Landing on Moon

Qur'aanic Verse 54:1:

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Transliteration:

1. Iqtarabati alssaAAatu wainshaqqa alqamaru


Translation:

1. The Hour (the time when the present world will end and the Hereafter begin) has drawn near and the moon is visited.

Study Note:

1. The Arabic word shaqqa has a number of meanings. Most translators have given it here the meaning of ‘split’ and thus attributed to Prophet Muhammad [peace on him] the performing of the miracle of splitting the moon in two and then rejoining the two parts. Such a miracle – if it did happen – would have indeed been a unique one! The Qur’aan does say that the earlier Prophets were endowed with the gifts of performing various miracles. But none of such miracles involved moon or any other heavenly body! All those miracles were restricted to things of this mundane world. This miracle attributed to Prophet Muhammad is preposterous on another count as well. Nowhere else in the Holy Book does Allah Almighty mention performance of any miracle – on mundane things or otherwise – as performed by earlier Prophets like Moses and Jesus. The Book, on the other hand, points out the fact that the earlier peoples had failed to follow their Prophets despite the latter showing them the miracles! The stress was therefore laid on Prophet Muhammad’s Ummah to look for miracles in the natural creation of their own selves and of all things around them, and thus attain to faith in Allah Ta’ala. That being the unmistakable tenor throughout in the Qur’aan, it was indeed preposterous for the Prophet to come up suudenly with such an unlikely miracle. Moreover, shaqqa alqamar is meant in this Verse to be the Sign for the approaching end of this world.  There were definitely no signs of the approaching Doom over 1400 years ago when this Verse was revealed. But there definitely are such signs now when nation after nation is engaged in piling up weapons of mass destruction [WMD]. And this piling up was preceded by Man’s first visit to the moon in the late sixties [Watch the Video]. This Verse foretells that visit.

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The above is extracted from yet-to-be-published Qur'aanic Studies Manzil VII.

Mohammad Shafi