Search Results for "عَاصِفٍ"

17:67; 29:66; 31:33.

Important Words:

عاصف (violent) is the active participle from عصف. They say عصفت الریح i.e. the wind blew violently or vehemently. عصفت الناقة براکبھا means, the she-camel went quickly with her rider, as if she were the wind. عصف الدھربھم means, the time destroyed them. عصف الزرع means, he cut the corn before its attaining maturity. ریح عاصف means, wind blowing violently or vehemently. یوم عاصف means, a day violent in respect of wind and storm (Lane & Aqrab).

Commentary:

The verse purports to say that on the part of God the system of punishing and showing mercy goes hand in hand, as does on the part of disbelievers the habit of acting wickedly in time of ease and repenting temporarily when punishment overtakes them. But disbelievers always ignore the fact that, just as a pleasant breeze sometimes develops into a violent gale and causes widespread destruction, similarly, the remission that is granted to them may prove the prelude to their destruction. To bring home to disbelievers this patent truth, their attention is drawn to the comforts and perils of a sea-voyage.

It is worthy of note that whereas the verse uses the pronoun "you" in the second person in the first two clauses, it suddenly changes to a pronoun of the third person (them, they) in the third and the following clauses. This is not without purpose. The first two clauses referred to both believers and disbelievers, for it is both for believers and disbelievers that God has provided the means of travel by land and sea. Hence the pronoun "you" has been used in the first two clauses. But as in the following clauses it has been pointed out that a section of the people become ungrateful, therefore here the second person has been changed into the third person, in order to show that it is only disbelievers that become ungrateful.

24:40.

2:265.

Commentary:

The words, کفروا بربھم (disbelieve in their Lord) do not mean that they deny the existence of God, for even the idolaters of Mecca believed in the existence of God. They only mean the denial of the favours or powers of God. There are people even among the so-called educated classes who believe in God but do not believe that He ever interferes in the affairs of the world. The actions of such people are wholly devoted to the furtherance of their material ends. They have no thought for God and do nothing to please Him. It is of the actions of such people that the verse says that they are null and void so far as the reward of the next world is concerned. They are like ashes upon which a furious gale blows, widely scattering them.

The words "their works" may also mean the efforts which disbelievers made in opposition to the Prophets of God, for such works invariably produce no result and come to nothing. Instead of attaining the object for which they are performed, they bring ruin and destruction in their wake, as punishment from God.

The verse should not, however, be understood to mean that no works of disbelievers will produce any result for, in conformity with the physical laws of nature, every deed done in a right way must produce its natural result. What, therefore, the verse means to say is that the works of disbelievers would fail to achieve the real object of life, which is God’s pleasure, because all their efforts are devoted to the achievement of the good of this world. On the other hand the Faithful, while reaping the fruits of their actions as a natural and inevitable result, will also win God’s pleasure, because all their works are for the sake of God.

34:13; 38:37.

Commentary:

The reference in the words, the land which We had blessed, is to Palestine. It appears that the vessels of Solomon plied in the Persian Gulf, the Red Sea and the Mediterranean Sea and regular trade was carried on between Palestine and the countries lying round the Persian Gulf and these two seas.

"The commercial activity of Solomon seems to have been extensive. In this respect, he reminds us of the Pharaohs, who appear almost to have monopolized the foreign commerce of Egypt. His imports were on a scale so lavish that he is said to have made silver as common as stones, cedars as sycamores, in Jerusalem. There was an extensive trade in horses (1 Kings 10:27-29).In partnership with Hiram of Tyre he maintained a fleet of ocean-going ships trading at regular intervals to Mediterranean ports, bringing gold, silver, ivory, apes and peacocks (1 Kings 10:22). In his trading ventures down the Gulf of ‘Akaba he was assisted by skilled Tyrian navigators supplied by Hiram (1 Kings 9:27, 29), his own people never did take kindly to the sea. This passage was evidently misunderstood by the chronicler, who took it to mean that Hiram supplied the ships (2 Chron. 8:18); how they were transported is a problem he leaves unexplained. Ophir, the land to which these vessels ventured, is not identified with certainty, but may be S. Arabia. Solomon brought Israel for the first time fully into a current of oriental commerce and civilization, and during his reign Jerusalem, at any rate, was a city of wealth and luxury" (Enc. Brit, 14th edit. under "Solomon"). In Jew. Enc. under "Solomon" we read: "With the Phoenicians he united in maritime commerce, sending out a fleet once in three years from Ezion-geber, at the head of the gulf of ‘Akaba to Ophir, presumably on the eastern coast of the Arabian peninsula. From this distant port, and others on the way, he derived fabulous amounts of gold and tropical products. These revenues gave him almost unlimited means for increasing the glory of his capital city and palaces, and for the perfection of his civil and military organizations."

In the present verse the adjective used about the wind is عاصفة (violent) while in 38:37 it is رخاء (gentle) which shows that though the wind blew fast, it was gentle and did no damage to Solomon’s ships.

The implied reference in the present and the preceding two verses may be to the great military might and economic progress and prosperity which the Muslims were to attain in the heyday of their glory which they achieved during the reigns of the Omayyad and the Abbasid dynasties.