Verse 19

● Allāh says: أَوَلَمْ†يَرَوْا۟†إِلَى†ٱلطَّيْرِ†فَوْقَهُمْ†صَٰٓفَّٰتٍۢ†وَيَقْبِضْنَ†مَۚا†يُمْسِكُهُنَّ†إِلَّا†ٱلرَّحْمَٰنُ†إِۚنَّهۥُ†بِكُلِّ†شَىْءٍۭ†بَصِيرٌ

○ Do they not see the birds above them, expanding and contracting

their wings? None holds them up except The Most Merciful. Surely

He is All-Seeing of everything.

● At this point in the sūrah, we are not shifting back to Allāh’s

descriptions of His magnificent creations

○ He talked about creating life and death, creating seven heavens in

layers, creating stars in the sky, creating the Earth

■ And with each of these creations there is perfection, majesty,

and might

● We are now coming to the next creation Allāh is detailing for us, and

through this creation and its description we learn something else about

who Allāh is

○ We learn something new about Allāh’s Mulk, His Dominion

● In this verse, Allāh is encouraging us to look up at the birds flying above

us

○ Just one of many commands we find in the Q of Allāh telling us to

look at the world around us and the creation in it

○ Allāh is encouraging us to look at the birds flying above us, and He

describes their manner of flight

○ They expand their wings, and they contract their wings

○ This movement creates flight

○ A constant cycle of expansion and contraction

● Allāh then tells us, there is nothing, absolutely nothing and no one that

is holding those birds up, except Allāh, except al-Raḥmān, The Most

Merciful

○ What does this teach us about Allāh and His Mulk?

○ It teaches us that Allāh is actively involved in running the universe

○ He is actively working in His Mulk

○ He did not just create everything and then leave

● There is a theory in philosophy called The Clock-Maker Theory

○ This theory asserts that God created the universe, but is not

actively involved in its operation

■ Just as a clock-maker makes a clock, and then the clock

operates independently of its maker

○ When someone makes a clock, they make the design, they put

together the pieces, they set up the function, but once that clock is

made, the clock-maker is no longer needed

■ The clock will continue to function, perfectly normal and just

fine, and the clock-maker is no longer involved in the

constant functioning of that clock

○ This is how some philosophers view God

■ They claim that, yes there is a God, yes this God did create the

universe, but He just created it and left

■ He is not involved in the day-to-day operations

■ The universe functions on its own, after the creation of the

universe the Creator is no longer needed for the universe to

function

● This theory is in direct contradiction to what we believe about Allāh, as

Muslims, and our verse for today proves that

○ As Muslims we believe that Allāh is deeply, intricately involved in

every single aspect of the universe’s functioning

○ Allāh did not simply create His Mulk and leave

○ Rather, Allāh’s Mulk cannot survive, it cannot last for even a

fraction of a second, without Allāh’s management and

involvement

○ We need Allāh for every breath we take

○ Nothing can happen without Allāh being the cause and source of

that occurrence

● Allāh is giving us a visual example of His constant, nonstop

management and involvement in the universe — the birds

○ We have all seen birds before, we have all seen them fly

○ The way birds fly is so elegant, so graceful, so seamless and

effortless

○ Yes, the birds put in the work of expanding and contracting their

wings to create flight, as this verse tells us, but they are not the

ones holding themselves up

○ They put in the effort, but they have no control over the outcome

○ Allāh is the One who holds them up in the air, keeps them

suspended in the sky

○ There may be birds that expand and contract their wings, but no

matter how much they do it, they can’t fly

■ No matter how much they flap their wings, they cannot stay

up and suspended in the air

○ Allāh is One who is allowing their flapping to do anything

○ And in this is a huge lesson for all of us

● Our job is to put in the effort, and the outcome, the result, is completely

left to Allāh

○ In this verse Allāh tells us first that the birds expand and contract

their wings

■ They are putting in the effort, they are doing what they can to

achieve what they want to do

○ But at the end of the day, the only real reason that those birds are

able to actually fly, is Allāh

○ Similar deal with us human beings

■ When we want to do something, when we want to achieve

something, we have to put in the effort

■ We cannot sit around, doing nothing, and say — Allāh is going

to handle it all

○ We have to put in the effort, we have to invest the work

○ But the result, the outcome of that work and effort is completely

Allāh

■ The result of our work is not because of our own efforts,

rather it is because of Allāh

○ That is why you have people that put in the same amount of work

and effort to achieve a certain goal, some are successful and some

are not

○ Some birds may flap just as long and hard as others, but some of

them will fly and some of them will not

● Another point to appreciate in what this verse is teaching us about

Allāh, is a deeper understanding of Allāh’s Divine Names al-Ḥayy and

al-Qayyūm

○ And His description that لَا†تَ†أْخُذُهۥُ†سِنَةٌ†وَ†لَا†نَوْمٌ

○ Well-known descriptions of Allāh that are detailed for us in  yah

al-Kursī, which is verse #255 in Sūrah al-Baqarah

● Allāh tells us that He is al-Ḥayy and al-Qayyūm

○ The Ever-Living and The All-Sustaining, these two qualities go

hand-in-hand

○ Two qualities of Allāh that directly contradict the Clock-Maker

Theory

○ Allāh has life, Allāh is always there, Allāh never ceases to exist

○ And with that constant, perpetual, neverending life, Allāh

constantly and perpetually manages and sustains the universe

○ He is always continually sustaining all that is in existence

● لَا†تَ†أْخُذُهۥُ†سِنَةٌ†وَ†لَا†نَوْمٌ†—neither drowsiness nor sleep overtakes Him

○ Meaning, there is never a break in Allāh management and

sustainment of the universe, of His Mulk

○ It is continually, constantly taking place

○ Not even a fraction of a second break, because as we stated earlier,

nothing can exist for even a fraction of a second without Allāh’s

sustainment

● This verse, by encouraging us to ponder and reflect upon the birds

above us, teaches us that

○ 1) Allāh is intimately involved in the management and sustainment

of His Mulk

○ 2) We have to put in the effort, the outcome is left to Allāh

○ 3) Allāh never takes a break, his management and sustainment of

the universe is constant

● May Allāh help us to learn more about Him and grow closer to Him