Yā-Sīn: the cards as text

Qur'an and Tafsir, Surah 36. Awaiting scholar review.

1. Card 1

   A city laughed at a warning. This surah is the reply.

2. Card 2

   A city with a lot to lose

   A trading town. Its income is tied to the pilgrims who come to its idols.

   One of its own now says: one God, and the dead will rise.

   The leaders laugh. Dead is dead.

3. Card 3

   The reply, in five moves

   1. 1-12: The standoff. He is a messenger. Most of Makkah will not hear it: collars, walls, a covering. The warning is for those still willing to look.
   2. 13-32: The story. A town rejects three messengers. One man runs in to defend them and, most reports say, is killed. One cry ends the town. It is the pattern, not the exception.
   3. 33-44: The evidence. Dead soil that turns green. The night and the day. The sun and the moon in their orbits. Ships on the sea.
   4. 45-68: The Day. A blast in the middle of an ordinary day. The graves empty. Peace for some. For others, sealed mouths and hands that testify.
   5. 69-83: The bone. Not poetry. A man crumbles a bone and asks who can revive it. The One who made it the first time: "Be", and it is.
4. Card 4

   Yā-Sīn 36:3: The claim Makkah rejects, stated flat.

   إِنَّكَ لَمِنَ ٱلۡمُرۡسَلِينَ ۝٣

   ³ Indeed you, [O Muḥammad], are from among the messengers,

5. Card 5

   Yā-Sīn 36:8: Then a picture of the people who reject that claim.

   إِنَّا جَعَلۡنَا فِيٓ أَعۡنَٰقِهِمۡ أَغۡلَٰلࣱا فَهِيَ إِلَى ٱلۡأَذۡقَانِ فَهُم مُّقۡمَحُونَ ۝٨

   ⁸ Indeed, We have put shackles on their necks, and they are to their chins, so they are with heads [kept] aloft.

6. Card 6

   Yā-Sīn 36:9: The picture is not finished.

   وَجَعَلۡنَا مِنۢ بَيۡنِ أَيۡدِيهِمۡ سَدࣱّا وَمِنۡ خَلۡفِهِمۡ سَدࣱّا فَأَغۡشَيۡنَٰهُمۡ فَهُمۡ لَا يُبۡصِرُونَ ۝٩

   ⁹ And We have put before them a barrier and behind them a barrier and covered them, so they do not see.

7. Card 7

   Not lost. Stuck.

   A collar forces the head up. The wearer cannot see their own feet. A wall in front, a wall behind. This is not someone on the wrong road. It is someone who cannot move at all.

8. Card 8

   Two kinds of blindness

   Al-Razi's reading: the collar stops you seeing yourself. The walls stop you seeing the world. Most commentators take it as a picture of a closed mind, not real chains.

9. Card 9

   Yā-Sīn 36:12: What you sent ahead, and the traces you left.

   إِنَّا نَحۡنُ نُحۡيِ ٱلۡمَوۡتَىٰ وَنَكۡتُبُ مَا قَدَّمُواْ وَءَاثَٰرَهُمۡۚ وَكُلَّ شَيۡءٍ أَحۡصَيۡنَٰهُ فِيٓ إِمَامࣲ مُّبِينࣲ ۝١٢

   ¹² Indeed, it is We who bring the dead to life and record what they have put forth and what they left behind, and all things We have enumerated in a clear register.

10. Card 10

    Traces

    Your legacy: what others carry on because of you. And your footprints, literally. A clan was told their steps to the mosque were being written down.

11. Card 11

    Three messengers, one answer

    A town rejects two messengers. A third is sent. The answer is the one Makkah gives: you are only people like us.

12. Card 12

    Yā-Sīn 36:19: The town blames the messengers for its bad luck. The reply:

    قَالُواْ طَٰٓئِرُكُم مَّعَكُمۡ أَئِن ذُكِّرۡتُمۚ بَلۡ أَنتُمۡ قَوۡمࣰ مُّسۡرِفُونَ ۝١٩

    ¹⁹ They said, "Your omen [i.e., fate] is with yourselves. Is it because you were reminded? Rather, you are a transgressing people."

13. Card 13

    Which town?

    Many reports say Antioch. Ibn Kathir doubts it and gives three reasons. The Qur'an names no town, no messengers. An early saying: leave vague what Allah left vague.

14. Card 14

    Yā-Sīn 36:20: Nobody powerful speaks up. Then someone does.

    وَجَآءَ مِنۡ أَقۡصَا ٱلۡمَدِينَةِ رَجُلࣰ يَسۡعَىٰ قَالَ يَٰقَوۡمِ ٱتَّبِعُواْ ٱلۡمُرۡسَلِينَ ۝٢٠

    ²⁰ And there came from the farthest end of the city a man, running. He said, "O my people, follow the messengers.

15. Card 15

    He says "I", not "you"

    The running man, to an angry crowd. Not "why don't you worship your Maker?" but "why should I not worship mine?" He makes his case, accusing no one.

