5) “And We Sent down Iron”

Allah (SWT) says: “And We sent down iron, in which there is great might, as well as many benefits for mankind.” (LVII: 25)

The verse tells us about the source of iron in the earth and confirms that it was brought down from space. This leads us to the study of the way iron is synthesized in the Universe.

Specialists have found out that 98% of the universe consists of hydrogen and helium, which are the lightest elements[58]; the remaining 2% comprises the other 105 heavier elements. This has made researchers conclude that atomically heavier elements are synthesized from lighter ones, and that this takes place through nuclear fusion[59] that is accompanied by tremendous energy. Researchers have found that there are stars with temperature ranging between 300,000 million and 400,000 million degrees c.[60], which makes the synthesis of iron inside them possible. When the amount of iron synthesized reaches 50% of the mass of the star and its entire core has changed into iron, the process comes to a standstill completely and the star explodes. On exploding, the star’s fragments scatter hither and thither in the vast Universe, and enter, through Allah’s predestination, the gravity fields of other celestial bodies that need iron. We see this happen even now, as we see iron meteorites come to earth. An example is what happened in the South of the Sudan when a 90 ton meteorite fell onto the city of Juba. The bulk of a meteorite usually burns when colliding with the atmosphere. The arrival of 90 tons of pure iron to the earth means that the mass of the meteorite had been several times its size when it reached the earth.

Iron meteorites fall onto the earth, the moon and other celestial bodies, which makes scientists imagine the earth, on separating from the sun, as a pile of ash

Specials say that four and a half billion years ago the Earth was formed in massive conglomeration and bombardments of meteorites and comets. The immense amount of heat energy released by the high-velocity bombardment melted the entire planet, and it is still cooling today. Denser materials like iron from the meteorites sank into the core of the Earth, while lighter silicates, other oxygen compounds, and water from comets rose near the surface.

Iron constitutes more than 30% of the Earth’s mass, for the Earth consists of a solid iron core surrounded by an outer core composed of mostly iron in its liquid state and then the mantle, which is composed of iron, magnesium, aluminum, silicon and oxygen silicate compounds. The crust is the outer rocky layer that contains a good amount of iron. The following figure shows the concentration of metals in the Earth’s various layers. We notice that the inner core is composed mostly of solid iron, while the outer core surrounding it is composed of molten iron with about 10% sulfur. Thus, iron is a significant component in the structure of the Earth’s seven layers.

Professor Armstrong, a well-known astronomer in America, who works at NASA (the National Aeronautics and Space Administration), answering our question about the way iron was formed, said: “I will tell you how all the elements in the earth were formed. We have discovered it. I myself carried out several experiments to prove what I say to you. In the structure of various elements, different atomic particles, such as electrons and protons and others, gather. To be bonded in the atom of each element, these particles require tremendous energy. In calculating the energy required to form one atom of iron, it was found to be about four times as much as the energy of the entire solar system.”[61]

When Professor Armstrong was asked about the time when scientists discovered the fact that iron came down to the Earth, he said that it had been discovered by the experimental scientists during the last fourth of the twentieth century. Prior to that time none of the specialists or researchers had mentioned anything in relation to this fact, and none of the publications of experimental science had mentioned this fact thitherto.

Physicists have managed to synthesize heavier elements from lighter ones[62] and have been able to calculate the energy required to synthesize every element and have found that to synthesize a single atom of iron we need four times the energy found in the entire solar system. That has made them sure that iron could not have been synthesized in the earth or the solar system, but it must have been created in a star outside the solar system and then came down to earth.

The commentators’ sayings:

Let’s see what the scholars of Qur’anic commentaries said regarding the verse:

The commentators divided in two groups in this respect: some interpreted the utterance literally. They said: “(We sent down iron) means that Allah sent down iron with Adam from the heaven to the Earth.” That was the saying of Ibn ‘Abbas and ‘Ikrimah. Al-Tabari, al-Qurtubi and al-Wahidi have a similar opinion.

Some commentators found themselves forced to interpret the utterance as meaning something implied, for in their opinion it could not be imagined that iron came from the sky or space, for they saw iron, in their time and environment, produced from underground. Thus they interpreted the expression “We sent down iron” as meaning “originated” or “created”. Al-Hasan said that and so did Ibn Kathir, al-Tha’alibi and al-Shawkani.

We notice from their statements that they interpreted the expression “We sent down” as “We created or made”, and there is a lot of difference between sending down and creating or making. But it was the limited human knowledge in those times that forced the commentators to divert the expression from its explicit meaning.

