Verses 51–57

The Story of Ishmael, Truthful in his Promise

Based on one of the two previous interpretations, the story of Ishmael son of Ezekiel the Prophet only appears in these two verses [19:54-55] in the Qur’an. God praises him highly and deems him to be truthful in his promise, one who enjoins what is right and one in whom his Lord is well pleased. It says that he was a Messenger Prophet.

As for oral tradition, it is narrated on the authority of al-Ṣādiq: Ishmael about whom God says in His Book: And mention Ishmael in the Book; surely he was truthful in (his) promise, and he was a messenger, a Prophet was not Ishmael son of Abraham. On the contrary, he was one of the Prophets sent by God, Mighty and Sublime is He, to his people. They took him, scalped him and skinned his face. An Angel then came to him and said: Verily, God, sublime is His splendor, has sent me to you so tell me to do what you want. He replied: I have a good example and sufficient consolation in the Prophets and what has been done to them.¹

27:93Words to the same effect are narrated in ʿIlal al-sharāʾiʿ, in a chain of narration back to Abī Baṣīr on his authority. The end of the oral tradition says: I have a good example to follow in al-Ḥusayn.

Abū l-Ḥasan al-Riḍā asked: Do you know why Ishmael was called “truthful in his promise”? [Sulāyman] replied: I do not know. He said: He made a promise to a man and sat waiting for him for a year.²

Words to this effect are narrated on the authority of al-Ṣādiq. ³Majmaʿ al-bayān narrates the same without citing the chain of narration back to him.

Tafsīr, Al-Qummī says about, And mention Ishmael in the Book; surely he was truthful in (his) promise, and he was a messenger, a Prophet: “He made a promise and waited for his companion for a whole year. He was Ishmael son of [Prophet] Ezekiel”.

Author’s comment: His promise—to stay in one place, waiting for his companion—was not fixing the duration of his waiting time “for an hour” or “for a day” or anything like that. Nevertheless, truthfulness was so important to him that he was bound to keep his unqualified promise and remain in the place where he had promised his companion he would stay until he came back to him.

The virtue of delivering one’s promises, like all psychological attributes such as love, will, resolve, belief, reliance on God, and submission to Him, are commensurate with the level of one’s knowledge and certitude. For example, belief which is mixed with any error and sin is the lowest level of belief. Conversely, belief can continue to grow and become purer until it is free of all latent forms of associating partners to God, and until it causes the heart to detach from everything apart from God or does not even take notice of anyone else. At that point, this is the highest level of belief.

There are also levels of keeping one’s promises. Consider having made a promise to wait for a friend without having specified the waiting time. One level of keeping one’s promise is waiting an hour or two until another matter arises that dictates one’s departure. This is what current societal norms deem as loyalty. A higher level is staying in the same place until one’s friend returns, waiting at most until nightfall or the like, considering that to be the maximum reasonable waiting time. Higher still is sticking to the literal meaning of the unqualified promise and staying, no matter how long. Strong souls that watch what they say and do, do not say anything unless it is within their power to keep their word, by doing as they say. Then, once they have uttered the words, nothing diverts them from keeping it and carrying out what they have resolved upon.

27:94An oral tradition says that the Prophet promised to wait for one of his Companions in Mecca by the Kaaba until he returned to him. The man went off on his business and forgot about the matter. He remained there for three days waiting for him. Someone saw him and told the man about it. He then came and apologized to him. This is the level of the quintessentially truthful (ṣiddīqīn). They never say they will do something and then fail to do so.

The Story of the Prophet Enoch (Idrīs)

(1) He is not mentioned anywhere else in the Qur’an apart from the following two sūrahs and verses: And mention Enoch [Idrīs] in the Book; surely he was a truthful man, a Prophet, And We raised him to a high place (19:56-57), and And Ishmael and Enoch [Idrīs] and Ezekiel [Dhū l-Kifl]; all were of the patient ones; And We caused them to enter into Our mercy, surely they were of the good ones (21:85-86).

There is high praise for him by Him in these verses—He refers to him as a Prophet, a man of truthfulness, one of the patient and good ones and says that He raised him to a high place.

