It was also said that its answer is His saying (1): “Surely in this is a lesson for whoever fears Allah.”

It was also said that there is an inversion in the order (2), its intended arrangement being: “On the Day when the first blast will quake, followed by the second blast—and by those who extract [souls] with force” (3).

“On the Day when the first blast will quake (6), followed by the second blast (7).”

His saying, exalted is He: “On the Day when the first blast will quake” means the first blowing of the Trumpet, at which everything will shake and move, and all creatures will die (4). “Followed by the second blast”: this is the second blowing of the Trumpet, which follows the first, with forty years between them.

Qatadah said: They are two cries: the first causes everything to die, while the other brings everything to life by Allah’s permission (5).

Mujahid said: At the first blast, the earth and the mountains quake; the second follows it when the sky is split open, “and the earth and the mountains are lifted up and crushed with a single crushing” (6). ‘Ata’ said: “The first blast” is the Resurrection, and “the second blast” is the raising of the dead. The basic meaning of rajfah is sound and movement.

Ahmad ibn Ibrahim al-Shurayhi informed us; Ahmad ibn Muhammad ibn Ibrahim al-Tha‘labi informed us; Ibn Fanjawayh informed me; ‘Abd Allah ibn Yusuf ibn Ahmad ibn Malik related to us; Muhammad ibn Harun (7) al-Hadrami related to us; al-Hasan ibn ‘Arafah related to us; Qabisah ibn ‘Uqbah related to us, from Sufyan al-Thawri, from ‘Abd Allah ibn Muhammad ibn ‘Aqil, from al-Tufayl ibn Ubayy ibn Ka‘b, from Ubayy ibn Ka‘b, who said: Whenever a quarter of the night had passed, the Messenger of Allah, may Allah’s peace and blessings be upon him, would rise and say: “O people, remember Allah—remember Allah (8)! The first blast has come, followed by the second blast. Death has come with all that it entails,”