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Dhul-Qarnayn and the Sun Setting in a Muddy Spring - Part Two: Difference between revisions
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Dhul-Qarnayn and the Sun Setting in a Muddy Spring - Part Two (view source)
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, 2 November 2018→Are the things found described figuratively?
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In fact, 18:90 says what the sun did after it emerged (perhaps because that’s when Dhu’l Qarnayn reached them, and/or because Muhammad’s purpose in that phrase was to describe the people, not the sun). If this was mirrored in 18:86 to describe the sun before it disappeared, that verse would have to say something like “he found it set on a spring of murky water” (using AAala instead of fee), which perhaps, if we again ignore the context, would be a figure of speech to convey a reality that the sun started to appear too low to shine on a muddy spring. | In fact, 18:90 says what the sun did after it emerged (perhaps because that’s when Dhu’l Qarnayn reached them, and/or because Muhammad’s purpose in that phrase was to describe the people, not the sun). If this was mirrored in 18:86 to describe the sun before it disappeared, that verse would have to say something like “he found it set on a spring of murky water” (using AAala instead of fee), which perhaps, if we again ignore the context, would be a figure of speech to convey a reality that the sun started to appear too low to shine on a muddy spring. | ||
Instead the word “fee” is used, and we have not found any evidence that “it set in a spring of murky water” could be a figurative phrase meaning something else. | Instead the word “fee” is used, and we have not found any evidence that “it set in a spring of murky water” could be a figurative phrase meaning something else. There is no evidence in Lane’s lexicon suggesting that such a phrase could be used as a figure of speech.<ref>Lane’s lexicon - [http://www.studyQuran.org/LaneLexicon/Volume6/00000024.pdf Volume 6 page 2240] and [http://www.studyQuran.org/LaneLexicon/Volume6/00000025.pdf page 2241] - StudyQuran.org</ref> Neither can “fee” mean “behind”.<ref>Lane’s lexicon - [http://www.studyQuran.org/LaneLexicon/Volume6/00000250.pdf Volume 6 page 2466] and [http://www.studyQuran.org/LaneLexicon/Volume6/00000251.pdf page 2467] - StudyQuran.org</ref> The word “waraa” is used in Arabic to mean behind. | ||
In any case it would also be a highly misleading figure of speech to say that the sun set in a muddy spring when something else is meant, especially considering the contextual issues discussed above, for example that a few words earlier Dhu’l Qarnayn reached maghriba a'''l'''shshamsi, and the usage of wajada, and that the literal reading reflected a popular legend, and that early Muslims took it literally. | |||
If “setting in a muddy spring” in 18:86 communicated a figurative meaning, why is there no evidence of this interpretation, and plentiful evidence that it was understood literally, for centuries until educated Muslim scholars knew that the literal interpretation was problematic? | |||
As for 18:90, even if the phrase in this verse could be regarded as a figure of speech in the sense that the sun was not exactly overhead during the period when it is described as “rising on a people”, the context of the surrounding words strongly imply that they must at least have been unusually close to it during that part of the day, as discussed above. We can also obviously rule out one literal interpretation where AAala means that the sun was in physical contact with the people as it was rising. That was set up as a straw man by al-Qurtubi (see above) who pretended that it was the only alternative to a figure of speech interpretation. | |||
The only interpretation of 18:90 that fits with the context within the verse and with the fact that 18:86 is clearly not figurative is that Dhu’l Qarnayn found the sun to be over and/or close to a people when it was still relatively low in altitude after it emerged from its rising place. It is the clear and obvious interpretation, which was the only one found in the early commentaries. | The only interpretation of 18:90 that fits with the context within the verse and with the fact that 18:86 is clearly not figurative is that Dhu’l Qarnayn found the sun to be over and/or close to a people when it was still relatively low in altitude after it emerged from its rising place. It is the clear and obvious interpretation, which was the only one found in the early commentaries. | ||