His words, Exalted is He:

and taught him [coherent] speech (bayān).^{1On the word bayān, see above p. 32, n. 105.}

He said:

This means: He has taught him [mankind] speech (kalām) which pertains to the spiritual self (nafs al-rūḥ), understanding of the intellect (fahm al-ʿaql), discernment of the heart (fiṭnat al-qalb), natural intuition (dhihn al-khulq) and knowledge of the natural self (ʿilm nafs al-ṭabʿ). God granted Adam عليه السلام this [knowledge] through inspiration and then explained (bayyana) it to him.

His words, Exalted is He:

…and has set up the balance,

He said:

Its inner meaning refers to commandments and prohibitions governing the bodily members [of a person].

His words, Exalted is He:

He is Lord of the two risings and Lord of the two settings.

He said:

Its inner meaning refers to the rising of the heart and its setting, the rising of the tongue and its setting, and the rising of the profession of His oneness, [whose] setting is the witnessing (mushāhada) of Him. And He also says, [I swear] by the Lord of the risings and the settings [70:40], meaning the risings of the bodily members through sincerity (ikhlāṣ), and their settings through subservience to people (ṭāʿa li’l-nās) inwardly and outwardly.

His words, Exalted is He:

He has loosed the two seas, and they meet.^{1In his Jāmiʿ al-bayān, Ṭabarī presents a few possible interpretations of what the two seas might be, such as one sea being the Mediterranean Sea (Baḥr al-Rūm) and the other, the Persian Gulf (Baḥr al-Fārs). However, Ṭabarī prefers the view given in the majority of traditions that the two seas are the earthly and heavenly seas (baḥr al-arḍ wa-baḥr al-samāʾ).}

He said:

One of these seas is the heart, which contains a variety of gems: the gem of faith, the gem of gnosis (maʿrifa), the gem of realising God’s oneness, the gem of contentment (riḍā), the gem of love (maḥabba), the gem of longing (shawq), the gem of sorrow (ḥuzn), the gem of neediness [for God] (faqr), and other [gems]. The other sea is the self (nafs).

His words, Exalted is He:

Between them is a barrier [that] they do not overstep.

This is divine protection (ʿiṣma) and divinely-bestowed success (tawfīq).

His words, Exalted is He:

But for whosoever feared the standing [before] their Lord, there will be two gardens,

Labīd^{1Perhaps this is Abū ʿAqīl b. Rābiʿa Labīd (d. 40/661). The editor of the Dār al-Kutub al-ʿIlmiyya edition notes, however, that this tradition is attributed to Mujāhid in Aḥmad b. Ḥanbal’s Kitāb al-Waraʿ (Beirut, 1983), p. 115.} said:

[Such a one] was on the point of [committing] a transgression, but then recalled the time when he will stand before God, Exalted is He, on the Day of Reckoning and refrained from that.

I heard [the story of] a young man during the era of the caliphate of ʿUmar رضي الله عنه who was endowed with beauty and had a striking appearance. ʿUmar رضي الله عنه was impressed with the young man and sensed that much good [would come] from him. One day the youth encountered a woman to whom he took a fancy. However, as soon as he was on the point of committing an indecent act, the divine protection descended upon him and he fell down on his face in a swoon. The woman then carried him to his house. He had a father who was an old man and it was his wont when evening fell to sit in front of his door waiting for his son’s return. When the old man saw him he also fell into a swoon. When he regained his senses he asked his son about his condition. So he recounted the story, but then suddenly yelled with one cry and fell down dead. After he was buried ʿUmar رضي الله عنه stood up and recited over his grave: But for whosoever feared the standing [before] their Lord, there will be two gardens, upon which he [the young man] cried to him from the grave, ‘God has given them to me and has granted me a third along with them.’^{2A similar tradition is related in Bayhaqī, Shuʿab al-īmān, vol. 1, p. 468.}

His words, Exalted is He:

In them are maidens of restrained glances…

He said:

That is, they lower their gaze to all except their husbands. Thus whoever restrains his glances in this world from that which is forbidden and dubious, and from sensual delights and their attraction, will find that God grants him in Paradise maidens restraining their glances just as He has promised.

His words, Exalted is He:

Houris, secluded in pavilions.

That is, kept in seclusion in pavilions. It was related from Muḥammad b. Sawwār, on the authority of his chain of transmission, that Abū Mūsā al-Ashʿarī رضي الله عنه related that the Prophet ﷺ said, ‘Verily the believer will have in Paradise a pavilion made of white pearl, thirty miles in length, in which there are many inhabitants but they do not see one another.’^{1Muslim, Ṣaḥīḥ, ‘Kitāb al-Janna’; Bukhārī, Ṣaḥīḥ, ‘Kitāb Tafsīr al-Qurʾān’.}