The Aspect of the Miracle

Man could not detect the fact that iron came down to the Earth from space till he possessed such scientific devices as made him discover what happened and is still occurring in the depths of distant stars to produce iron, and after he managed to change some light elements into heavier ones and calculated the thermal energy required to achieve that, and after having known that he cannot synthesize iron from lighter elements, for that would require as much energy as four times that of the whole solar system.  Moreover, mining iron from underground made people think that iron is unlikely to have come down from space to the Earth and made them believe that it had been created along with other terrestrial elements. Therefore, experimental sciences had not said anything whatsoever about this fact prior to the last fourth of the twentieth century. Similarly, many commentators, including contemporary ones who lived in the twentieth century, had to suggest for the expression “And We sent down iron” a meaning it does not bear.

Who, then, informed Muhammad (Peace be upon him) of this fact, which human beings had not discovered till the last fourth of the twentieth century, and which had remained a secret till then? Who other than He  Who sent down the Qur’an to His slave to be a warning to the worlds, and Who says: “And We sent Our Messengers with Clear Signs and sent down with them the Book and the Balance (of Right and Wrong), so that mankind may keep up justice. And We sent down iron, in which there is great might, as well as many benefits for mankind, that Allah may testwgo it is that will help Him (His Religion) and His Messengers in the unseen. Verily, Allah is All-Strong, All-Mighty.is HisHHhhHH” (LVII: 25)[63]

6) “Or (the unbelievers’ state) is like layers of darkness in a deep sea.”

Seas had been an unknown world till the eighteenth century. Superstitions and myths about seas were prevalent in ancient civilizations. The Romans believed that wave peaks were white horses pulling the cart of the god Neptune,[64] as they alleged. They used to practice certain rituals and celebrations to please such gods. They believed in the existence of vampire fish that had magic effect to stop ships. Greeks had similar beliefs, and their sailors attributed whirlpools to the presence of a monster they called Charybdis that swallowed huge amounts of water three times a day and then spouted it back out again.[65] Man could not know the depth of shallow shores and still waters, let alone the deep sea and the inner movements of these waters. Nor was he able to dive into these shores for more than 20 meters deep and for just a few seconds, to breathe the atmospheric air again. Even after the invention of respiratory apparatus for divers,  man could not dive deeper than 30 meters, because the water pressure increases as we go deeper. Such pressure, at the depth of 30 meters, becomes four times the atmospheric pressure at sea level,[66] and nitrogen would dissolve in the diver’s blood and disrupt his brain’s function and cause him to lose control over his movements[67]. As a result, divers would develop what is medically called the diver’s diseases. If the diver goes deeper, water pressure will be enough to crush his body.

The chronology of discovering the deep

ü     In 1300 AD, pearls divers used the first protective spectacles made of turtle shell.[68]

ü     In 1860 AD creatures were discovered at the bottom of the Mediterranean by using an iron cable.

ü     In 1865 AD Rouquayrol and Denayrouze invented independent diving apparatus.

ü     In 1893 AD Butan was able to take photos under water.[69]

ü     In 1920 AD the echo sounding method was used to measure the depths.

ü     In 1930 AD Otis Barton and William Beebe were able to dive in the first bathysphere to the depth of 3028 feet. (Masks, fins and respiratory tubes were invented then.)

ü     In 1938 AD Cousteau and Emile Gagnan carried out successful tests on a system known as Self-Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus (SCUBA).

ü     In 1958 AD Experiments were carried out on the depth submersible (the Sixties) and respiratory gills for breathing under water were invented.

ü     Man managed to dive to the deepest area in Pacific Ocean,[70] was able to stay in the deep for several days[71] and discovered vents there[72] and manufactured the yellow submarine[73] and nuclear ones.[74]

 Modern Oceanographic Information

 Studies related to marine sciences and sea depths did not practically start before the beginning of the eighteenth century, when appropriate instruments and techniques were available and when later advanced submarines were invented. After 1958, and as a result of three centuries of scientific studies and research by successive generations of oceanographers, man arrived at wonderful findings, such as the following:

1.      Sea divides into two major parts:

·                       the surface sea that is penetrated by the solar energy and light.

·                       the deep sea where the solar energy and light are non-existent.

2.    The deep sea and surface sea differ in temperature, density, pressure, the amount of sun light and the creatures living in each of them. They are separated by internal waves.

3.     Sea internal waves:

Internal waves cover the deep sea and serve as a boundary between the deep sea and the surface sea. Surface waves cover the sea surface and serve as a boundary between water and air. Internal waves were discovered in 1904.[75] The lengths of internal waves range from tens to hundreds of kilometers. Their height ranges from 10 meters and 100 meters.

