Surah Al-Qari’ah - The Calamity
(Revealed at Mecca)
11 Verses in 1 Section
Sections of Surah Al- Qari’ah
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Deeds weighed.
Al-Qari’ah - Deeds Weighed
Those whose good deeds weigh heavy will rejoice in a pleasant life, and those whose good deeds weigh light will have the abyss as their abode.
بِسْمِ اللَّهِ الرَّحْمَٰنِ الرَّحِيمِ
“In the name of God the Beneficent the Merciful”
الْقَارِعَةُ
“The Striking Calamity!” (101:1)
مَا الْقَارِعَةُ
“What is the Striking Calamity?” (101:2)
وَمَا أَدْرَاكَ مَا الْقَارِعَةُ
“What maketh thee know what the Striking Calamity is?” (101:3)
يَوْمَ يَكُونُ النَّاسُ كَالْفَرَاشِ الْمَبْثُوثِ
“The day when people shall be like moths scattered” (101:4)
وَتَكُونُ الْجِبَالُ كَالْعِهْنِ الْمَنْفُوشِ
“And the mountains shall become like wool carded1“ (101:5)
فَأَمَّا مَنْ ثَقُلَتْ مَوَازِينُهُ
“Then as for him whose scales2(with good deeds) are heavy” (101:6)
فَهُوَ فِي عِيشَةٍ رَاضِيَةٍ
“He shall be in a life, well pleased with” (101:7)
وَأَمَّا مَنْ خَفَّتْ مَوَازِينُهُ
“And as for him whose scales (with good, deeds) are light” (101:8)
فَأُمُّهُ هَاوِيَةٌ
“His home shall be ‘Haviah’ (a burning abyss3)” (101:9)
وَمَا أَدْرَاكَ مَا هِيَهْ
“What maketh thee know what ‘Haviah’ is?” (101:10)
نَارٌ حَامِيَةٌ
“It is a Raging Fire” (101:11)
Commentary
Verse 1
‘Qariah’, i.e., a tremendously clamorous striking noise which will accompany the inauguration of the great calamity, the earth will suffer at the dawn of the Day of Judgment when the whole of the present order of the world will undergo a thorough change giving place to a totally new atmosphere of a new state of the existence of a new world of a new order of realities with total wiping out of all false appearances and false values.
Verse 2-3
Since anything similar to the terrible experience of the clamorous noise mentioned here, has never been experienced by anyone in the world, it is an impossibility even to correctly imagine what the noise would be like.
Verse 4
Out of the terror, the clamorous voice will create in the minds of the people they will be running bewildered on all sides in tumultuous multitude - out of the fear and the tumult each falling over the other, like the tiny insignificant being, the moths scattered by a violent stormy wind. This is to give an imaginable view of the confusion and distress and helplessness man will be thrown into, all of a sudden.
Verse 5
When even the solid and immovably and unshakably fixed huge mountains will be scattered in the atmosphere, like the insignificant flakes of the carder’s wool4.
Verse 6
On that day nothing but the deeds, good and bad will be counted. The appraisement, valuation measuring or the weighing, will be strictly to the real value of each deed and deed means any deed of the physical body given to man and as well as the activity of the mind, i.e., the various faculties he has been endowed with. Every action physical and mental will be weighed viz., the motives, passions, thoughts, imagination, feelings, aspirations, love, hatred, the degree of faith in God anil the extent of the disbelief in Him, and the attitudes etc. And whosoever’s measure of his good deeds will exceed the measure of his evils, will receive the blissful life with which he will naturally be pleased.
Verse 8-9
And whosoever’s evils will exceed his good deeds will be thrown into the abyss -and ‘Haviah’ is interpreted to be the abyss or the depth the bottom being immeasurably low in an unfathomable depth.
Verse 10
As man in this life cannot rightly imagine the like of what the ‘Qariah’ mentioned in the verse 1 above, will be, he cannot correctly visualise the likeness of the abyss called ‘Haviah’ which will be the abode of the wicked.
Verse 11
The simplest note of description of the abyss ‘Haviah’ is that it is a blazing fire and the rest of it to be experienced and known when it is given to the wicked on the Day of Judgment.
