Expound the Qur’an’s Miraculousness Concisely
One time I had a dream: I was at the foot of Mount Ararat. The mountain suddenly exploded, scattering rocks the size of mountains all over the world, shaking it.
Then a man appeared at my side. He told me: “Expound the aspects of the Qur’an’s miraculousness you know, concisely and succinctly!”
I thought of the dream’s meaning while still dreaming, telling myself: the explosion here symbolizes a revolution in mankind. As a result of it the guidance of the Criterion of Truth and Falsehood..
will be exalted everywhere, and will rule. And the time will come to expound its miraculousness! I said to the questioner in reply: The Qur’an’s miraculousness
is manifested from seven sources, it is also composed of seven elements: First Source: This is the fluency of its wording, arising from the purity of its language;
and its brilliant manner of exposition, born of the beauty of its composition; the eloquence of the meanings, the originality of the concepts, the excellence of the inferences, and the singularity of its styles.
Combined with these, in its miraculousness are a wondrous embroidery and exposition, and an original art and language, so its repetition never wearies or bores.
Second Element: A treasury of occult sciences containing the hidden principles of cosmic events, the obscure mysteries of the divine truths, the unseen matters of revelation,
events concealed in the past, and matters hidden in the future.
The tongue of the worlds of the Unseen speaks with the Manifest World; it discloses its matters symbolically; its aim is mankind, a luminous flash of miraculousness.
Third Source: It has a wondrous comprehensiveness in five aspects. In its words, meanings, injunctions, its knowledge, and the balance of its aims.
Its words contain truly vast possibilities and numerous aspects, yet each is the one preferred by eloquence, the most correct in its Arabic and apt in the view of the Shari‘a.
Its meaning: The miraculousness of its exposition at once comprehends and comprises the ways of all the saints, the illuminations of those versed in knowledge of Allah the Most High, the schools of those on the Sufi way, the ways of the scholars of kalām, and the paths of the philosophers.
The breadth of its evidence, the expanse of its meanings. If you look through this window, what a broad arena you will see!
The scope of its injunctions: The wondrous Shari‘a has deduced from it all the principles for the happiness of this world and the next, all the means of salvation.
Its pronouncements at once embrace all the relations of social life, all methods of education, the realities of all conditions.
The profundity of its knowledge: It has brought together in its paradise, in the fortresses of its suras, both the physical sciences and the divine sciences, and all signs, allusions, and indications of them.
Its aims and purposes: It has applied perfect balance and regular sequence; conformed with the principles of the innate nature of things and unity, and has preserved the balance.
So see the marvellous encompassment in the comprehensiveness of its words, the breadth of its meanings, the scope of its injunctions, the profundity of its knowledge, and the balance of its aims.
Fourth Element: It bestows a luminous effulgence on every age in accordance with its understanding and degree of literacy, and on all the classes of men in accordance with their capacities and abilities.
Its door is open to every era and every class within each. It is as though this speech of the Most Merciful is freshly revealed every instant, everywhere.
The Qur’an grows younger as it grows older; its signs become apparent; it rends the veil of nature and causes, that divine address.
It sheds the light of divine unity continuously from every verse. It raises the veil of the Manifest World, cast over the Unseen. The loftiness of its address invites man’s attentive gaze,
for it is the tongue of the Unseen; it speaks with the Manifest World. Its wondrous freshness proceeds from this element, an all‑encompassing ocean!
Divine condescension to the mind’s of men, to make it familiar. The variety of the styles of its revelation makes it familiar to men and jinn.
Fifth Source: It relates in an original style laden with meaning, as though itself had witnessed them, its stories and narrations and truthful accounts, making their essential points; With them it warns mankind.
What it relates is these: it tells of former events, and future events, the secrets of Hell and of Heaven;
Truths of the Unseen, and mysteries of the Manifest World, divine mysteries, stories about cosmic relations;
Clear stories that neither fact has refuted, nor logic. Even if logic does not accept them, it cannot refute them – the revealed books, which are revered by all the world.
It relates faithfully the points on which they agree, and mentions in correct form the subjects on which they differ. These matters issuing from an unlettered person was a wonder of the time!
Sixth Element: It was the founder of the religion of Islam, and comprises it. If you investigate time and place, neither the past was capable of producing the like of Islam, nor is the future.
This heavenly thread holds the globe in its annual and daily rotations, and spins it. It weighed down heavily on the earth and mounted it; it disallows its non‑compliance.
Seventh Source: The six lights pouring forth from these six sources blend together; from this a beauty becomes apparent, and from this an intuition, a luminous means of understanding.
This produces a pleasure: the pleasure of miraculousness may be known, but our language is inadequate to describe it. The mind too is defective; that celestial star may be seen, but not held.
For thirteen centuries the Qur’an’s enemies have desired to challenge it, while it has aroused in its friends a desire to imitate it. This too is a proof of its miraculousness.
Millions of Arabic books have been written in consequence of these two intense desires, coming into the library of existence. If they are compared with revelation, if they are weighed up,
relying on the evidence of their eyes and ears not only the learned scholar, even the common man, will declare: “This is heavenly, those are human!”
They will also say: “It doesn’t resemble them, it is not of the same class. It is therefore lower than all of them, and this is self‑evidently not true.
“In which case, it is superior to all of them.” Its meanings in all that time. The door is open, dedicated to mankind; it has summoned to itself spirits and minds!
Man had power over it, and laid claim to it, but his meanings still could not oppose the Qur’an; he never could; now the time of testing has passed.
It does not resemble other books, it cannot be compared to them. For it was dominical wisdom its being revealed bit by bit over twenty years in relation to need, in miscellaneous parts.
The immediate causes of revelation were various and distinct. The questions about any one matter were repeated and various. The events related to injunctions were numerous and changed. The times of revelation were distinct and different.
The conditions it was considering were various and different; the groups of those it was addressing were numerous and remote from each other; the aims of its guidance were graded and various. Its structure, and expositions, and replies, and addresses were based on these foundations.
Yet despite this, its smoothness of style and lack of defect, its mutual proportion and harmony, demonstrated its perfection. Witness to this is that according to the science of rhetoric,
the Qur’an has a characteristic not present in other speech: if you listen to other speech, you will see the speaker (or writer) behind it, or you will find him within it. Style is the mirror of man.
O dream‑questioner! You asked for conciseness, so I have made an indication. If you want a detailed exposition, that is beyond my capabilities! A fly cannot behold the sky.
For of the forty sorts of miraculousness, only one is the eloquence of the composition and ordering; and an exposition of it did not fit in Isharat al‑I‘jaz.
My hundred‑page commentary was insufficient for it. Rather, I want a detailed exposition from spirit-inspirations like yourself!