Dhul-Qarnayn and the Sun Setting in a Muddy Spring - Part One: Difference between revisions

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This is part one of a [[Dhul-Qarnayn and the Sun Setting in a Muddy Spring - Part Two#Part Two: What do Qur’an 18:86 and 18:90 say happened next?|two-part]] article providing a comprehensive examination of the different interpretations of [[Qur'an]] 18:86 and 18:90.

 

The meaning of verses 18:86 and 18:90 in the Qur’an is a matter of considerable controversy. These verses occur within the Dhu’l Qarnayn episode in Surah al-Kahf, or “The Cave”, verses 18:83-101. This passage says that Allah empowered a person called Dhu’l Qarnayn, “Possessor of the two horns”, and gave him means or ways to all things. It says he used these to go on three journeys to unusual places where people live, and finishes with him making a prophecy about the end-times. Verses 86 and 90 are so controversial due to Muslim sensitivity to claims that they have Allah saying that the sun sets and rises in physical locations, and in particular that the sun sets in a muddy spring.

 

While many people have written about these verses to promote various interpretations, there are many new, important arguments, and much more evidence that can be used to shed light on this matter. This is particularly true concerning 18:90, which is relatively neglected in such writings.

 

This article will present the strongest case for each of the many different interpretations of the controversial phrases, even giving new arguments that support them, before critically examining them and reaching conclusions.

 

==Part One: What do Qur’an 18:86 and 18:90 say that Dhu’l Qarnayn reached?==

The first part of this article examines each of these interpretations in context to identify the true meaning of those words. Then Part 2 will look at what these two verses say happened when Dhu’l Qarnayn arrived and at broader questions concerning how this passage of the Qur’an was meant to be understood.

The first case to be presented is that maghriba a'''l'''shshamsi in 18:86 and matliAAa alshshamsi in 18:90 could be referring to the west and east such that Dhu’l Qarnayn reached the westernmost and easternmost parts of his travels in the direction of sunset and sunrise, but not literal setting and rising places of the sun.

However, as set out in the next section below, there are at least 5 serious problems with the claim that maghriba a'''l'''shshamsi in 18:86 means the west and matliAAa a'''l'''shshamsi in 18:90 means the east.

===Was alshshams ever used with al maghrib to mean the west?===

a'''l'''shshams means “the sun”, and the -i suffix (an Arabic ''kasarh'') in 18:86 and 18:90 is for the genitive case, which indicates possession (“of the sun”). When we look at how maghrib is used elsewhere in the Qur’an to mean west (see list above), we see that it is always used as a stand-alone word without a'''l'''shshams, in contrast to 18:86. Why is a'''l'''shshamsi added in 18:86 when it is not in the other instances if not to emphasize a literal meaning? Indeed, a'''l'''shshams is not even used with maghrib when it means the west anywhere in the hadith.<ref name="hadith">Based on searches of the Sunni hadith collections in Arabic using [http://www.ekabakti.com ekabakti.com] and [http://hadith.al-islam.com al-Islam] and [http://www.sunnah.com sunnah.com]</ref>

Lane’s Lexicon of classical Arabic, long regarded as authoritative and drawing on many classical Arabic dictionaries and sources, says that al maghrib can signify the west, and also the time of sunset, but originally signified the place (or point) of sunset, which it says is the meaning when a'''l'''shshamsi is added.<ref>Lane’s Lexicon - [http://www.studyquran.org/LaneLexicon/Volume6/00000025.pdf Volume 6 page 2241] - StudyQuran.org</ref> Indeed, this is what these words are used to mean elsewhere outside the Qur'an where it clearly means a place where the sun is physically located, as we shall see in section 6.2. As we shall also see in section 6.5, such was a common belief at that time in that region where we find other versions of the same story.

===Was al matliAA ever used to mean the east?===

It gets even worse when looking at 18:90. Al matliAA means “the rising place” or “the rising time” (of the sun) and is the first word in the phrase matliAAa alshshamsi in 18:90. MatliAA, with or without a'''l'''shshams, is not used to mean east anywhere else in the Qur’an, nor anywhere in the hadith.<ref name="hadith"></ref> The verb talaAAa (“it rises”), from which it is derived, is not used in this connection either.

The only place in the hadith<ref name="hadith"></ref> where matliAA might seem to be used in an idiom meaning the east is in Sahih Muslim:

This version of the hadith ends with “qibala almashriqi”, translated, “towards the East”. As mentioned above, al mashriq usually appears as an idiom to mean the east. It seems easy at first to argue that just as almashriq means the east in one version of this hadith, matliAAi a'''l'''shshamsi just means the east rather than the rising-place of the sun in the other version. However, even if almashriq means the east in Sahih Muslim 52i (rather than literally, “the rising point”, as in Qur’an 37:5 and 70:40), both the east and the imagined setting-place of the sun would be in the same direction. These hadith only show that the directions (“qibala”) of these two things (“matliAAi a'''l'''shshamsi” and “almashriq”) are interchangeable.

