Transcription
A connection becomes. Look, the stars are on the verge of falling. I swear by the stars that are about to fall. This person talking to you, your sahib, he's serious about what he's saying. He's not making this up. When Najmi, wouldn't it be nice if there was a streaming service that brought you closer to the Quran? But in a TV strives to do just that with over 2,000 hours of enlightening content centered on the Quran and Arabic. Make learning a habit. Tap now to get Bayana TV for yourself today.
Now, the same thing is happening. In the question, it has to be asked about when Najmi. I swear by the star as it vanishes, or as it falls, or as it rises. What is its relationship with? What is the relationship between these two things? That's what we're going to try to wrap our head around. There are actually seven items here in my own study, but the seventh item will have to wait until tomorrow. You're not ready for that yet, and I'm not ready to share that with you yet. That's the big one. But six items we can discuss today. Some of this we discussed yesterday, but I want your minds to be clear on some of these things.
So, one of the early opinions on when Najmi is that this is referring to stars when they start falling on Judgment Day, right? And Allah does describe stars falling on Judgment Day in other places. In fact, that's also one of the opinions about Surat Rahman when Yashodhan is also falling down on the ground, and the stars are going to start. It's as if they're falling off, as if the Judgment Day has begun, right? Now, interesting, the idea then being, Allah swears by the moment of Judgment Day, and then he's saying, the man talking to you right now is not lost. He's not deviated. He's telling you something very serious. What's the most serious thing that he's telling you? The coming of Judgment Day, which will determine how you will live your life. Who you're about to go meet. Not only will you meet Allah, you will meet your own deeds. All of it. The the the kind of the center of the message of Islam and the center of the message of Makkan Quran is actually Judgment Day. That is when everything converges. Allah, this life, human beings, their deeds, the devils, the angels, all of it. It's all in one. This one union that we're all heading towards, right?
So then the connection becomes, look, the stars are on the verge of falling. I swear by the stars that are about to fall. This person talking to you, your sahib, he's serious. He's going to keep this up. He's not making this up on his own, you know. This is not from his own feelings. This is this is urgent. So that would be a connection between the custom and the jawab.
Now let's look at another one. The piece-by-piece descent of the Quran. I told you comes from the verb which means to send down in installments. And Allah is saying, as these installments that come and they keep coming on down, which is a secondary meaning, swearing by that, saying the fact that the Quran keeps coming at the perfect occasion, the fact that the Quran keeps answering all of your questions. And Allah says, and they say this, tell them this, and they say this, tell them this, right? And it keeps stumping you over and over again. And then you ask questions, oh, I bet he doesn't know the answer to this. And the Quran comes and gives an answer to it. The fact that that keeps happening is it's self-clear evidence that he's not making any of this up. You see the connection?
Okay, the other is the arrival of changing realities. The stars, the the fall of this, the Pleiades constellation was actually associated with changing seasons. I told you, and revelation has gone through many seasons, and they've come and gone. The season of Ibrahim came and it went. The season of the Torah given to Musa came and went. The the the Injil came and went. Those seasons are now over. And now, you know, when the stars ultimately disappear when the sun rises, right? When the sun rises, doesn't matter how many stars are in the sky, they all disappear. So you know what? Now all those seasons are over. The morning has begun. And the morning is illusionary reference to the coming of the Quran. This is not some man's own wishes and desires. This is the revelation that is the climax of all those seasons, all those nights. And by the way, there's a beautiful comparison between previous revelations and the Quran. Previous revelations had light in them. They had light in them too. Allah says, Allah even says that there's some light even in what is left of previous scriptures. However, it's being compared. Their light is being compared here to the light that the stars give at night. And the Quran's light is being compared to the sun. Now, how much are the, you could see the light but of the stars, but the light of the stars is not enough to illuminate the reality on this earth. You can't see far into the landscape. You can't see the dangers that lie ahead. Your your view is limited. Though you can see them, they cannot show you the way as clearly anymore. Yes, you can get some guidance from the stars because the North Star is there and you can navigate your way, right? You can get women by way of the stars, they find their guidance. But man, by comparison, what has come finally is like the disappearance of the stars. They're no longer relevant. They're no longer needed. They're the ultimate light has now come. You know, it's interesting, the Prophet (SAW) in another place in the Quran is compared to the sun. You guys know that the sun is called Siraj in the Quran, right? It's also called. So the Prophet (SAW) is also called that brilliant lamp, like the sun. Anyway, let's keep going.
