by the messengers about the Last Day, the Resurrection with all its details, and about Paradise and Hell.

Dream interpretation is likewise called taʾwīl for both of these reasons: it is an explanation of the dream and, at the same time, the final outcome to which it leads. Joseph said to his father, “Father, this is the taʾwīl of my earlier dream” (Yusuf 12:100)—meaning its very reality and how matters have reached this point.

The ultimate rationale or intended wisdom that motivates an act is also termed taʾwīl, for it discloses the doer’s purpose, a purpose the onlooker did not previously know. Thus al-Khidr said to Moses—after recounting the wisdom behind scuttling the boat, killing the boy, and erecting the wall without payment—“I will inform you of the taʾwīl of that which you could not bear patiently” (Al-Kahf 18:77). When he had explained the final causes that underlay his deeds, he concluded, “That is the taʾwīl of what you could not bear patiently” (Al-Kahf 18:81).

Accordingly, taʾwīl in the Book of Allah (Exalted is He) means the concrete reality to which a statement ultimately refers—the actuality that exists outside the mind. Speech is of two kinds: informative and imperative. The taʾwīl of an informative statement is the fact itself; the taʾwīl of promises and threats is the very thing promised or threatened; the taʾwīl of what Allah reports about His attributes and actions is exactly how He in truth is, described by the most lofty attributes; and the taʾwīl of a command is the performance of the deeds commanded.

ʿĀʾishah said, “In his bowing and prostration the Messenger of Allah ﷺ used to say, ‘Subḥānaka ʾllāhumma Rabbana wa bi-ḥamdik,’ thereby ‘enacting (yatāʾawwal) the Quran’” (1). This taʾwīl, then, is none other than carrying out the commanded act (2); and that is the sense of taʾwīl in the speech of Allah and His Messenger.