Conclusive evidence that matliAAi a'''l'''shshamsi in the above quoted hadith means literally the rising-place of the sun and not merely the east comes a little earlier in the first version of it in Sahih Muslim 51, which has “where emerge the two horns of Satan”, which many other hadith tell us is where the sun rises.<ref>See {{Muslim||828b|reference}} and {{Muslim||832|reference}}, for example.</ref>

In both cases, wajadaha (وَجَدَهَا) means “he found it”. That “it”, the feminine “-ha” suffix to wajada, refers to the previous word, the sun, as the object of the verb.<ref name="arabic pronouns">[http://arabic.speak7.com/arabic_pronouns.htm Arabic Pronouns] - Speak7</ref> Thus, the words mean “he found the sun setting” and “he found the sun rising”. However, in the west and east interpretation the sun has only been mentioned as one part of an idiom for the west or the east, yet wajadaha clearly refers back to it as a literal object. The west and east interpretation would only make sense if the sun had also been mentioned explicitly as a literal entity. It would probably omit a'''l'''shshamsi in both verses, and then say, “wajada a'''l'''shshamsa taghrubu…” (“he found the sun setting…”), and “wajada a'''l'''shshamsa tatluAAu…” (“he found the sun rising…”).

For the same reason, neither can maghriba a'''l'''shshamsi nor matliAAa a'''l'''shshamsi mean nations or places that have those names in these verses (for example, the Japanese characters for Nippon (the Japanese name for Japan) means “sun origin”, and it is sometimes called The Land of the Rising Sun).

Better still, these verses would be worded completely differently. Even if one argues that there is some poetic reason to describe the west and east using the words we have in 18:86 and 18:90, it would be an extraordinarily poor choice of words since people reasonably understood them to be about the literal setting and rising places of the sun, as we shall see. How would we know what anything in the Qur’an means if it uses words that commonly (and when the context suggests) mean a particular thing when it really means a different concept, for which it uses a different word everywhere else?

The simplest and perhaps greatest problem for the west-east interpretation is the striking combination of the two key elements in each of verses 18:86 and 18:90. Not only did Dhu’l Qarnayn reach “the setting place of the sun”, but there also he found the sun setting in a certain place. Not only did he reach “the rising place of the sun”, but there he found the sun rising in a certain way.

Thus, an extraordinary coincidence is required. Under this interpretation, it just so happens that straight after the verses inform us that Dhu’l Qarnayn reached places that merely mean the west and east, but are distinctively and literally worded as the setting and rising places of the sun, we are told of the sun’s behaviour.

However, as pointed out by S. Shamoun and J. Katz at Answering Islam,<ref name="Answering Islam">Sam Shamoun & Jochen Katz - [http://www.answering-islam.org/Quran/Science/sun_set.html Islam and the Setting of the Sun: Examining the traditional Muslim View of the Sun’s Orbit] - Answering Islam</ref> when we look at the reasoning of commonly cited classical commentators, it is based not on narrated traditions or linguistic or contextual analysis, but rather on their knowledge that the obvious interpretation describes something that is impossible. We can look at the reasoning (which is highlighted in bold) of the commentators, who are frequently cited on this topic to deny the obvious interpretation and support the west / east idiom interpretation:

We shall also see when looking at the 3^rd interpretation that contemporary Muslim and non-Muslim sources demonstrate that in the early Islamic era before the translation and study of Indian and Greek astronomy under the Abbasid Caliphate, there was a widespread popular belief in the region that the world is flat and that the sun had literal rising and setting places. So, the above commentators were forced by their beliefs to say what they said since they knew certain things about the world, even though their interpretations cannot be correct (this will become even more apparent in part II when examining the wajada phrases). These are attempts to make the verses fit scientific knowledge acquired later, not evidence that the verses have those intended meanings or were originally understood in that way.

Furthermore, the commentators not only give the invented interpretation, but they also have to deny the literal setting and rising places interpretation (or for al-Qurtubi and Ibn Kathir, a caricature of it), thus confirming that the place where the sun sets on Earth was the interpretation that had been understood by Muslims before scientific knowledge was acquired later.

This does not mean that Ibn Ishaq (or his source) did not believe that Dhu’l Qarnayn reached the setting and rising places of the sun. Unlike the commentators quoted above, Ibn Ishaq is not denying that Dhu’l Qarnayn did so. In the Arabic it literally says that there was nothing from creation behind these places, so it must mean the edges of a flat Earth, and the setting-place would be at the western edge and the rising place at the eastern edge. He even uses a different word order: mashriq then maghrib rather than maghrib then matliAA as in the Qur’an. This suggests he was simply quoting a common phrase to summarize Dhu’l Qarnayn’s adventure.  

There is nowhere in the Qur’an where matliAAa alshshamsi is used to mean the time of sunrise. It is not used with this meaning in the hadith.<ref name="hadith"></ref> There are many other weaknesses with this interpretation. Discussed next are those that apply to it in general and then those specific to Dr Naik’s and Osama Abdallah’s interpretations.

===Why say itha and balagha?===

One can notice that in the above examples that hatta, “until”, is used without itha, “when”, and without balagha, “he/it reached”. There is no need for itha or balagha in verses 18:86 or 18:90 either if they mean that Dhu’l Qarnayn followed a way until the time of sunset/sunrise.

There are also various contextual problems with this interpretation. Verse 18:84 has Allah giving Dhu’l Qarnayn “min kulli shayin sababa'''n'''”, which in the word-for-word translation says, “of everything a means”. The word sababa'''n''' is used again in the next verse, “FaatbaAAa sababa'''n'''”, word-for-word translation, “So he followed a course”. The word fa (prefixed to atbaAAa) means “And so” or “thus”, clearly in reference to the preceding phrase.

Why say that Allah gave Dhu’l Qarnayn a course/way/road to everything without telling us what it was about the physical locations of the peoples he visited that made this a remarkable achievement?

