of all things have We taken account in a Clear Book.1 * From Whom is not hidden the least little atom in the heavens or on earth; nor is there anything less than that, or greater, but it is in the Record Clear.2
In order to be convinced of the elevated truth which these verses state, that, “All things together with all their states are recorded before they come into existence, when they come into existence, and after they have departed; and they are being recorded,” we point out to be observed the All-Glorious Inscriber’s including and preserving in immaterial fashion in the seeds and roots of the innumerable well-ordered creatures which He changes every season on the page of the earth, and particularly in the spring, the indexes of their beings, life-histories, and principles according to which they act; and when they die His inscribing in immaterial fashion with the same pen of Divine Determining those indexes, life-histories and principles in the simple seeds in their fruits; and every passing spring even His preserving them –whether fresh or dry– in perfect order in seeds like dry chips of wood and bones, limited and tiny. It is as if each spring is attached like a flower to the face of the earth in extremely orderly and balanced fashion by the hand of One All-Beautiful and All-Glorious, then plucked from it; each is placed on it, then removed. While the reality is this, one of the strangest forms of man’s misguidance is that he calls this natural writing, this inscribing full of art, this passive pattern of wisdom which is an index of dominical art and only a reflection and manifestation of the Preserved Tablet, ‘nature’, and considers it to be the source and active and effective. Can there be any comparison between the ground and the Pleiades? Can there be any comparison between reality and the views of the heedless?
THE THIRD: For example, in order to ascend to the truth which the Bringer of Sure News described concerning the Bearers of the Throne, the angels appointed to the earth and the skies, and other sorts of angels, stating that they glorify God with forty thousand heads, and with the forty thousand tongues in each head, and in forty thousand ways with each tongue, consider the following carefully. Through verses like,
The seven heavens and the earth and all within them glorify and extol Him.3 * It was We Who made the hills declare in unison with him Our praises.4 * We did indeed offer the Trust to the heavens and the earth and the mountains,5
the All-Glorious One expresses clearly that even the greatest and most
Qur’an, 36:12.
Qur’an, 34:3.
Qur’an, 17:44.
Qur’an, 38:18.
Qur’an, 33:72.