Yaseen (Yaseen)

41. “And a sign for them is that We bore their offspring in the loaded ship.”

42. “And We have created for them the like of it whereon they ride.”

Taking benefit from ships and animals has frequently been mentioned as the Divine blessings.

Former verses were about the signs of Allah in the creation of the sun and the moon as well as the night and the day, and also the earth and the blessing of the earth. Now, in the verse under discussion the words are about the seas and a part of the bounties and merits of the seas, i.e. the movement of ships over them for taking passengers and commerce.

Moreover, the movement of these ships in the middle of oceans is not unlike to the movement of celestial spheres in the ocean of atmosphere.

So, at first, it says:

“And a sign for them is that We bore their offspring in the loaded ship.”

The Arabic pronoun /lahum/ not only returns to the pagans of Mecca but also to all servants and creatures of Allah whom were spoken about in the previous verses.

The Arabic term /ŏurriyah/, as Raqib says in Mufradat, originally means little offspring, although it is sometimes used in ordinary speaking for all children, young and old.

This word is used for both singular and plural; and that it implicitly says that Allah bore their offspring (or their small children) in this ships without that it speaks about them, perhaps it is for this sake that offspring need more to this still amount, since adults are more prepared for walking and paving the beaches on foot than little children.

Moreover, this meaning is more fitting for moving their sympathy.

The application of the Qur’anic term /mašhun/ (full) points to this fact that not only they themselves embark in the ship but also their goods and their necessary means are carried with them.

However, the movement of ships is the greatest and the most important means of transformation for human beings, and their benefit is thousands times more than other vehicles. This is the result of the particular specialties of water and the specific gravity of the materials that an ordinary ship has usually been made therewith.

All of these are the might and forces that Allah has made subservient to man and each of them, and also their entire existence, is a sign among the Divine signs.

In order that it should not misunderstand that the only god-given mount is ship, in the next verse it adds:

“And We have created for them the like of it whereon they ride.”

These are the vehicles which run on land, or in the sky and atmosphere and carry both men and their heavy means. Some commentators have simply rendered this holy verse into camel which has been called the ‘ship of desert’.

Some others have rendered it into all beasts, and some others into airplanes and aircrafts which have been invented in our time; and applying the Qur’anic phrase /xalaqna/ (We created) about them is for this view that their materials and means have been created formerly.

But the verse has a vast scope of meaning which envelops all these concepts and other than them, too.

Of course, in some verses of the Qur’an the word beasts has numerously been mentioned beside /fulk/ (ships), like the verse which says:

“…and made for you of the ships and the cattle what you ride on.”1

And also in Surah Al-Mu’min, No. 40, verse 80 we recite:

“…and upon them and upon the ships you are carried.”

But these verses do not contrast to the generality of the concept of the verse.