(2) One of the oral traditions telling his story is narrated on the authority of al-Bāqir.¹ It is a long hadith, an abridged version of which states that when Enoch² was commissioned to Prophethood, it was during the reign of a tyrannical king. One day he set out on a trip away from the city and passed by a farmland which pleased him and he wanted to own it. The land belonged to a servant who was a believer. The king then had him summoned and bargained with him, seeking to buy it from him. However he would not sell it and refused to do so. The king then returned to the town, sad and perplexed over what to do, so he sought the counsel of a wife of his, whose counsel he normally sought in important matters. She advised him to have witnesses testify that he had left the king’s religion, to kill him and take possession [of it]. He did as she advised and seized the land.

27:95Thereafter, God revealed to Enoch to go to the king and relay the following to him:

“Are you not content with wrongfully killing My believing servant to take his land for yourself, making his children needy and hungry through his death? Lo! By My Power I will avenge him in the long run, I will seize your kingdom from you swiftly, I will bring chaos to your city, I will subjugate your might and I will feed the dogs your wife’s flesh. O you who is under my trial, My Clemency has deluded you”.

So Enoch took him God’s message and conveyed it to him before a crowd of his companions. Offended by the letter, the king expelled Enoch from his court and then sent people to kill him as advised by his wife. Some of Enoch’s companions became aware of that and advised him to flee. He left that very day with some of his companions.

He then spoke to his Lord in confidence and complained to Him about what he had experienced at the hands of the king, after he took His message to him. Then, God revealed to him to leave the township and that He would execute His plan for the king and do as He had said. Enoch asked that the sky not rain upon the township and its environs until he was asked to pray for rain. His supplication was answered.

Thereafter Enoch told his companions, who were believers, about it, and told them to also leave the township. They did so and dispersed through the lands. There were twenty of them.

News of his revelation and departure spread among the people. He departed and headed for a cave in a high mountain to worship God; he fasted by the day and an Angel brought him food with which to break his fast every evening.

God did to the king, his wife and his city as He had revealed to Enoch and another disobedient tyrant appeared in the city. The sky withheld rain from them for twenty years until the people became exhausted and their condition became serious. When the exhaustion became too much for them, some of them reminded each other that the only reason they were facing what they were experiencing, was because of Enoch’s supplication against them not to have any rain until he would be asked for it and because of Enoch’s expulsion from the city. Yet now they did not know where he was!

27:96The consensus [of the townspeople] was to turn back and repent to God, and ask Him for rain because He was more Merciful toward them than Enoch. They came together to supplicate and plead before God.

Thereafter, God revealed to Enoch: “The people have cried out to Me in repentance, praying for forgiveness, sobbing and beseeching [Me]. I have had mercy on them and nothing is stopping Me from raining down on them apart from your request—your asking Me not to cause the sky to rain on them until you ask Me. Ask Me to help them”. Enoch replied: “O God! Verily I do not ask that of You”.

God then revealed to the Angel who used to bring food to Enoch to hold back; he did so for three days until Enoch was gripped by the pangs of hunger. He then called out: “O God! You have withheld my provision before taking my soul”. God then revealed to him: “Enoch, you have become desolate over my withholding your food for three days but not over the hunger of the people of your township and their exhaustion over the past twenty years. I asked you to ask Me to bring rain to them but you were held back and did not ask Me, so I disciplined you with hunger. Go down from your place and earn your own living. Now, I’m leaving you to your own devices”.

Enoch then went down there to the township and looked at a house from which smoke was rising. He rushed to it and lo and behold a very old woman was serving two circular loaves of [bread] on a frying pan and so he asked her to give him one to eat because hunger had worn him out. She replied: “Servant of God, Enoch’s supplication has not left us any surplus to give anyone [anything] to eat”. She swore that she did not own anything else apart from it. “So ask one of the other people of this township for something to eat”. He said to her: “Give me something to eat to hold my soul together and to give my feet the strength to go and beg”. She replied: “There are just two loaves, one for me and the other for my son. If I give my share to you, I will die and if I give you my son’s share to you, he will die. There is no surplus here. He said: “Your son is small. Half a loaf is enough for him. Give us each half and it will suffice us”. She agreed and did so.

