divine messages and the Books He sent down to him. Then, after all this, ﴾He caused him to die.﴿ Death is the separation of the soul from the body. ﴾Then He had him buried,﴿ meaning that He placed him in a grave—buried and concealed—out of honor and respect for him. If, when human beings died, they were treated like all other dead creatures, their corpses cast onto rubbish heaps, this would be a grave indignity to the deceased and the deceased’s family. Yet one of the blessings of Allah, Glorified and Exalted, is that He prescribed burial for His servants. Thus, regarding the words of Allah Most High, ﴾Then He had him buried,﴿ Ibn Abbas (may Allah be pleased with him and his father) said, “He honored him by granting him burial.”

﴾Then, when He wills, He will resurrect him.﴿ That is, when Allah, Mighty and Majestic, wills, ﴾He will resurrect him﴿ on the Day of Resurrection to recompense him for his deeds. His words, ﴾Then, when He wills, He will resurrect him,﴿ mean that Allah, Mighty and Majestic, is not incapable of resurrecting him; rather, Allah’s command has not yet come. Thus He says, ﴾No indeed! He has not yet brought to pass what He commanded.﴿ ﴾Not yet﴿ here carries the sense of “not,” though the two differ in certain respects. The meaning is that Allah Most High has not yet brought to pass what He commanded—that is, what He commanded by His universal decree and predestination. In other words, the command for this dead person to rise or be raised has not yet been fulfilled; rather, an appointed time still awaits him.

This refutes those who deny the resurrection and say, “If the resurrection were true, we would see our forefathers now.” This is a false challenge on their part, for the messengers never told them that they would be resurrected now. Rather, they told them that they would all be resurrected after they had all died.

Then Allah, Mighty and Majestic, reminds man of the blessings He has bestowed upon him: ﴾Then let man consider his food.﴿ That is, let him consider where his food came from, who brought it, and whether anyone besides Allah, Mighty and Majestic, created it. At this verse, one should recall the words of Allah Most High:

﴾Have you considered what you sow? Is it you who make it grow, or are We the growers? If We willed, We could reduce it to chaff, leaving you to exclaim, “We have surely suffered loss! Rather, we have been deprived!”﴿ [al-Wāqiah: 63, 67].

Who caused this crop to grow until it matured and made it easy to obtain, so that it became food for us? It is Allah, Mighty and Majestic. Thus He says, ﴾If We willed, We could reduce it to chaff,﴿ meaning that after bringing it forth, We could crush it so that you derived no benefit from it. ﴾Indeed, it is We who