16. Card 16

    Yā-Sīn 36:26: Most reports say his people killed the running man. Then:

    قِيلَ ٱدۡخُلِ ٱلۡجَنَّةَۖ قَالَ يَٰلَيۡتَ قَوۡمِي يَعۡلَمُونَ ۝٢٦

    ²⁶ It was said, "Enter Paradise." He said, "I wish my people could know

17. Card 17

    One cry, and still

    No army was sent. One cry, and the town was "still": the Arabic word for a fire that has gone out.

18. Card 18

    Yā-Sīn 36:30: The town was not the exception. It was the pattern.

    يَٰحَسۡرَةً عَلَى ٱلۡعِبَادِۚ مَا يَأۡتِيهِم مِّن رَّسُولٍ إِلَّا كَانُواْ بِهِۦ يَسۡتَهۡزِءُونَ ۝٣٠

    ³⁰ How regretful for the servants. There did not come to them any messenger except that they used to ridicule him.

19. Card 19

    Yā-Sīn 36:33: Now the evidence. First, the ground.

    وَءَايَةࣰ لَّهُمُ ٱلۡأَرۡضُ ٱلۡمَيۡتَةُ أَحۡيَيۡنَٰهَا وَأَخۡرَجۡنَا مِنۡهَا حَبࣱّا فَمِنۡهُ يَأۡكُلُونَ ۝٣٣

    ³³ And a sign for them is the dead earth. We have brought it to life and brought forth from it grain, and from it they eat.

20. Card 20

    Yā-Sīn 36:40: Then the sky.

    لَا ٱلشَّمۡسُ يَنۢبَغِي لَهَآ أَن تُدۡرِكَ ٱلۡقَمَرَ وَلَا ٱلَّيۡلُ سَابِقُ ٱلنَّهَارِۚ وَكُلࣰّ فِي فَلَكࣲ يَسۡبَحُونَ ۝٤٠

    ⁴⁰ It is not allowable [i.e., possible] for the sun to reach the moon, nor does the night overtake the day, but each, in an orbit, is swimming.

21. Card 21

    Day, skinned off the night

    The verb is the one for pulling a hide off an animal. Darkness is underneath. Light is a covering, laid on and taken off.

22. Card 22

    Caught mid-argument

    The end comes on an ordinary day. People are haggling in the market. Two men have cloth unrolled between them and never fold it.

23. Card 23

    Yā-Sīn 36:52: Then the graves empty. Their first words:

    قَالُواْ يَٰوَيۡلَنَا مَنۢ بَعَثَنَا مِن مَّرۡقَدِنَاۜۗ هَٰذَا مَا وَعَدَ ٱلرَّحۡمَٰنُ وَصَدَقَ ٱلۡمُرۡسَلُونَ ۝٥٢

    ⁵² They will say, "O woe to us! Who has raised us up from our sleeping place?" [The reply will be], "This is what the Most Merciful had promised, and the messengers told the truth."

24. Card 24

    Yā-Sīn 36:58: For some: one quiet line in a loud surah.

    سَلَٰمࣰ قَوۡلࣱا مِّن رَّبࣲّ رَّحِيمࣲ ۝٥٨

    ⁵⁸ [And] "Peace," a word from a Merciful Lord.

25. Card 25

    Yā-Sīn 36:65: For the others, the excuses stop.

    ٱلۡيَوۡمَ نَخۡتِمُ عَلَىٰٓ أَفۡوَٰهِهِمۡ وَتُكَلِّمُنَآ أَيۡدِيهِمۡ وَتَشۡهَدُ أَرۡجُلُهُم بِمَا كَانُواْ يَكۡسِبُونَ ۝٦٥

    ⁶⁵ That Day, We will seal over their mouths, and their hands will speak to Us, and their feet will testify about what they used to earn.

26. Card 26

    Why seal the mouth?

    Because the mouth will lie. So the hands and feet are asked instead. In a hadith a man tells his own limbs: it was you I was arguing for.

27. Card 27

    The man with the bone

    A wealthy Makkan crumbles an old bone in his fist: who brings this back? The reply starts with him. He has forgotten how he was made.

28. Card 28

    Yā-Sīn 36:79: The answer to the bone.

    قُلۡ يُحۡيِيهَا ٱلَّذِيٓ أَنشَأَهَآ أَوَّلَ مَرَّةࣲۖ وَهُوَ بِكُلِّ خَلۡقٍ عَلِيمٌ ۝٧٩

    ⁷⁹ Say, "He will give them life who produced them the first time; and He is, of all creation, Knowing."

29. Card 29

    Fire from a green tree

    Arabs lit fires by rubbing green twigs of two desert shrubs. Fire out of sap. If that is ordinary, why is life from a dry bone impossible?

30. Card 30

    Yā-Sīn 36:82: The last word.

    إِنَّمَآ أَمۡرُهُۥٓ إِذَآ أَرَادَ شَيۡـًٔا أَن يَقُولَ لَهُۥ كُن فَيَكُونُ ۝٨٢

    ⁸² His command is only when He intends a thing that He says to it, "Be," and it is.

31. Card 31

    Reflect: What does the picture of the collar and the two walls show?

    Answer: People who cannot move at all. Most commentators read it as a picture of a closed mind: no way forward, no way back, nothing to see.

32. Card 32

    "Everything has a heart, and the heart of the Qur'an is Ya Sin."

33. Card 33

    The end of Yā-Sīn.

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