The next problem is that verses 18:86 and 18:90 seem to be explaining the reason why Dhu’l Qarnayn followed the ways mentioned in the previous verses. It could be argued that the purpose of each journey was to find a people, but the beginnings of each verse seem to suggest that the intention related to the sun and that this unexpectedly resulted in the discovery of some people. He would be traveling distances in order to reach the times of sunset and sunrise, which seems rather pointless. Similar points are made by P. Newton<ref name="P. Newton">P. Newton - [http://answering-islam.org/Authors/Newton/spring.html The Qur'an: Is It A Miracle?/ Zul-Qarnain and the Sun] - Answering Islam</ref> and Cornelius<ref>Cornelius - [http://www.answering-islam.org/authors/cornelius/sun_in_muddy_pool.html The Sun in the Muddy Pool and the Prophethood of Muhammad] - Answering Islam</ref> at Answering Islam.

A related problem is that if he just followed a way until the time when the sun sets rather than until he reached the place where the sun sets, there is no reason to then describe what he found the sun to be doing.

A highly significant contextual problem is that verses 18:92 – 93 use exactly the same introductory phrase:

The next two words are “bayna a'''l'''ssaddayni” (“between two mountains”), clearly describing the location reached, and each of the three journeys of Dhu’l Qarnayn begins with the same phrase. Surely the exact same phrase would not be used to say that he reached a time or an unstated location at a time in the first two instances, but explicitly a location in the third.

===Different wording is used elsewhere when the time of sunset is meant===

In the Qur’an, there are three verses that mention the times when the sun rises and sets (and three more that just mention the time of sunrise – those will be looked at in a moment). The verbs gharaba, used in 18:86 in the form “taghrubu”, “it set”, and talaAAa, used in 18:90 in the form “tatluAAu”, “it rise” are used for this purpose in those three verses (in a noun form of the verbs in the latter two cases) along with a time adverb, “when”, or “before”.

Verses 18:86 and 18:90 could have simply followed this pattern if they were meant to express the time of sunset and sunrise, saying that he followed a way “until when the sun set” (hatta itha gharabat a'''l'''shshamsu) and “until when the sun rose” (hatta itha talaAAat a'''l'''shshamsu), similar to 18:17. They could have even said that he followed a way “til the setting of the sun” (ila ghuroobi a'''l'''shshamsi) and “til the rising of the sun” (ila tulooAAi a'''l'''shshamsi), similar to 50:39 and 20:130.

If the Qur’an in 18:90 meant the time of sunrise, it would likely have used a formulation similar to these using a derivative of ashraqa or used talaAAat / tulooAAi as in the other 3 verses.

===Could it mean he reached [a place at] the setting and rising time of the sun?===

As well as the problems above, there are problems specific to Dr. Naik’s claim that the relevant words mean “until when he reached at the time of sunset, he found it…”. The verb balagha is always transitive when it means to reach, and always has an explicit object elsewhere in the Qur’an, but in Dr. Naik’s interpretation, balagha is used as an intransitive verb, which even if it was technically allowed, would make no sense here.  It is allowed in Arabic for the object (maf’ul bihi) of a transitive verb to be omitted (mahdhuf), but only if the object has already been mentioned, since otherwise the sentence would make no sense.<ref>See post #8 [http://www.lqtoronto.com/forums/showthread.php?t=241 here] - lqtoronto.com</ref> That is not the case here, so we wouldn’t know what Dhu’l Qarnayn reached and the sentence would make no sense.   

As noted at the beginning of this article, maghriba and matliAAa have the accusative case ending, which you'd expect if they are the objects of the verb balagha. If maghriba alshshamsi and matliAAa a'''l'''shshamsi are not the things reached, but instead are redundantly stating the time of day (redundant because it mentions the sun setting/rising immediately afterwards), they would interrupt the flow of the sentence before it continues with the wajadaha phrase (“he found it…”). It would be a ludicrously awkward, and misleading way to phrase such a meaning, an easily avoidable flaw.

===Balagha cannot mean that a person reached the time of an external event===

It would be very unusual for balagha to be used to mean someone reaching a time of day in Arabic, and it is not used in that way in the Qur’an. Various verses have been used to support the claim that balagha (بَلَغَ), translated “he reached”, means that Dhu’l Qarnayn reached the time of sunset in 18:86 and reached the time of sunrise in 18:90.<ref name="Answering Christianity"></ref> As well as reaching a location, balagha can mean reaching an age or milestone in one’s life. It is used in this way in the following verses (“old age”; “marriageable age”; “his full strength”; “puberty”; “work with his father”; “forty years”):

It is important to notice that age is an attribute of a person, who is reaching a point on the human age scale. There is also a clear difference between saying that a man has reached 40 years (a personal duration - the sun has been orbited 40 times since his birth) and saying that he has reached a particular year or time of day, which is not a measurement of duration from a personal milestone.

We can also look at two other types of example that someone might attempt to use (although they do not seem to have been used by anyone) to support the time interpretation.

In verse 68:39, balagha is used in reference to a covenant “reaching till the day of judgement”, “balighatun ila yawmi alqiyamati” (ila means “till” or “to”). Clearly, you could also speak of a covenant “reaching till the time of sunset”, “balighatun ila maghribi”. However, in these cases balagha has a different meaning to the examples above. Here it refers to the valid duration of the covenant. It always had this duration from the moment it was defined. It always could be said to reach till the day of judgement. Perhaps, when the day of judgement happened it could also be said that the covenant had “reached the day of judgement”, “balagha yawma alqiyamati”. Here it would mean that the covenant had now reached that point on its duration attribute, which can be described in terms of external events. Dhu’l Qarnayn is not like a covenant, as a person has no such attribute (a person’s age is described in terms of personal events and milestones, as we saw above). He could not be described as a man reaching until the day of his death or until sunset.