Now, the reliability of the stars for direction, and then the reliability of the stars for coming seasons. I separated those two, but I'll combine them when I discuss them. The idea here is they knew the stars are reliable when they traveled at night. And by the way, stars are still used for navigation at sea, and stars are still used in navigation by pilots. Pilots have, you know, GPS navigation systems, and basically many of the satellite systems that we rely on for navigation are actually based on constellations. They're based on the positions of the stars. And when sometimes navigation systems on planes, they don't tell the pilot doesn't get on the on the speaker and say, by the way, our nav system has failed. Um, if you know any surahs, you should recite them now. Like he doesn't do that. But sometimes their nav systems actually malfunction, and they are trained that when they malfunction, what are they supposed to do? Look at the stars. They're actually trained to look for navigation in the stars. So stars are a reliable source for finding guidance in the darkness, right? And so in that, there's also another kind of comparison to what the Prophet (SAW) is saying. You're thinking the Prophet is lost and misguided. Actually, his role is much like the stars that are so reliable that you navigate through the darkness with them. What he's been given isn't that well something that will get him lost and will get you lost. In fact, this is the only way to navigate life. It's the opposite.
Then finally, the or a second to last, the reliability of the stars for coming seasons. And this is actually something that I I talked about when I talked about the the, you know, the changing realities. It's similar. They did associate the stars with the change in seasons. They were very, the way actually I was talking to Professor Saket was saying today about this. He said something remarkable. He said, the way we talk about cars and sports and tournaments and movies, that's how they used to talk about stars. That's what his finding is from scouring through poetry and nothing and literature. They were so in tune with the position of the stars, the names of the stars. When somebody just made a reference to the star, everybody knew what they're talking about. You know, they were taught. They'll when they even when they used to roast each other, they used to say, oh, he thinks he's like serious, serious, not serious as in serious, but serious, the star. Oh, this guy thinks he's Shara. Now he's a big deal. Oh, what do you think your uncle is Sagittarius? That's how they used to talk smack to each other. This is found in their poetry, you know. Oh, when this guy gets super drunk, he thinks he can run with Daloo. Daloo is a the constellation that looks like a bucket. Like he thinks he's high up among them. They were really connected to that. And so the idea when Allah presents this is that they were so aware which stars are most visible in which season and which stars are associated with which season. And it's similar in a sense to the Quran, which ayah is suitable for which occasion, which surah should come down at what time, and when should have the final revelation come? Where should it come? Why should it come in the Arabian desert? Why should it come to this man Muhammad? Why should it come now? Why should it take piecemeal? Why shouldn't it come all at once? Doesn't come down one shot, be done with it. Give me the whole 604 pages, give me the whole 114 in one go. Why is it coming little by little by little? You don't say that about the stars. You wait for them in the right season and the right occasion. And the same way, the surahs are coming at the right times. By the way, when sometimes the the ayat of the Quran would not come to the Prophet (SAW), what would they say? Oh, what happened? Ran out of is what happened? No, no good Wi-Fi connection with the revelation. What's your deal done? And they would start mocking. And Allah would reveal, you know, even those the gaps in revelation, there's documented evidence in the Sira, even in the Quran, you know, uh, Allah Azzawajal is saying to to the Prophet (SAW) that he did not leave him, right? So that's also kind of captured inside here.
And finally, and this is a really important one, and we'll come back to this one at the end of the Surah also, and that is stars have been part of the mythology of almost every religion outside of the scriptures. And stars have a very close relationship with the angels. The angels travel across the stars. The Bible actually compares the angels to stars. The biblical references actually make a metaphorical comparison between angels and stars. The Arabs considered stars angels themselves, many of them. And they considered stars also gods. And those of you that are watching documentaries or read up on ancient civilizations, many temples around the world, including the the pyramids in Egypt and, you know, the Mayan temples, and they're actually designed to face particular stars in the sky because the ancients clearly believed in these stars as some kind of gods that we have to show proper homage to. We have to show reverence to them. And so when Allah swears by the star, he didn't just say, I swear by the star. He says, I swear by the star as it falls, as if to say, I swear by all the religions of the world that have been based on that are now what falling because this has come. It's incredible. Like, just one is mind-blowing. And I haven't even shared the mind-blowing one with you yet. That's going to be tomorrow because that one, oh boy, you gotta just take a break and just take it in. What is Allah saying here? But this is, um, this is why understanding that seventh concept, there's a relationship between the Allah, the object, and the subject of the oath, right? That's actually a really important thing for all of us to, uh, to wrap our heads around.
Okay, uh, what, how much time do I have left? I gotta keep track of time. Oh, I don't have time left. Let's go pray. Hey guys, you just watched a small clip of me explaining the Quran in depth as part of the Deeper Look series. Studying the Quran in depth can seem like a really intimidating thing that's only meant for scholars. Our job is to make deeper study of the Quran accessible and easy for all of you. So take us up on that challenge. Join us for this study, the Deeper Look of the Quran for this Surah and many other surahs on bayanatv.com under the Deeper Look section.