(1–11) “In the name of Allah, the Most Compassionate, the Most Merciful. By those ranged in ranks, * those who drive with a stern rebuke, * and those who recite the Reminder: * truly your God is One, * Lord of the heavens and earth and all between them, and Lord of all the points of sunrise. * We have adorned the nearest heaven with the beauty of the stars, * and made it a safeguard against every rebellious devil. * They cannot eavesdrop on the highest assembly and are pelted from every side, * driven away; and theirs is an everlasting punishment. * But any who snatches a fragment is pursued by a piercing flame. * So ask them: Are they more difficult to create, or those We have created? We created them from tenacious clay.”
This is an oath from Him, Exalted is He, by the noble angels as they worship Him and administer, by their Lord’s permission, the affairs entrusted to them. By this oath He affirms that He alone is divine and Lord. He said: “By those ranged in ranks,” meaning the angels, standing in ranks in the service of their Lord.
“Those who drive with a stern rebuke” are the angels, who drive the clouds and other things at Allah’s command.
“Those who recite the Reminder” are the angels who recite the words of Allah, Exalted is He.
Because they are wholly devoted to worshipping their Lord, serve Him in worship, and do not disobey Him even for the blink of an eye, He swore by them that He alone is worthy of worship, saying: “Truly your God is One.” He has no partner in His right to be worshipped, so dedicate your love, fear, hope, and every other form of worship exclusively to Him.
“Lord of the heavens and earth and all between them, and Lord of all the points of sunrise.” That is, He is the Creator, Provider, and Governor of these created things. Just as He has no partner in His lordship over them, so too He has no partner in His right to be worshipped. Allah frequently establishes that He alone deserves worship by establishing that He alone is Lord, for the latter proves the former. Even those who associated partners with Him in worship acknowledged His lordship; He therefore uses what (1) they acknowledged as proof against what they denied.
Allah specifically mentioned the points of sunrise because they imply the corresponding points of sunset, or because they are the rising points of the stars that He was about to mention. Thus He said: “We have adorned the nearest heaven with the beauty of the stars, and made it a safeguard against every rebellious devil. They cannot eavesdrop on the highest assembly.”
Allah mentioned two tremendous benefits of the stars:
The first is that they adorn the sky. Were it not for them, the sky would be a dark mass with no light. He placed them there as an adornment so that its reaches would be illuminated, its appearance made beautiful, travelers would be guided by them through the darkness on land and sea, and all the other benefits they afford could be realized.
The second is that they guard heaven against every rebellious devil who goes so far in his rebellion as to eavesdrop on the highest assembly—that is, the angels. Whenever the devils eavesdrop, they are pelted with piercing flames “from every side,” driving them away and keeping them far from hearing what the highest assembly says.
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“And theirs is an everlasting punishment”—that is, a perpetual punishment prepared for them because they rebelled against obedience to their Lord.
Had He [Exalted is He] not made an exception, this would have shown that they hear absolutely nothing. But He said: “But any who snatches a fragment,” meaning any rebellious devil who stealthily steals away a single word, “is pursued by a piercing flame.” Sometimes it overtakes him before he can convey the word to his allies, and the news from heaven is thus cut off. At other times he reports it before the flame catches him; they then add a hundred lies to it and make them seem credible because of the word heard from heaven.
After explaining these mighty created things, He said: “So ask them”—that is, ask those who deny that they will be created again after death—“Are they more difficult to create?” In other words, is bringing them into existence after their death a greater and more arduous act of creation? “Or those We have created” among [these] created beings? They must acknowledge that the creation of the heavens and earth is greater than the creation of human beings.
They are therefore obliged to acknowledge the resurrection. Indeed, if they considered themselves and reflected, they would realize that, rationally considered, originating their creation from tenacious clay is harder than bringing them into being after their death. Thus He said: “We created them from tenacious clay,” meaning clay that is strong and firm, as in His saying, Exalted is He: “We certainly created man from sounding clay, from altered black mud.”