We have now seen how balagha may be used in reference to an event in time. In contrast, the time interpretation of 18:86 and 18:90 requires balagha to mean that Dhu’l Qarnayn reached the time of an external event, not a personal event. Furthermore, Lane’s lexicon defines balagha thus:

It is clear here and in the usage of balagha in the Qur’an that even when it is used in reference to a time, that time is distinguished as one that is reached (unlike any other time) because something is intended for that time (e.g. widows can remarry after waiting their term, a righteous man prays for gratitude when he is 40 years old etc.). The wajada phrases suggest that Dhu’l Qarnayn’s intention for his reaching would have been to find out what the sunset and sunrise looked like. This shows why the time interpretation would suffer from one of the contextual problems mentioned above (you needn’t follow a road to reach the time of sunset).

===Could balagha mean “it reached”?===

An alternative version of the time interpretation appears in a Muslim article on this topic when they attempt to use the following argument from common usage:

Finally, nowhere in the Qur’an nor in the hadith<ref name="hadith"></ref> is there a phrase where a'''l'''shshams or maghrib or matliAA are used with balagha to describe reaching a time. Thus the time interpretation requires a very unusual, perhaps unique, and certainly misleading phrase usage. With this and the other problems (and the strong evidence supporting the next interpretation examined below) it is clear that the time interpretation is not correct.

 

We saw that while maghriba a'''l'''shsamsi is used a few times in the hadith to mean the time of sunset, matliAAa a'''l'''shshamsi is not used to mean the time of sunrise, so it would be very uncommon usage. We saw that elsewhere in the Qur’an other phrases are always used for these purposes. We also saw that there were serious contextual problems, such as the same wording being used in verses 92-93, where the thing reached is indisputably a place.

 

Supporters of the time interpretation cannot point to a classical commentator who took this interpretation for 18:86 or 18:90. We are asked to believe that nobody understood for centuries that these phrases, against strong evidence to the contrary, just meant that Dhu’l Qarnayn traveled until the times of sunset and sunrise or to unstated places at those times. It should come as no surprise by now that of the most popular Muslim translators of the Qur’an into English (A.Y. Ali, M. al-Hilali and M. Khan, M. Ali, M.H. Shakir, M. Asad, M. Pickthall and many others), none of them use the time interpretation.<ref name="IslamAwakened">[http://www.islamawakened.com/quran/ Master Ayat (Verse) Index] - IslamAwakened</ref> At most they use the non-committal phrase, “he reached the setting of the sun”.

Far more significantly, we find the words used in 18:86 and 18:90 also used in hadith that concern the behaviour of the sun. We need not assume that these hadith are accurate reports about Muhammad. We can use them simply as contemporary evidence of how Arabic words and phrases were used.

The hadith below that refer to the setting or rising place of the sun use maghrib or matliAA followed by the suffix –ha (meaning “of it” or “its”) or –ki (meaning “your”) in reference to a'''l'''shshamsu, “the sun”, mentioned earlier in those hadith. Therefore they effectively say maghriba a'''l'''shshamsi and matliAAa a'''l'''shshamsi.

There are numerous hadith relating to the end of the world and use these phrases. See for example:

Here, “mina matliAAiha” is translated as “from its rising place”, “mina maghribiki” as “from the place of your setting” (so the sun is commanded to go somewhere – it cannot be claimed that this is an idiomatic way of commanding the Earth to rotate), and “mina maghribiha” as “from the place of its setting”, all in reference to a'''l'''shshamsu, “the sun”. Maghribiha and maghribiki can only mean the sun’s setting-place. The hadith would have just used “mina almaghribi” if the meaning had just been “from the west”.

There is some inconsistency about the way the English translators of Sahih Muslim and Sahih Bukhari translate maghribiha in other versions of the same hadith. See the footnotes for a discussion of this.<ref>It should be noted that while A. Siddiqui translates maghribiha in Sahih Muslim as “the place of its setting”, M. Khan translates maghribiha as “the west” in exactly the same Arabic phrases for the versions in Sahih Bukhari of the above quoted hadith. MatliAAiha does not appear in Sahih Bukhari so Khan did not have to translate that word. However, when M. Khan (this time with M. al-Hilali) later translated the Qur’an, maghriba a'''l'''shshamsi in 18:86 and matliAAa a'''l'''shshamsi in 18:90 are translated as “the setting place of the sun” and “the rising place of the sun”.<BR><BR>A. Siddiqui, whose translation of Sahih Muslim is used in the main text, also translates maghribiha as “the west” in the exact same Arabic phrases about the sun at the end of the world for seven other hadith in Sahih Muslim. These do not mention the rising place. He could not attempt to translate this as “the west” in the above quoted hadith because of the “your setting place” phrase and references nearby to the rising place using matliAAa, which as we saw earlier, never means east. The motivation for translating maghribiha as the west in the other hadith is probably to make it fit with Qur’an 2:258:<BR><BR>…‘But it is Allah that causeth the sun to rise from the east: Do thou then cause him to rise from the west.’…<BR><BR>…fainna Allaha yatee bi'''al'''shshamsi mina almashriqi fati biha mina almaghribi… - Qur’an 2:258<BR><BR>Here, almaghribi does not have the -ha suffix, so indeed it can just mean the west. The -i suffix is there because a noun following a preposition (mina means “from”) takes the genitive case.<BR><BR>There is another obvious motivation for translating maghribiha as “the west” rather than “its setting place”. This way the phrase can be interpreted as a figure of speech (with a literal meaning that the Earth’s rotation will reverse), thus saving those important hadith (except when they clearly say “your setting place”) from conflict with scientific knowledge unknown to Muhammad. We saw how some commentators (and some translators) reinterpreted verse 18:86 for the same reason.<BR><BR>These are the four hadith where Khan translates maghribiha (“its setting place”) as “the west”. It is clear from the use of the 3rd person (and in other versions, 2nd person) possessive endings that a more specific translation, “its setting place” would have been justified.<BR><BR>{{Bukhari|||3199|darussalam}}, {{Bukhari|||4635|darussalam}}, {{Bukhari|||4636|darussalam}}, {{Bukhari|||7424|darussalam}}</ref>