4.    The deeper the sea the darker it becomes till it gets as dark as pitch from the depth of about (200) meters. At this depth there starts the thermocline that separates the warm surface waters from the cold waters of the deep. In it we find the internal waves that cover the cold water in the depth of the sea. Light disappears completely at the depth of 100 meters.

As for the darkness that overwhelms the deep, fishermen have realized that light is absorbed even in clear water and that the slopping sea bottom with its white sand changes its color gradually till it disappears completely at a certain depth. Light penetration is inversely proportional to depth. The simplest scientific instrument for measuring how deep light penetrates the ocean water is “the Secchi disc.”[76] Although this disc is an easy way to approximately measure the penetration of light into water and although it is widely used, the measurement of darkness in seawater was not achieved except after the use the photography at the end of the past century[77] and the development of the devices of measuring the intensity of light that used the photoelectric cells during the thirties of the twentieth century, and after the invention of such equipment as made it possible to dive to these deep levels.

In the footnote[78] there is more information on the intensity of light at different levels of the ocean.

In deep seas there are several layers of darkness, and light is non-existent in them. Living organisms and fish that live in them depend on chemical energy to produce light with which to find their way. Some species are blind and use means other than sight to sense their surroundings. Darkness begins at the depth of about 200 meters, and the entire visible light disappears at the depth of about 1000 meters. The structure of these fish is mostly water to withstand the enormous pressure.

Layers of darkness one over the other:

The darkness that gets greater from the depth of 500 to 1000 meters takes place in the deep sea as a result of several layers of darkness topping one another because of two main factors:

      1.        The darkness of the colors of sunlight:

Sunlight consists of seven colors (red, orange, yellow, green, indigo, violet and blue). Each color has its own wavelength.[79]

Between 3 and 30 percent of the sunlight is reflected at the sea surface.  Then almost all of the seven colors of the light spectrum are absorbed one after another in the first 200 meters, except the blue light. (Oceans, Elder and Pernetta, p. 27.)

  The penetration of light ray into water depends on its wavelength; the shorter the wavelength the deeper the light ray penetrates. The red color is absorbed at the depth of about 20 meters and then disappears. Consequently there appears the darkness of the red color. If a diver should be injured at the depth of about 25 meters and wanted to see the blood he would see it black because of the absence of the red color of the light. At the depth of about 30 meters the orange light is absorbed causing another type of darkness under the darkness of the red color, that is, the darkness of the orange color. At the depth of about 50 meters the yellow light is absorbed; at the depth of about 100 meters the green color is absorbed; at the depth of about 125 meters the violet and indigo colors are absorbed. The last color to be absorbed is the blue color at about 200 meters deep. Thus several layers of darkness of the colors of sunlight top one another because of the depth of water where colors are successively absorbed at different depths.

      2.        The Darkness of Barriers

The barrier darkness along with the color darkness contributes to the deep darkness in the deep sea. There are three types of barrier darkness:

a.    The cloud darkness:

The surfaces of deep seas are often covered with clouds as a result of evaporation. Clouds partially obstruct sunlight[80] and cause the first barrier darkness that is seen as shadow of these clouds on the earth and sea surface.

b.   The darkness of surface waves:

The slopping surfaces of surface sea waves reflect sunlight. An observer at the seashore would notice the degree of the brilliance of the light reflected on these slopping surfaces of the surface waves.[81]

c.    The darkness of internal waves:

Long, narrow sea surface slicks associated with internal waves are common features of exposed coastal environments. Such slicks, which may be accompanied by foam or debris, also have been shown to be associated with high concentrations of many types of planktonic organisms

Internal waves overwhelm and cover deep sea at the depth from 70 meters to 240 meters.[82] Millions of millions of organisms are suspended on the surfaces of internal waves. An internal wave may extend to the sea surface where these organisms appear as dirt gathering together on the sea surface, which makes them along with the inclination of the internal waves an obstacle to prevent light from penetrating into the deep sea. Thus a third layer of darkness occurs under the cloud darkness and the darkness of the surface waves.

We conclude from what has been said that the layers of darkness in the deep are:

a.     Seven layers of darkness (the seven colors of the spectrum), which top one another.

b.    The three layers of barrier darkness 1) clouds 2) surface waves and 3) internal waves. They also top one another. Thus we have ten layers of darkness.

Scientific Discoveries Related to the Verse

Experimental science, over the last three centuries and as a result of the availability of precise instruments and the findings of a large number of researchers and oceanographers, has discovered the following facts:

      1)        There are layers of darkness in deep seas topping one another. Darkness gets more intense gradually till visibility is utterly impossible. There are internal waves that cover the deep sea. The internal waves with the organisms suspended on hem prevent light from penetrating.

