does the same work in both.

هَنِيٓـًٔا — root ه-ن-أ: wholesomeness, being without trouble or harm. Hanīʾ is what causes no discomfort when eaten, what has no aftermath. The English wholesome carries this sense: not what tastes good but what does no harm.

And the record the word makes is important: what is stressed is not the flavour of the food but the ease of what follows. Every eating and drinking in this world has an afterwards — satiety, heaviness, sickness, exhaustion. Hanīʾ removes these.

I record this as an observation about a word.

مُتَّكِئ — root و-ك-أ: to recline, to lean. Ittikāʾ is to sit leaning on something.

And this posture has a cultural sense. To eat reclining is, in that period, the posture of one who is not in a hurry, who is served, who is secure. To eat standing or sitting upright is the eating of a man with work to do.

سُرُر — the plural of sarīr: a couch, a throne, a raised place on which one sits. Root س-ر-ر, and the lexicographers relate it to surūr (joy) — the place one sits in gladness.

مَّصْفُوفَة — root ص-ف-ف: row, line. Ṣaff — a row. Maṣfūfa — ranged in rows.

And the adjective is a passive participle. The same pattern as in the sūra's oaths: something has been done to a thing.

And note what "being ranged" says. The couches are not scattered; they are in an order. That is, those seated can see one another, they face one another.

This prepares the twenty-fifth verse: wa aqbala baʿḍuhum ʿalā baʿḍin yatasāʾalūn — "they turn to one another and ask."

That is, the arrangement of the couches is the ground of the conversation that will be set up later.

I record this as an observation about word order.

Root: ز-و-ج. This root was treated in the discussion of al-Dhāriyāt 51/49; I do not repeat it here. Its summary: zawj states one member of a pair.

The verb is in Form II: zawwaja — he paired, he brought one together with another.

حُور — root ح-و-ر. And the concrete sense of the root: whiteness; and the distinctness of the black of the eye against the white of it.

From the same root:

• حَوَارِيّ — an intimate friend, a helper. The Qurʾān uses this word for the helpers of Jesus (ʿĪsā) (Āl ʿImrān 3/52; al-Ṣaff 61/14). The lexicographers make the link by way of "purity, clearness".
• مُحَاوَرَة — talking with one another. The Qurʾān uses this (al-Kahf 18/34, 37; al-Mujādila 58/1).
• تَحْوِير — to whiten.

عِين — the plural of ʿaynāʾ; root ع-ي-ن (eye). ʿAynāʾ means wide-eyed.

That is, the construct is a description of the eye: the white and the black of it distinct, and large.

And this must be recorded: in Arabic poetry the large and distinct eye is the standard description of beauty; and the description is most often built with the likeness of a gazelle's eye. That is, the expression uses the settled language of beauty of that period.

A record about the language of the descriptions of the Garden. As has been recorded earlier in this commentary: in describing the Garden the Qurʾān uses things the one addressed knows and feels the lack of. A text can tell of something unknown only by way of something known.

And the general language of the descriptions of the Garden was treated in the section on al-Insān 76; I do not repeat it here.

I do not enter into a detailed discussion of this expression, because the matter is one that goes beyond the whole of the Qurʾān and the limits of this commentary; and because I cannot give most of the details transmitted in the classical sources with their chains, I do not convey them.

One observation about word order can be recorded: the verb comes with the plural of majesty (zawwajnāhum — We paired). That is, everything told in the tableau is something given; and this agrees with the record mā ātāhum rabbuhum in the eighteenth verse.