Finally, we have examples of matliAAa a'''l'''shshamsi meaning the rising-place of the sun in Sahih Muslim 52h discussed above) and in Sunan Al-Nasa-I, which has the phrase:

The evidence is that wherever matliAA and maghrib are followed by a'''l'''shshamsi (or indirectly as when a'''l'''shshamsu is the referent of matliAAiha and maghribiha in the hadith), then the phrases mean the rising place of the sun and the setting place (or occasionally setting time, but maybe not rising time) of the sun. A'''l'''shshamsi is probably added to maghrib to avoid the ambiguity that would arise if just al maghriba without a'''l'''shshamsi is used, since that can be an idiom for the west.

===Balagha is a perfect fit in this interpretation===

Of most importance are verses 18:92 – 93 discussed above. We have the exact same phrase as in 18:85-86 and 18:89-90, “atbaAAa sababan hatta itha balagha”, used there to describe reaching a place, This is surely no accident.

Immediately preceding the passage about Dhu’l Qarnayn we have one about Moses. There we have:

Finally, we saw above that balagha implies an intention. Finding the place of sunset serves as a purpose once the destination is reached after following a road / way.

===It fits the context===

This interpretation explains the purpose of the second phrase in verse 18:84 discussed above because reaching the setting and rising places of the sun would be an extraordinary feat and the desire to relate it to Allah is understandable.

Clearly, the setting place of the sun could be such an end, but reaching the time of sunset makes no sense as an end to which this ''sabab'' is a means. It is also worth mentioning that Kevin Van Bladel has written some interesting things about what may be the real meaning of this word.<ref>Van Bladel 2007a op. cit. pp.223-246.

Mentioning that Dhu’l Qarnayn found the sun setting in a spring also makes sense if he was at the place where it sets. Otherwise it could have just said that he found a people by a spring without mentioning the sun. Similarly, mentioning the people in 18:90 only in terms of how the sun affects them fits the rising place interpretation perfectly.

We now look at explicit statements in the hadith about the sun (regardless of whether or not these hadith authentically reflect Muhammad utterances, they do at least show some of the contemporary beliefs of the early Muslims, which help us judge the likelihood that Muhammad could have believed and intended a literal interpretation of 18:86 and 18:90). Afterwards we shall look at some early commentaries, early-Islamic poetry and a highly significant contemporary legend.

Before we begin, it’s worth noting that in the same article just mentioned<ref>Van Bladel 2007a op. cit.</ref>, Van Bladel describes how Christian theologians in the region of Syria in the sixth century CE shared the view that the Earth was flat and the sky or heaven was like a tent above the Earth, based on their reading of the Hebrew scriptures. This was a rival view to that of the churchmen of Alexandria who supported the Ptolemaic view of a spherical Earth surrounded by celestial spheres. He says, “Clearly the Ptolemaic cosmology was not taken for granted in the Aramaean part of Asia in the sixth century. It was, rather, controversial.”

We saw above some of the hadith that describe the sun having setting and rising places which it goes into and comes out from. The following hadith is graded Sahih (authentic) by Dar-us-Salam (Hafiz Zubair 'Ali Za'i) and has a chain of narration graded as Sahih by al-Albani. It is from Sunan Abu Dawud, book XXV - Kitab Al-Ahruf Wa Al-Qira’at (Book of Dialects and Readings Of The Qur’an):

{{Quote|{{Abu Dawud||4002|darussalam}}|Abu Dharr said: I was sitting behind the Apostle of Allah who was riding a donkey while the sun was setting. He asked: Do you know where this sets? I replied: Allah and his Apostle know best. He said: It sets in a spring of warm water.<ref>Kitab Al-Ahruf Wa Al-Qira’at [Book of Dialects and Readings Of The Qur’an], Chapter 1498, p. 1120 in Prof. Ahmad Hasan (trans.), Sunan Abu Dawud – English Translation With Explanatory Notes, Volume III. Chapters 1338-1890, XXV, hadith 3991, Lahore: Sh. Muhammad Ashraf, 1984 quoted in [http://www.answering-islam.org/authors/shamoun/mhmd_on_sunset.html Muhammad and the Sun’s Setting Place] - Sam Shamoun, Answering Islam</ref> [The references section includes a link to the Arabic with sahih in chain grading<ref>For the Arabic, English, and grading by al-Albani, see [http://sunnah.com/abudawud/32/34 here]</ref>]}}

