An Atheist Explores the Qur'an Part 44: In Which Solomon Watches Lippizaner Horses and Gets Made an Airbender (Ṣād)

Ṣād (Ṣād) 1-88
In Which Solomon Watches Lippizaner Horses and Gets Made an Airbender.

Welcome to the next instalment of An Atheist Explores Sacred Texts (Qur’an version).

In this series I work my way chapter-by-chapter through the Qur’an, commenting on it from the point of view of the text as literature and mythology.

For more detail, see the introductory post https://bit.ly/2ApLDy0

For the online Qur’an that I use, see here http://al-quran.info and http://quran.com

Ṣād (Ṣād) 1-20

“They consider it odd that there should come to them a warner from among themselves, and the faithless say, ‘This is a magician, a mendacious liar.’”

This chapter is not “sad” as in unhappy, but “Ṣād” as in “saad”, the Arabic character equivalent to “S”. Which, for some reason, this chapter begins with, like an exclamation. Not for the first time do I wonder if this is just the zealous preservation of some kind of mistake or warm up mark in the belief that it has some deeper holy meaning.

Whatever the case, the chapter begins on familiar territory, where the faithless decide not to believe the Prophet but instead describe him as a “mendacious liar” (is there any other kind?) and proclaim that since the old ways were polytheistic it would be madness to reduce the multitude of gods to one God. The Prophet is encouraged to stand fast in his belief and is given the usual examples of the previous prophets such as Noah, Lot etc. and how the faithless that refused them were destroyed by “a single Cry”. So far, so familiar.

Ṣād 21-40

“Has there not come to you the account of the contenders, when they scaled the wall into the sanctuary?”

The narrative turns to David, and a story about two men that scale the walls to his inner sanctum in order to hear judgement. They are brothers, and one brother has 99 ewes, the other just a single ewe which the brother with the 99 ewes also wants.

David’s judgement is that “He has certainly wronged you by asking your ewe in addition to his ewes, and indeed many partners bully one another, except such as have faith and do righteous deeds, and few are they.”

For some reason he then realises that this is a test form God and begins asking for forgiveness, although for what I’m not sure. It seems to me that David is saying that if you have faith then you won’t go around trying to bully people into giving you more than your share, which seems like the kind of message God should be endorsing.

Anyway, we then move to Solomon who also gets a little cautionary tale. He’s so busy watching some “prancing steeds” that the sun sets and he’s forgotten the evening prayer. “Indeed I have preferred the love of [worldly] niceties to the remembrance of my Lord until [the sun] disappeared behind the [night’s] veil.”

There’s a verse that requires a bit of interpretation where Solomon cries out “Bring it back for me” which is taken to be him asking for the sun to be brought back so that he can do his evening prayers. Then “the others began to wipe their legs and necks” which would appear to be the ritual ablutions (wudu) needed before prayer.

Solomon asks God for forgiveness, which is given, but he’s also given the power to control winds (“We disposed the wind for him, blowing softly by his command wherever he intended”) and apparently control over devils (“and the devils [as well as], every builder and diver”), which seems like a risky thing to give to a king. – a horde of supernatural evil entities to command.

Ṣād 41-60

“And remember Our servant Job [in the Qurʾān]. When he called out to his Lord, ‘The devil has visited on me hardship and torment,’”

Job gets a brief mention, but there’s nothing here about his life being ruined because of a bet between God and Satan so that God can prove how big and strong He is. No, here Lot’s family is restored because he asks, but for some reason needs to “Take a faggot in your hand and then strike [your wife] with it, but do not break [your] oath”. “God told me to hit you with a lump of firewood, dear. Nothing personal”.

There’s a quick breeze through some other Biblical figures – Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Ishmael, Elisha and … Dhu’l-Kifl. Who? How’d he sneak in at the end there? This, apparently, is a reminder that the “Gardens of Eden” await the “Godwary” with “gates flung wide open”, fruit and drink and “maidens of restrained glances of like age”. The Magical Sky Brothel again. And it’s interesting that it’s “Eden” again, rather than Heaven. And of course the faithless get the trip to the other place where they get to drink “scalding water and pus”. Honestly what kind of mind comes up with this stuff?

Ṣād 61-88

“And they say, ‘What is the matter with us that we do not see [here] men whom we used to count among the bad ones?”

There’s some “contentions of the inmates of the Fire” about who’s supposed to be there, and I’m not sure I understand the point. They seem surprised that some people that they thought were “bad” are not there; possibly this is because they are counting the likes of the Prophet as “bad” because they disagree with him, because that’s the general gist of the following verses, that the Prophet is a “warner” and whilst he does not have knowledge of “the Supernal Elite”, he nonetheless claims his message to be a real one.

Then there’s a bit about Iblis’ rebellion against God for refusing to worship Adam, because Iblis is fire and Adam is clay. So God punishes him, then pardons him, but then for some reason Iblis decides to spend his time filling Hell with souls, but also kind of on God’s orders – “By Your might, I will surely pervert them”. It’s a confusing arrangement so I hope at some point we’ll revisit it with other details.

And that’s about it, it returns with a few words from God to the Prophet about passing on the message to people that will listen. So, mostly more of the same but there were some strange little stories about David and Solomon tucked away in there.