27:97When Enoch saw her son eat from his loaf, he convulsed out of anxiety and died. His mother said: “Servant of God, you have killed my son through anxiety over his share”. He replied: “Do not be alarmed, for I will resurrect him for you straight away with God’s permission”. He took the boy by the upper arm and said: “O, soul which has left his body, by God’s command and with His permission return to his body, I am Enoch the Prophet”. The boy’s soul then came back to him.

When his mother heard Enoch speak, specifically his words: “I am Enoch”, and she looked at her resurrected son, she said: “I testify that you are Enoch the Prophet”. She went out calling at the top of her voice in the township: “Rejoice over relief. For Enoch has entered your township”. Enoch proceeded until he sat down on the site of the first tyrant’s city which had turned into a pile of dust. People from his township gathered around him, begged him for mercy and asked him to pray for rain for them. He replied: “Not until this tyrant of yours comes along with all the inhabitants of your township, walking barefoot to ask me that”.

News of that reached the tyrant and he sent forty men to Enoch, commanding them to bring Enoch to him. When they came and told him to go with them he prayed against them and every last one of them died. The tyrant then despatched five hundred more men. When they came to him, they told him to go and begged him for mercy. Enoch showed them where their companions lay dead and said: “I will not go to him and not ask until he and all the inhabitants of this township come walking barefoot to me and ask me to pray for rain”. They then set off for the tyrant, told him what Enoch had said and asked him, along with all the inhabitants of the township to walk barefoot to him and ask him to ask God for the sky to rain on them. Thereafter they went to him, stood before him, submissive and humble and asked him to ask God for the sky to rain on them.

Thereupon, Enoch prayed for the sky to rain on them and a cloud in the sky passed over them. There was thunder and lightning, and it poured [rain] upon them that very instant until they thought that it was a flood. They did not return to their homes until their new anxiety was on account of the water.

al-Ṣādiq said in a hadith referring to the mosque of al-Sahla: Do you not know that it is where Enoch the Prophet’s house was, where he used to sew.³

27:98Many biographers and historians say that he was the first person to write with a pen and the first person to sew.

Tafsīr, Al-Qummī says: He was called Enoch (Idrīs) on account of his abundant study (dars) of books.

Some oral traditions say that (the verse), And We raised him to a high place means: God was angry with one of the Angels and so He cut his wing and cast him onto one of the islands in the sea. He then remained there as long as God willed. Thereafter, when God dispatched Enoch, he came to that Angel. He asked him to pray to God to be pleased with him and give him his wing back. Enoch then prayed to Him and God gave his wing back and was pleased with him. The Angel said to Enoch: Do you need anything? He replied: Yes. I want you to raise me up to Heaven so that I can look at the Angel of death. I cannot find enjoyment in this world as long as I am mindful of him. The Angel then took him on his wing until he let him reach the fourth Heaven. Lo and behold, the Angel of death was shaking his head in astonishment. Enoch greeted him and asked him: “What’s wrong? Why are you shaking your head?” He [the Angel of death] replied: “Verily, The Lord of Might has commanded me to take your soul between the fourth and fifth Heavens. I asked, ‘Lord, how can that be when there are four Heavens between me and him —and the thickness of every Heaven is the distance it takes five hundred years to travel— and between every two Heavens lies five hundred years of travel?’” He then took his soul between the fourth and fifth Heavens. That is what, And We raised him to a high place means.⁴

Something to the same effect is narrated on the authority of the Prophet.⁵

Besides the weakness in the chain of transmission (sanad) of both narrations, especially the second one⁶ it is impossible to rely on them because they contradict the literal meaning of the Book, which clearly states that Angels are infallible and that they are innocent of all sin and error.

27:99Summarizing what Ibn ʿAbbās and others have said: Enoch traveled one day and was afflicted with sunstroke so he said: “I have walked in the sun for just one day and hurt myself. What is it like for the one who in a single day carries the sun a distance it would take five hundred years to travel? O God, lighten his burden and take its heat away from him”. God answered his supplication and the Angel who was carrying the sun felt it. He then asked God about it and so He told him about Enoch’s supplication and His answer to it. He then asked Him to bring him and Enoch together and make an intimate friendship between the two of them. He granted him permission.

