“Then He completed them as seven heavens in two days and assigned to each heaven its command. We adorned the lowest heaven with lamps and made it a protection. That is the decree of the Almighty, the All-Knowing.”

“Then He completed them as seven heavens in two days.” Thus, the creation of the heavens and the earth was completed in six days, the first being Sunday and the last Friday. Although Allah’s power and will were fully capable of creating them all in a single instant, He is not only All-Powerful but also All-Wise and Gentle. It was therefore part of His wisdom and gentleness that He created them over this appointed period.

You should know that the apparent meaning of this verse, when considered alongside Allah Most High’s words in Sūrat al-Nāziʿāt—where, after mentioning the creation of the heavens, He says, “And after that He spread out the earth”—may suggest a contradiction, although there is neither contradiction nor inconsistency in Allah’s Book.

The answer is what many of the early Muslims stated: the creation and formation of the earth ⦗746⦘ preceded the creation of the heavens, as mentioned here, whereas the spreading out of the earth—when “He brought forth from it its water and its pasture, and firmly anchored the mountains”—came after the creation of the heavens, as stated in Sūrat al-Nāziʿāt. Hence He says there, “And after that He spread out the earth: He brought forth from it…” and so forth. He did not say, “And after that He created the earth.”

His words, “and assigned to each heaven its command,” mean the command and governance appropriate to it, as required by the wisdom of the Wisest of judges.

“We adorned the lowest heaven with lamps”—namely, the stars, by which light is obtained and guidance found. They are an outward adornment and beauty for the heaven, and an inward beauty as well, since they are made missiles against the devils so that they cannot eavesdrop therein. “That”—all that has been mentioned of the earth and what it contains, and the heaven and what it contains—“is the decree of the Almighty,” who, by His might, subdues all things, governs them, and creates all creatures; “the All-Knowing,” whose knowledge encompasses all creation, both unseen and seen.

That the polytheists should fail to devote worship sincerely to this magnificent Lord—the One, the All-Subduing, to whose command all creatures submit and in whom His decree takes effect—is among the most astonishing of things. Even more astonishing is that they should set up rivals to Him and equate them with Him, though those rivals are deficient in their attributes and deeds. If they persist in turning away, there is no remedy for them except punishment in this world and the Hereafter. He therefore warned them, saying: