Surah Al-Furqan, The Criterion

Surah 25 · 77 verses · revealed at Mecca

Al-Furqan means the thing that separates true from false, and it is one of the Qur'an's names for itself.

Much of the surah is taken up with the objections the Meccans raised, quoted back at them almost word for word. Why does this messenger eat food and walk in the markets. Why was an angel not sent with him. Why was he not given a treasure, or a garden to eat from. Why was the whole book not sent down at once. The surah answers each in turn, and its general reply is that a messenger sent to people has to be one of them.

Its closing passage is the reason the surah is loved. It describes the servants of the Merciful: those who walk on the earth gently, who answer the ignorant with peace, who pass the night in prayer, who are neither extravagant nor miserly but keep a balance between, who do not bear false witness, and who pass by idle talk with dignity. It runs for more than a dozen verses and is among the most complete portraits of a good life anywhere in the book.

Between the argument and the portrait sit short accounts of Noah, of 'Ad and Thamud, and of the ruined town that the Meccans passed on their trading routes and did not think about.

The surah also contains the verse in which the Prophet complains on the day of judgement that his people had abandoned this Qur'an — a verse often quoted in sermons about reading it.

Surah Al-Furqan on this site

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