There is also another version of the hadith in Musnad Ahmad (this time the spring is muddy rather than warm - the Arabic words sound similar and the same variant readings exist for Qur’an verse 18:86). The same hadith is also recorded by al-Zamakhshari (1075-1143 CE) in his commentary on the Qur’an, al-Kashshaf.<ref>For a translation see Al-Zamakhshari, Al-Kashshaf 3rd Edition, Volume 2, p. 743, Lebanon: Dar Al-Kotob Al-Ilmiyah, 1987 quoted in (trans.) [http://www.answering-islam.org/Responses/Shabir-Ally/science11.htm Science in the Quran/ Chapter 11: The Sun & Moon and Their Orbits] - Sam Shamoun, Answering Islam (''The phrase translated “spring of slimy water” is actually, “hot spring” in the Arabic. For the Arabic, click [http://www.altafsir.com/Tafasir.asp?tMadhNo=0&tTafsirNo=2&tSoraNo=18&tAyahNo=86&tDisplay=yes&UserProfile=0&LanguageId=1 here]'')</ref> Even if one doubts that this is an authentic report about Muhammad, it is certainly further evidence that early Muslims understood 18:86 to mean a literal setting place. The possibility that Muhammad ever claimed a different interpretation thus further diminishes.

As S. Shamoun and J. Katz point out,<ref name="Answering Islam"></ref> Al-Tabari (839-923 CE) gives a lengthy hadith in the first volume of his History of the Prophets and Kings, which claims that Ibn ’Abbas gave an account of what Muhammad said about the sun and moon and the setting and rising places. Their quote has been verified in a library copy of Franz Rozenthal’s translation of this hadith for the purposes of this article. Whether or not Muhammad said the things attributed to him here (or said anything similar), this hadith certainly demonstrates a belief in literal rising and setting places among the early Muslims.

The earliest surviving authentically attributed tafsir, Tafsir Muqātil ibn Sulaymān (d. 767 CE), i.e. who lived closer to the time of Muhammad than any other scholar quotes the companion Ibn Abbas on a difference in the sun when it sets and rises in the context of this passage.

The end of the 3^rd and 2^nd from last sentences literally say, “In other words: it sets in a spring of muddy water” and, “That is to say that it sets in a spring of hot water”. Notice he omits wajada (“he found”) in these sentences. His ensuing discussion reports the uncertainty as to which Arabic word was used to describe the spring (muddy or hot), incidentally revealing that the sun setting in some kind of spring was understood literally. These variant readings continue to be recited today, and translators take different choices between muddy, hot, or both.

We can clearly see from al-Tabari’s commentary that it was understood by early Muslim communities that 18:86 meant that the sun actually sets in a spring. We can also imply from this that they understood the verse to say that Dhul Qarnayn reached the place where the sun sets.

The views reported in these commentaries understand these verses to mean literal setting and rising places (most early commentators include no opinion). It is clear from the hadith contained in hadith collections and commentaries that there was interest in what happens to the sun when it is beyond view, so if Muhammad had given another interpretation there would surely be hadith to indicate as such, yet there are none.

It has been known since 1890 thanks to Theodore Nöldeke that there is a very close similarity between the account in the Qur’an of [[Dhul-Qarnayn and the Alexander Romance|Dhu’l Qarnayn and the Alexander Legend]]. This was written by a Syriac Christian in the 6th century CE (with a small interpolation inserted around 629-630 CE), but incorporates older traditions such as that of the iron gate built by Alexander to enclose Magog dating to at least the time of the Jewish historian Flavius Josephus in the 1^st century CE<ref>Van Bladel 2007b op. cit. p.181 (See Flavius Josephus, The Wars of the Jews, Book VII, Chapter VII, Verse 4 and the same author's Antiquities of the Jews, Book I, Chapter VI, Verse 1)<BR />The prevailing theory when van Bladel wrote was that the entire legend, not just the interpolation was composed around 629-630 CE. Academic opinion has since shifted to the 6th century (apart from an interpolated additional prophecy about 629-630 CE), especially since the compelling analysis by Tommaso Tesei in his 2023 book, ''The Syriac Legend of Alexander’s Gate: Apocalypticism at the Crossroads of Byzantium and Iran'', Oxford University Press.</ref> and journeys to the rising and setting place of the sun from the Epic of Gilgamesh.<ref>See Epic of Gilgamesh, [http://www.ancienttexts.org/library/mesopotamian/gilgamesh/tab9.htm Tablet IX] and [http://www.ancienttexts.org/library/mesopotamian/gilgamesh/tab1.htm Tablet I] (Van Bladel 2007b op. cit. p.176 & p.197, note 6)</ref>

It is often denied by modern Muslims that Dhu’l Qarnayn is meant to be Alexander because we now know that he was not a monotheist. However, it is clear from the Alexander Legend and other sources that he was widely believed in Muhammad’s time and region to have been pious and to have worshiped the God of Abraham, and the Qur’an tells his mythical legend.

Whatever the historical relationship between these texts<ref>Van Bladel’s thesis is that the Syriac Alexander Legend is the source for the Qur’anic account, rather than the other way around (which is indeed highly unlikely due to strongly evidenced dating of the former to the 6th century, with an interpolation around 629-630 CE), and that they are not both products of a common source. The prevailing theory when van Bladel wrote was that the entire legend, not just the interpolation was composed around 629-630 CE. Academic opinion has since shifted to the 6th century (apart from an interpolated additional prophecy about 629-630 CE), especially since Tommaso Tesei’s work in 2023, ''The Syriac Legend of Alexander’s Gate: Apocalypticism at the Crossroads of Byzantium and Iran'', Oxford University Press.</ref> and whether or not Dhu’l Qarnayn is meant to be Alexander the Great, it is clear from the legend that the setting and rising places interpretation of 18:86 and 18:90 was entirely compatible with contemporary beliefs in the region. Indeed, verse 18:83 tells us that what follows was supposed to relate to an already known story (“They ask thee concerning Zul-qarnain”).