Thereafter, Enoch would ask him things, one of which was: “You have said that you are the dearest Angel to the Angel of death and the most able to influence him; intercede on my behalf for him to put off my death so that I can give more thanks and worship more”. The Angel replied: “God does not put off [the death of] a soul when its time comes”. He said: “True, but this is preferable for me”. The Angel replied: “I will speak to him for you. Whatever he can to do for any of the children of Adam, he will do for you”.

The Angel then carried him to Heavens on his wing and placed him where the sun rises. He then went to the Angel of death, told him what Enoch needed and interceded on Enoch’s behalf. The Angel of death replied: “That is not up to me. However, if you like, I will tell him when he will die”. He said: “Yes”. Thereafter, he [the Angel of death] looked in his record, he [the other Angel] told him his name and he [the Angel of death] said: “I do not see his ever dying except that I find him dying where the sun rises!” The other Angel said: I came to you and left him there. The Angel of death said to him: “Go forth, because for you will only find him dead. I swear by God, nothing remains of his appointed time”. The Angel returned to him [Enoch] and found him dead.⁷

This is also narrated on the authority of Kaʿb, except that it says that the Angel that tried to intercede for Enoch was the Angel who would carry up his deeds. He would take up deeds equivalent to everyone else on earth in his time. Being impressed by this, the Angel asked God if he could descend to him. He was granted permission so he descended to him and kept him company … etc. Ibn Abī Ḥātim narrates this hadith via another chain of narration on the authority of Ibn ʿAbbās, saying that Enoch died between the wings of the Angel.⁸

27:100It is narrated that the Prophet said: deeds equal to those of the entire population of the world would be taken up for Enoch. That Angel was amazed by it so he asked God for permission to descend to earth and keep him company. God granted him permission so he descended to earth and kept him company. They traveled around the world, worshiping God. Enoch was amazed by what he saw of his companion’s worship, [who showed no] laziness or languor. He then asked him about it and kept on asking him until the Angel of death introduced himself and told him the story of his descent and his keeping him company. When Enoch found out, he asked him to grant three wishes:

(i) To take his soul that very instant and not return it to him—he sought God’s permission and did so;

(ii) To lift him up to Heaven and show him hell—he sought permission and did so; and

(iii) To show him Heaven—he sought permission and did so.

He entered Heaven, ate of its fruits and drank of its water. The Angel of death then told him: Leave, Prophet of God, for you have what you wanted. He refused to leave, clinging to a tree therein. He challenged the Angel, saying: God has said: Every soul shall taste of death (3:185; 21:35; 29:57). I have tasted it. He has also said: And there is not one of you but shall come to it (19:71). I have come to hell. He has said: nor shall they be ever ejected from it. (15:48) I cannot leave Heaven after having entered it.

Thereafter, God revealed to the Angel of death: My servant has overcome you with his argumentation so leave him be. So He remained in Heaven.⁹

Al-ʿArāʾis narrates the same on the authority of Wahb but says at the end: So he is alive there, worshiping God in the fourth Heaven one moment and enjoying comfort in Heaven the other.

27:101Al-Ḥakīm’s al-Mustadrak ʿalā l-Ṣaḥīḥayn says on the authority of Samura: Enoch was white, tall, large and broad-chested. He had little body hair and a lot of hair on his head. One of his eyes was bigger than the other. He had a non-leprous white spot on his chest. When God saw what he saw of the people of earth’s wrongdoing and transgression of God’s commandments, God raised him up to the sixth Heaven, which is what, And We raised him to a high place means.

A careful critic should have no doubt that these narrations are Isrāʾīliyyāt (fabrications based on Judeo-Christian tradition) that have been entertained by hands of forgery. They are rejected by the principles of Islamic sciences and unanimous fundamentals of the religion.

(3) He was called Hermes.

Al-Qafaṭī says by way of biographical note on Enoch: Philosophers (ḥukamāʾ) disagree over his birthplace, upbringing and on those he learned from before becoming a Prophet. One group says that he was born in Egypt, he was called the Hirmis (Hermes) of the Harāmisah (pl. of Hirmis). He was born in Manf. Others say that he was called ʾIrmīs (Irmis) in Greek, arabicized as Hirmis. ʾIrmīs means Mercury. Others say that his Greek name was Ṭirmīs (Tyramis). According to the Hebrews he was Khanūkh, arabicized as ʾAkhnūkh. God, Mighty and Sublime is He, calls him Enoch in His clear Arabic Book.