     2)        The layers of darkness accumulated on deep seas are ten: seven layers of darkness are caused by depth of waters, and three by barriers: clouds, surface waves and internal waves.

      3)        The waters of the seas are of two types:

·        The surface waters where light energy is found.

·        The waters of the deep over which layers of darkness are accumulated.

The Description of these Marine Secrets and Facts in the Holy Qur’an

Allah (SWT) says: “Or (the unbelievers’ state) is like the layers of darkness in a deep sea covered by waves topped by waves, topped by clouds: Layers of darkness, one above another. If a man stretches his hand, he can hardly see it. For any to whom Allah gives no light, there is no light.”(XXIV: 40) 

The Qur’an confirms the existence of layers of darkness in the deep sea. It describes the sea by the term “lujji” (deep) to emphasize that such layers of darkness are found only in deep seas, thus excluding the surface sea where such darkness is non-existent.

Linguists and Commentators explained the meaning of “lujji”. Qatadah and the author of al-Jalalain said: “Lujji” means “deep”. Al-Zamakhshari said: “’Lujji’ means deep and with large amounts of water.” Al-Tabari said: “Describing the sea as ‘lujji’ indicates its depth and abundance of water in it.” Al-Bashiri said: “It refers to something the bottom of which cannot be sounded.

Such layers of darkness form because of the depth the deep (lujji) sea. They are the layers of darkness mentioned above. Allah  (SWT) says: “Or like the layers of darkness in a deep sea”. Al-Zamakhshari said; “Accumulated layers of darkness because of the depth of the sea, the waves and the clouds.” Al-Khazin said: “’Or like the layers of darkness in a lujji sea’ means ‘deep and with abundant water…’ which means that the lujji sea has a very dark bottom because of the depth of water.”

The Qur’an mentions that the deep sea is covered by waves: “Or like the layers of darkness in a lujji sea topped by waves”.  The Verse mentions that there are othr waves atop the first waves. Allah (SWT) says: “covered by waves topped by waves...” This is a characteristic of the sea in that it has two types of waves atop one another. They are not successive waves in one place but simultaneous waves, the second type atop the first.  The verse states that over these waves, which cover the deep sea, there are other waves. Allah (SWT) says: “topped by clouds.” These other waves are none but the waves at the surface of the sea that must cover the first waves.

The verse states that the superiority of the second waves over the first waves is like the superiority of the clouds over the second waves. Allah (SWT) says: “covered by waves topped by waves, topped by clouds….”

The Verse mentions that there are waves covering the deep sea and also other waves that top the first waves, which entails the existence of a sea over the first waves and the deep sea, i.e. the surface sea that covers the second waves that are topped by clouds.

 The Qur’an confirms the role of these three barriers in forming the successive layers of darkness in the deep sea and that they are atop each other, as Allah (SWT) says: “covered by waves topped by waves, topped by clouds: Layers of darkness, one above another….” This is what some Commentators understood. Al-Imam al-Baghawi, interpreting the Verse, said: “The darkness of the first waves over that of the sea, and the darkness of the second waves over the first waves, and the darkness of the clouds over that of the second waves.” Al-Imam Ibn al-Jawzi, in his commentary, says: “Layers of darkness mean the darkness of the sea, the darkness of the first waves, the darkness of the waves that top the other waves, and the darkness caused by the clouds.”

The verse refers first to the seven layers of darkness in the deep and to the three layers of darkness caused by barriers at last: “Or like the layers of darkness in a deep sea covered by waves topped by waves, topped by clouds: Layers of darkness, one above another….”

The verse states that the above-mentioned layers of darkness caused by the depths or the barriers are atop each other. The Qur’an uses the Arabic term “Zulumat” (pl. of Zulma) “a layer of darkness” which is a plural form that is used to indicate a number between 3 and 10. This indicates that the successive layers of darkness in the deep sea are between 3 and 10. This is verified by modern science, as we have mentioned: 7 layers of darkness created by colors as a result of depths and three layers caused by barriers (internal waves, surface waves and clouds).

The verse demonstrates the gradual intensity of darkness in deep seas by using the Arabic word meaning “hardly” “If a man  stretches out his hand, he can hardly see it” which makes the expression carry two likely meanings: First: the person who stretches out his hand in these depths to look at it will not see it but with the greatest difficulty, (according to some commentators, such as al-Mubarrid and al-Tabari. Second: such a man will not see it at all (according to some other commentators, such as al-Zajjaj, Abu ‘Ubaidah, al-Farra’ and al-Naysaburi. Both interpretations are relevant, for one is true for depths closer to the surface and the other is true for depths reaching about 1000 meters, as has been stated above. See how a concise Qur’anic expression carries several correct meanings!

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