As we can see, a literal setting in a spring is mentioned (in the Arabic those lines are literally, “he followed the sun nearby its sunset to observe it in its spring while lowly”).<ref>The Arabic text which Nicholson translates is from: Von Kremer, Alfred, [http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=TsAoAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false Altarabische Gedichte uber die Volkssage von Jemen, als Textbelege zur Abhandlung] “Ueber die sudarabische Sage.”, pp.15-16, VIII, lines 6-11, 1867<BR/>See also [https://web.archive.org/web/20170713044809/http://www.ye1.org/forum/threads/34164 here] for the arabic text of the poem</ref> See also the poem at the end of section 6.5.1 above for another example quoted by Ibn Ishaq and al-Tabari ("He witnessed the setting of the sun in its resting place into a pool of black and foetid slime"). We only have these poems from Islamic sources, and it is likely that they were composed or edited after Muhammad’s death. Even so, they demonstrate how the story was understood in the early Islamic era.

 

 

If we suppose that even Muhammad himself misunderstood Allah’s words, then how could an all-powerful God have made such a poor choice of words if this is not the intended meaning? He would have known about the popular legend and how Arabic words and phrases were used and understood by the people, yet would have chosen wording that reinforced people’s false notions about this myth and the sun. The Alexander Legend, the poetry, and the phrase “They ask thee concerning Zul-qarnain” in 18:83 suggest this was a popular belief and need not have seemed unbelievable to Muhammad. The legend, or an earlier version of the same story, provides an obvious potential source for the Qur'anic version.

Before getting into specific arguments that people have raised against the ism makan interpretation, it is worth briefly addressing a subtly different way of interpreting the phrases maghriba alshshamsi and matliAAa a'''l'''shshamsi, which might occur to some people.

The root word from which maghrib is derived is gharaba, meaning “to set” in the context of the sun. This word also means “to go away” such that something can no longer be seen.<ref>Lane’s Lexicon - [http://www.studyQuran.org/LaneLexicon/Volume6/00000024.pdf Volume 6 page 2240] - StudyQuran.org</ref> Thus one might argue that maghriba a'''l'''shshamsi is the area of land on the horizon, from Dhu’l Qarnayn’s perspective, behind which the sun disappears at sunset. On the other hand, matliAA is derived from talaAAa, meaning “to rise”<ref>Lane’s Lexicon - [http://www.studyquran.org/LaneLexicon/Volume5/00000152.pdf Volume 5 page 1867] - StudyQuran.org</ref> in the context of the sun. Could matliAAa a'''l'''shshamsi be the place on the horizon that the sun rises from behind?

The first problem with that explanation is that there are no single places on the Earth behind which the sun seems to set and rise, but rather it depends on the observer’s location. Perhaps we can suppose that maghriba alshshamsi means the point on the horizon that the sun disappeared behind from the perspective of Dhu’l Qarnayn’s starting position, so it was not a moving target. That’s reading quite a lot into the text. Even this makes no sense given the context. Why follow a special road / way to get there, and why then mention the sun setting, now hidden by a 2^nd horizon? Why describe both the 18:86 and 18:90 destinations in those terms? Another problem is that if maghriba means the disappearing place or the place where the sun goes away, can you really describe a place on the horizon as the place where a much more distant object disappears? It seems more natural that the place where something disappears would be in the same location as the thing that is disappearing. An ism makan, after all, is the place where an action occurs. Since the Earth’s rotation hides the sun from a location-specific viewpoint, a literal horizon interpretation doesn’t work as an ism makan, but a specific place that the sun literally sets into does work. A similar set of arguments applies to matliAAa.

Neither can these words be successfully interpreted as simply places which the sun sets or rises on as the Earth revolves. Anywhere outdoors is such a place. The same place would also simultaneously be a setting and rising place of the sun. Furthermore, there is no evidence in the Qur’an, hadith or Lane’s Lexicon that maghriba a'''l'''shshamsi and matliAAa alshshamsi had any of these meanings.  

Nor can the words here mean the apparent points in the direction of the horizon where the sun appears to set and rise when viewed from a particular location since they are not places (how could Dhu’l Qarnayn reach them?). These horizon interpretations lack supporting evidence and have serious problems.

It would be too lengthy to discuss here the controversy over whether or not the Qur’an says or implies that the [[Flat Earth and the Quran|Earth is flat / egg-shaped / some other shape]], that it is stationary or rotates on its axis and that it supports a [[Geocentrism and the Quran|geocentric or heliocentric solar system]]. However, there is a phrase that occurs in the Qur’an twice and is of direct relevance here. It may at first seem to suggest that 18:86 and 18:90 cannot mean literal setting and rising places of the sun.

