Surah Ar-Rahman 55:2

سُورَةُ الرَّحۡمَٰن · Medinan · Verse 2 of 78

عَلَّمَ ٱلْقُرْءَانَ

Translation

who taught the Quran.

English translation: M.A.S. Abdel Haleem.

Meaning and reflection

'He taught the Qur'an.' al-Razi and Ma'arif al-Qur'an note the striking order: teaching the Qur'an is mentioned before creating man in the next verse, the natural sequence reversed. The message is that guidance is the very purpose of the creation about to be named: the reason you were made is mentioned before you were. Ask yourself: I tend to treat guidance as an optional extra added onto a life whose real business is elsewhere, work, family, survival. This verse places the Qur'an first, ahead of my own existence, as though I was made for it, not it for me. If guidance is the point of my being here and not a hobby within it, does that rearrange what I treat as central?

Grounded in classical tafsir: al-Razi, Ma'arif al-Qur'an, al-Saadi.

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