Those scholars say that his teacher’s name was al-Ghuthādhīmūn (Agathodaimon). Alternatively, it is said that he was ʾIghthādhīmūn the Egyptian. However, they do not say who this man was. They just say that he was one of the Greek and Egyptian Prophets. They also call him ʾŪrīn II, Enoch was ʾŪrīn III. Ghuthādhīmūn (Agathodaimon) means the one of felicity and good providence. They say: Hirmis (Hermes) left Egypt and traveled the whole of the earth. He then returned there and God raised him up to Himself from there. That was when he was eighty-two years old

Another group says that Enoch was born in Babel, grew up there and started learning—at the beginning of his life—from Seth (Shīth), son of Adam, who was his great-great-grandfather because Enoch was the son of Jared (Yārid) son of Mahalalel (Mahlāʾīl) son of Kenan (Qīnān) son of Enos (ʾAnūsh) son of Seth (Shīth). Al-Shahristānī says that Agathodaimon was Seth (Shīth).

27:102When Enoch grew up, God granted him Prophethood. Thereafter, he told mischief-makers out of the sons of Adam not to break the law of Adam and Seth (Shīth). The minority of them obeyed him but the majority disobeyed him and so he made an intention to travel away from them, ordering those who had obeyed him to do the same.

However, they felt burdened to travel away from their homelands and so they said to him: “Where will we find a place like Babel if we travel away from it?” Babel in Syriac means river. It is as if they were implying the Tigris and the Euphrates. He replied: “If we migrate toward God, He will provide us with something else”. He then set off and they set off with him and they traveled until they left this region which is called Babelyon (Bāblīyūn).They then saw the Nile and saw an uninhabited valley. So Enoch stood over the Nile, praised God and said to his group: “Babelyon (Bāblīyūn)”.

There is disagreement over what Babelyon (Bāblīyūn) means. One claim is that it means big river, another: a river like your river, another: blessed river and another that yūn in Syriac is like the superlative af ʿal form in Arabic. It thus meant the ‘Greatest River’. The region is called Babelyon by all groups among the nations, apart from the Arabs who call it the region of Miṣr, named after Miṣr son of Ḥām who settled there after the flood. However, God knows best about all of that.

Enoch and everyone who was with him stayed in Egypt calling all people to enjoin what is right and forbid what is wrong and to obey God, Mighty and Sublime is He. In his days, the people spoke in seventy-two languages. God, Mighty and Sublime is He, taught him their languages so that he could teach each group in their own language. He designed the layout of their cities. All the students of every city were gathered before him and he would familiarize them with the policy of the city. Its foundations were laid for them and every group out of the nations built a city in their own land. The number of cities built in his time was a hundred and eighty-eight cities, the smallest of which was al-Rahā. He taught them all the sciences. He was the first to derive wisdom (ḥikma) and astronomy because God, Mighty and Sublime is He, made him understand the secret and structure of the celestial sphere and the nodes or points of intersection of Heavenly bodies within it and made him understand the number of years and the calculation of time. Were it not for that, minds with all their inductive reason would not have achieved that.

27:103He established socio-political norms for every region, each set of norms being appropriate to its people. He divided the land into four quarters, appointing a king over each quarter to administer the affairs for that quarter. He instructed every king to bind the people of the quarter by a code of religious law, some of which will be referred to below. The names of the four kings were Ilawus (ʾIlāwūs), which means the Merciful (al-Raḥīm), ʾAws, Saqalabyus (Saqalabīyūs) and Awsamun (ʾAwsʿāmūn), or Ilawusamun (ʾĪlāwūs ʾĀmūn), or, Yasilukhus (Yasīlūkhus), that is, Amun (ʾĀmūn) the King.¹⁰

These hadiths and reports go back to what occurred in prehistoric times. Hence, they cannot be relied upon so much. However, the continued reference to his memory by philosophers and people of knowledge, generation after generation, their reverence and respect for him and their attribution of the fundamentals of knowledge to him reveals that he was one of the oldest father figures of knowledge. He was one of those great figures who led the human world into the realm of deductive thought and inspired it to continuously search for deeper knowledge of the divine sciences. Alternatively, if he is not one of the oldest father figures, he may have been the very first of them.