If this phrase meant to say that the sun moves in a circle around the galactic center or around the Earth, then it would apparently preclude the existence of setting and rising places. Tafsir Ibn kathir comments on 36:40:

However, he comments on verse 31:29 that ibn 'Abbas also said that the sun runs in the sky / heaven (alssama) in its rounded course (falakha) during the day, and when it sets it runs at night (bi al-layli - omitted in the translation) in its falak beneath the Earth:

Moreover, we saw above in the hadith given by al-Tabari that belief in the sun circling the sky above a flat Earth and setting and rising in springs was believed to be compatible with the “falakin” phrase in the Qur’an:

In any case, falak does not necessarily mean a sphere. Arabs would have understood the phrase to mean a hemisphere, as Lane’s Lexicon entry for al falak defines the word:

 

There is another argument to consider from Mahir Karaosmanovic.<ref>Mahir Karaosmanovic - [http://www.answering-christianity.com/mahir/scientific_errors_rebuttal.htm Rebuttal to Answering-Islams: "Scientific Errors of the Qur’an"] - Answering Christianity</ref> He quotes the following hadith in Tasfir Ibn Kathir when it comments on verse 36:38 to claim that the verse conflicts with a daily setting and rising event.

The Arabic word daibayni is translated as the phrase “both diligently pursuing their courses”. This is not actually a problem for the setting and rising place interpretation since the commentators and other hadith quoted above showed a belief that the sun keeps moving after passing through its setting place (springs in al-Tabari’s History) into heaven (or according to the Ibn ‘Abbas hadith quoted above, under the Earth) after it has set and continues back to its rising place. Unlike the hadith, the Qur’an does not mention the sun stopping to prostrate (but even if it did, that would simply be a stage of its daily course which happens reliably every day until judgement day). Either view is compatible with the setting and rising places interpretation of 18:86 and 18:90.

Perhaps the most likely explanation is that these verses do not have to be consistent with a single cosmology. Perhaps it seemed necessary to Muhammad to give a recitation about Dhu’l Qarnayn to confound those who had questioned him and any need for it to neatly fit the other recitations was of less importance. The already known story of the great traveler had Dhu’l Qarnayn reaching these places, so the recitation had to do so as well in order to pass the test of the questioners. However, we shall see later that it must have been intended to be believed as a true historical account.

The Earth's tilt causes the apparent places of the sun's setting and rising to shift back and forth along the horizon during the course of a year. A flat Earth believer might imagine there were many places where the sun sets and rises, or places that move (see above for the set of springs or places the commentators mention), but 18:86 and 18:90 only refer to one of each. Al magharib and al mashariq in 37:5, 55:17 and 70:40 are usually translated as the easts and wests (or in 55:17, the two easts and the two wests). As noted earlier however, other translations have here the points of sunrise and sunset or explanatory notes to that effect. The commentators say that these verses are referring to the points from which the sun rises and sets from the Summer to Winter solstices.  See for example Tafsir Ibn Kathir,<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20160620134449/http://www.qtafsir.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1521&Itemid=111 Allah is the Lord of the Two Easts and the Two Wests] - Tafsir Ibn Kathir</ref> Tafsir al-Jalalayn,<ref>[http://www.altafsir.com/Tafasir.asp?tMadhNo=0&tTafsirNo=74&tSoraNo=55&tAyahNo=17&tDisplay=yes&UserProfile=0&LanguageId=2 Sura 55 Verse 17] - Tafsir al-Jalalayn</ref> Tafsir al-Tabari,<ref>[https://www.altafsir.com/Tafasir.asp?tMadhNo=0&tTafsirNo=1&tSoraNo=55&tAyahNo=17&tDisplay=yes&UserProfile=0&LanguageId=1 Sura 55 Aya 17] - Tafsir al-Tabari</ref> and Tafsir Ibn ‘Abbas.<ref>[http://www.altafsir.com/Tafasir.asp?tMadhNo=0&tTafsirNo=73&tSoraNo=37&tAyahNo=5&tDisplay=yes&UserProfile=0&LanguageId=2 Sura 37 Verse 5] - Tanwîr al-Miqbâs min Tafsîr Ibn ‘Abbâs</ref> It could mean points on the horizon (from a flat earth perspective) or actual setting and rising places (though they are not mutually exclusive).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Even if the Qur’an did not have the word bihi here, the only metaphorical aspect of the sentence he could point to would be that Muhammad is warning people he hasn’t met (it is actually via the Qur’an, as the other translations show). Either way, the people who Muhammad’s message reaches (carried in the memory or written record of people) are indeed in actual physical locations away from where it initially was.

After quoting various verses where balagha refers to a reaching an age (this argument was addressed above), he then makes the pedantic criticism that balagha does not have to mean literally reaching a specific place (or in reference to time, to a specific time). Strictly speaking this is correct. Even in English, to say you reached the coastline does not have to mean that you came so close that you actually touched the very edge of the land. It must at least mean that you reached the vicinity, however.

He then claims that you would use yudrik / tudrik / adraaka instead of balagha to describe someone travelling to the sun, but you wouldn’t unless you wished to say that he came so close as to touch it! To claim that balagha is metaphoric after all of this is to confuse the word “metaphor” with “approximate”, a completely different concept.

==Conclusion of Part One==

We have seen that only the setting and rising places interpretation of 18:86 and 18:90 fits the context, grammar, and words used in these verses and nearby verses such as 18:93. It was the only interpretation until the Muslims acquired Greek and Indian astronomical knowledge and it complimented the beliefs and legends of the region, including the remarkable match with the ''Alexander Legend''.  

For the original source for both parts of this article, see the [http://quranspotlight.wordpress.com/articles/dhul-qarnayn-sunset-sunrise/ quranspotlight] website.