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wa-ka-dhālika baʿathnāhum li-yatasāʾalū baynahum qāla qāʾilun minhum kam labithtum qālū labithnā yawman ʾaw baʿḍa yawmin qālū rabbukum ʾaʿlamu bi-mā labithtum fa-bʿathū ʾaḥadakum bi-wariqikum hādhihī ʾilā l-madīnati fa-l-yanẓur ʾayyuhā ʾazkā ṭaʿāman fa-l-yaʾtikum bi-rizqin minhu wa-l-yatalaṭṭaf wa-lā yushʿiranna bikum ʾaḥadan
So it was that We aroused them [from sleep] so that they might question one another. One of them said, ‘How long have you stayed [here]?’ They said, ‘We have stayed a day, or part of a day.’ They said, ‘Your Lord knows best how long you have stayed. Send one of you to the city with this money. Let him observe which of them has the purest food, and bring you provisions from there. Let him be attentive, and let him not make anyone aware of you.
— Ali Quli Qarai
Surah Al-Kahf – Verses 19 - 20
19. “And in like manner We did raise them that they might question among themselves. One of them said: ‘How long have you tarried?’ They said: ‘We have tarried a day, or part of a day’. (Finally) they said: ‘Your Lord knows best how long you have tarried. Therefore send one of you with this money of yours to the city and let him see which of them has purest food, and bring you provision from it, and let him behave with (care and) gentleness, and let him not inform any one about you.”
20. “For verily if they prevail against you, they will stone you, or turn you back to their religion, and then never will you succeed.”
Wakefulness After a Long Sleep!
When explaining the commentary of the coming verse, we will detail that the Companions of the Cave’s sleep prolonged so much that it took about 309 years. Thus, it was a sleep like death, and its wakefulness was rather similar to Resurrection. Therefore, the Qur’an in this verse says:
This statement means that in like manner that Allah was able to put them in such a long sleep, He returned them to wakefulness again. The verse continues saying:
Then, the verse adds:
But, finally, since they could not know precisely the length of their sleep, they expressed as follows:
“…(Finally) they said: ‘Your Lord knows best how long you have tarried...”
However, they felt a serious hunger and they needed to eat food, because what they had in reserve in their bodies were consumed. Therefore, their first suggestion was that they would give the silver coins they had in their possession to one of their own members and send him to the city to see which of the sellers of that city had the purest food to bring them some of it enough for their provision. The verse says:
Immediately after that, the verse adds:
The reason of that precaution was that they thought if the people of the city were informed of their position, and found them, they would stone them and might bring them back to their own creed, (the creed of idolatry).
Explanations
1. The Arabic term /wariq/, mentioned in the verse, had been called to the silver coins which had the design of the king of that time on them.
2. The Qur’anic phrase /walyatalattaf/ has been occurred exactly in the middle of the Qur’an. It means: ‘conciliation and spiritual intelligence accompanied with kindness’, which itself is a grace that the middle-word of the holy Qur’an has spiritually been made up of conciliation, mercy, and kindness.
3. The wakefulness of the Companions of the Cave had two results. One of them was for themselves that they asked question,
and the other was for others that they were an illustration of Resurrection and raising in Hereafter.
4. No one should surprise upon the subject of Resurrection and being raised, because every single wakefulness of men from sleep is a kind of raising and Resurrection.