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wa-qālū yā-waylanā hādhā yawmu d-dīni
and say, ‘Woe to us! This is the Day of Retribution!’
— Ali Quli Qarai
37Aṣ-ṢāffātالصافاتVerse 20 of 182
Those who set the Ranks37. Aṣ-Ṣāffātالصافات
al-Ṣaffāt
The Ranged Ones
MeccanVerse 20 of 182
37Aṣ-ṢāffātالصافاتVerse 20 of 182
The Ranged Ones
and say, ‘Woe to us! This is the Day of Retribution!’
— Ali Quli Qarai
Surah As-Saffat – Verses 19-21
19. “Then it (the Resurrection) will only be a single cry, and behold, they begin to see (the scene of Hereafter)!”
20. “And they shall say: ‘Woe for us!’ This is the Day of Judgment.”
21. “(They will be told:) ‘This is the Day of Separation (of right and wrong), which you used to belie.”
Man becomes dust and it is not a barrier for his being quickened again. The obstinately denying the Resurrection causes humiliation in the Hereafter. This holy verse indicates that you think that quickening you and your forefathers is difficult for Allah, the Mighty, the Omnipotent. But by a single great cry, ordered from the side of Allah, all will suddenly come out of their graves, and, being alive, they all will see the scene of Resurrection by their own eyes, the thing which they would have been denying until that Day.
The verse says:
The Arabic word /zajrah/ is derived from /zajr/ and, as we pointed out before, sometimes it means ‘drive away’, and sometimes means ‘cry’, and here the second meaning is meant. It points to the second Blast, which will be done by Seraph: the explanation about it will be stated in the commentary of the verses of Surah Az-Zumar, Allah willing. The Arabic sentence /yanzurun/ (they begin to see) refers to their look at the scene of Hereafter awaiting for the punishment. And, however, its purpose is that not only they will be quickened, but also will gain again their senses of understanding and seeing by that one single cry.
Regarding to the content of these two Arabic words: /zajratan wahidah/ (a single cry) the verse refers to the speed of the event and that Resurrection will happen suddenly, and it is easy for the Might of Allah that by a commanded cry of ‘the angel of Resurrection’ everything will be arranged. It is in this place that the moaning of these obstinate proud polytheists, which is the sign of their weakness and disgrace, is heard, as the verse says:
Yes, when they observe the just court of Allah, the witnesses and the judgment of this court, and the sings of chastisement, they involuntarily cry moaning and thoroughly confess the truthfulness of Resurrection, a confession that cannot solve any problem for them, or create the least mitigation in their sentence. The third verse indicates that it is here that from the side of Allah or His angels they will be addressed, as the holy verse says:
This means: the separation of the right from the wrong, the separation of the rows of the wrong doers from the good doers, and the Day of arbitration of Allah, the Exalted. Some other verses of the Qur’an contain a similar meaning like this very verse which have introduced the Hereafter Day as the Day of separation: /yaum-ul-fasl/. What a wonderful, expressive and horrible meaning it is! It is noteworthy that on the Day of Hereafter when the pagans speak about that Day they render it as the Day of Judgment.
But Allah refers to it as ‘the Day of separation’. This difference of meaning may be from this view that the guilty think only about their own retribution and sentence, while Allah points to a vaster meaning, one of which is the subject of sentence and it is one of its dimensions, and that the Day of Hereafter is the Day of separations. Yes, it is the Day of separation of the rows of the ugly doers from the righteous ones, as Surah Yasin, No. 36, says:
And how painful this is that they observe that their faithful children and relatives separate from them and go toward Paradise! Moreover, that Day is the Day of separation of the truth from false. The opposite schools and lines, and the true programs and false ones are not mixed with each other, like this word, Everyone of them must be set in their own position. Besides all, that Day is the Separation Day, that is, the Day of Judgment, and the Lord of the Worlds, the Just, in the rank of judgment, will issue the most exact judgments about His servants, and it is here that there will be a complete disgrace for the polytheists.
Shortly speaking, the nature of this world is with the mixture of right and wrong, while the nature of Hereafter is the nature of separation of these two from each other. That is why one of the names of Hereafter in the Qur’an, which has been numerously repeated, is /yaum-ul-fasl/ (the day of separation). In principle, on the day when all the hidden things are made manifest, the separation of the rows is unavoidable.
Footnotes