Al-Hajj (The Pilgrimage)

73. “O people! A parable is struck; so listen to it. Verily, those whom you call upon besides Allah can never create (even) a fly, though they should all gather for it; and should the fly snatch away anything from them, they could not take it back from it. Feeble are (both) the seeker and the sought!”

74. “They have not estimated Allah with the estimation that is due to Him. Verily Allah is Strong, Mighty.”

We must always take the parables of the Qur’an under careful consideration.

The person who is helpless when he confronts a single fly is not eligible to be worshipped.

This verse illustrates an interesting and lively picture of the situation of the artificial idols and deities and explains their weakness and inability. It makes manifest the falsehood of the pagans’ belief very clearly.

It addresses the common people and says:

“O people! A parable is struck; so listen to it. Verily, those whom you call upon besides Allah can never create (even) a fly, though they should all gather for it;…”

If all their idols, all the objects of their worship, and even all the scientists, the mindful ones, and inventors from among human beings gather with together and try to create a fly they will not be able to create it.

Thus, how can you consider them in a row with the Great Lord Who is the Creator of the heavens and the earth and thousands of thousand living creatures in the seas and on the lands, in forests, and in the depths of the ground; the Lord Who has assigned the life and living in different shapes and various kinds, each of which causes man to wonder and to admire them.

How far and different are those weak objects of worship and this Almighty Wise Creator!

Then the Qur’an adds that not only they are not able to create a fly, but also they are unable to stand against a fly, because as the verse says:

“…and should the fly snatch away anything from them, they could not take it back from it.…”

A weak and feeble being that fails even in standing against a fly, how is it worthy that they consider it as a manager of their fate and remover of their difficulties?

Yes, both ‘the seekers’, and the worshippers, and those objects of worship, ‘the sought’ are feeble!

The verse says:

“…Feeble are (both) the seeker and the sought!”

Some Islamic narrations indicate that the idolaters of Quraysh used to plaster the idols that they had gathered and arranged around the Ka‘bah, with musk, ambergris and saffron mixed with honey, and around them they used to loudly say some words similar to the term ‘labbayk’ (here am I) of the monotheists which indicated their polytheism and idolatry as well as the distortion of the saying of monotheists, and they used to imagine these worthless and low objects as the partners of Allah.

But flies came sitting on them, ate the honey, saffron, musk and ambergris thereover while the idolaters had not the power to take them back from the flies.

Taking this scenery as an example, the Qur’an reiterates the feebleness and inability of the idols and the weakness of the logic of the polytheists and implies that the idolaters can see carefully how their objects of worship are under the feet of flies and they are not able to show the least defence from themselves.

These are some worthless and incapable objects of worship that the polytheists demanded them to solve their various problems!

By the way, the objective of the Arabic words /talib/ (the seeker) and /matlub/ (the sought) is just the same thing which was said in the above: the former is the worshippers of the idols and the latter is the idols themselves both of which are weak and incapable.

Some commentators have also said that probably here the term /talib/ refers to ‘fly’ and /matlub/ refers to ‘idols’, (since the flies seek the idols in order to enjoy of the food stuff over them).

After stating the above lively parable, in the next verse the Qur’an concludes that they have not recognized Allah so that they must know Him.

The verse says:

“They have not estimated Allah with the estimation that is due to Him.…”

They are so weak and feeble in knowledge of Allah and theology that they degraded Allah, the Exalted, to the level of their weak and worthless objects of worship, those that they counted as partners of Allah.

If they had the least amount of knowledge about Him they would certainly laugh at their own comparison.

At the end of the verse, the Qur’an states:

“…Verily Allah is Strong, Mighty.”

Allah is not like the idols that are not able to create a small creature such as a fly, and they are not able even to defend themselves against a fly. Allah is powerful over everything, and none is able to resist before Him.

A Point Concerning Theology

If we deal with the books written about physiology of the living creatures and study carefully the biological activities of a small insect, such as a fly, we will see that the structure of the mind of a fly, its system of nerves, and its digestion organs are more complicated than the structure of the most equipped aeroplanes, or they can not be comparable with each other at all.

In principle, the problem of life and the senses and the motion of the living creatures, as well as their growth and procreation, have remained as a secret before the scientists; and the details and delicacy used in the structure of these creatures are in turn some other secrets, the ones which have not been answered yet.

According to the statements of the scientists of natural science, the extraordinary small eyes of some of these insects are composed by about one hundred eyes. That is, the same eye that we can hardly see, and perhaps is as small as a needlepoint, is made up of several smaller eyes, the collection of which is called ‘a compound eye’.

Supposing that man can produce a living cell from some lifeless substance, who can arrange hundreds of small eyes, each of which in turn has a delicate camera, layers, and systems, beside each other and join their branches and lines of communication to the brain of the insect and transfer the outward information to the brain of the insect by them so that the insect can react unto the events happen around it?

If all human beings gather and assist, can they create such an apparently small being which is in fact very complicated and mysterious?

Again, if supposedly a man can solve all these problems, can this be called as creation? Or it is a combination of the existing means and tools in this very world of creation. Are those persons who mount the ready-made parts of a car called as inventors, and can their action be called invention?