الطارق · الآية 13

Commentary

The pronoun in innahu goes back to what the Qurʾān says, or to the Qurʾān itself. And the verse does not name it outright, it entrusts that reference to the hearing that receives the Book. Whoever reads the Surah he holds knows that what he reads is the very thing sworn upon. The Book speaks of itself through itself.

In the eighth verse the pronoun of innahu appeared with the power over the bringing back. Here the pronoun comes again in a like construction, but it turns toward another object: not toward the One who is able, but toward what is said. Pronouns in the Qurʾān move between their references, and the hearer follows them as one follows a thread running in the weave.

Qawl, in Arabic, is from the root q-w-l: the uttered that goes out from the tongue with intent. Not every sound is a qawl, only what carries a meaning and is turned into a form that is understood. And the verse names what it speaks of a qawl, setting it in the class of what is uttered and received.

And there is a modesty in the naming. Had it been said kalām faṣl or waḥy faṣl, it would have pointed to something else. But qawl chooses the class of the uttered in its generality, then determines it by the qualifier. The qawl is the class, and the faṣl is what distinguishes it.

Faṣl is a noun of action, or a noun of action set as a qualifier. And faṣl, in Arabic, is the cut between two things that were joined: faṣala bayna al-khaṣmayn is said of one who cut between two disputants by a judgement, fiṣāl is the parting of a nursling from its mother, and al-fāṣila is the word that halts the sentence at a limit one can hear.

Qawl faṣl: a word that cuts between truth and falsehood, between earnest and jest, and between what scatters as doubt in the soul. The qualifier is indefinite and nominative: qawl, faṣl. As though the cutting were the very measure of the word itself. And whoever reads the Qurʾān touches this cutting in his mouth before he touches it in his mind. The verse falls like a struck note, and the verse after it falls like a struck note. Every note cuts what is before it from what is after it.

The answer of the oath comes down after the heaven, the one of returning, and the earth, the one of cracking-open: "It is, truly, a word that decides." The emphasis is doubled: inna at the opening, and the lām of emphasis before the predicate. Two marks gathered before the predicate tie two knots upon the meaning. Qawl, from q-w-l, is the uttered that goes out from the tongue with intent and is received carrying a meaning. And the choice of qawl rather than kalām or waḥy keeps it in the class of the uttered that is received, which the qualifier then distinguishes. Faṣl, from f-ṣ-l, is the cut between two things that were joined: faṣala bayna al-khaṣmayn, he judged between them; and al-fāṣila is what halts the sentence at a limit one can hear. Qawl faṣl is therefore a word that cuts between truth and falsehood, between earnest and jest, between what scatters as doubt and what is certainty. And the qualifier is indefinite and nominative: the cutting is the very measure of the word, not a trait brought in from outside.

Two Readings

The two readings do not conflict. The first conveys the meaning; the second stays in the image of the cut. This book chooses the additional listening.