The building of the ship by Nuh / The flood and the people of Nuh / The landing of the ship of Nuh

The building of the ship by Nuh

« And construct the ship under Our eyes and Our revelation: and address Me not concerning those who wronged: they will be drowned. »

And that because Nuh (peace be upon him): when he despaired of their amendment: and their success: and saw that there was in them no good: and they reached causing him harm: and opposing him: and denying him: by every way of deeds: and sayings: he invoked against them an invocation of anger for Allah: Allah therefore answered his invocation: and granted his request: « And indeed Nuh called Us: what excellent answerers We are: and We saved him: and his family: from the great distress. » « And Nuh: when he called Us before: We answered him therefore: and saved him: him and his family: from the great distress. » « My Lord: my people denied me: so judge between me and them with a decisive judgment: and save me: and whoever of the believers is with me. » He invoked his Lord: « I am overcome: so aid Me.

» « My Lord: aid me: because they deny me. » « For their sins they were drowned: then entered into a Fire: they found for themselves: against Allah: no helpers. » « And Nuh said: my Lord: leave upon the earth no dweller of the disbelievers: if You leave them: they mislead Your servants: and beget none but wicked ingrates. » So gathered against them their sins: of their disbelief: and their wickedness: and the invocation of their prophet against them: Allah the Most High commanded him then to construct the ship: which is the great vessel having no like before it: nor will there be after it its like: and Allah the Most High announced to him beforehand: that when His command comes: and He befalls them with His assault which is not repelled from the criminal people: he would not return to him about them: nor plead: for perhaps at beholding the punishment descending upon them a tenderness for his people might seize him: for the report is not the beholding: « and address Me not concerning those who wronged: they will be drowned.

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« And he constructed the ship: and every time an assembly of his people passed by him: they mocked him. » That is: they derided him: deeming improbable what He threatened them with: he said: « if you mock us: we shall mock you: as you mock: we are those who mock you: and wonder at you: in your persistence upon your disbelief: and your obstinacy requiring the falling of the punishment upon you: and its befalling you: you will then know to whom comes a punishment disgracing him: and upon whom descends an enduring punishment. » And their qualities were the heavy disbelief: and the extreme obstinacy in this world: and thus in the Hereafter: for they deny also that a messenger of Allah came to them: Moussa ibn Isma'il narrated to us: Abd al-Wahid ibn Ziyad narrated to us: al-A'mach narrated to us, from Abu Salih: the messenger of Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) said: « Nuh will come (peace be upon him): "Have you conveyed? "Yes.

"O Lord: has he conveyed to you? "No: no prophet came to us. "Who bears witness for you? "Muhammad: and his community.

» « And thus We made you a middle community: that you be witnesses over the people: and the messenger a witness over you. » (al-Baqara, 143)

Justice: this community bears witness to the testimony of its prophet, the truthful, the confirmed: that Allah sent Nuh with the truth: and sent down upon him the truth: and commanded him with it: and that he conveyed it to his community in the most complete of ways: and the most perfect: and left nothing of what benefits them in their religion but that he commanded them it: and nothing of what may harm them but that he forbade them it: and warned them of it: and such is the state of all the messengers: to the point that he warned his people of the Antichrist deceiver: though he did not expect his going forth in their time: out of caution for them: and solicitude: and mercy for them: 'Abdan narrated to us: 'Abdallah narrated to us, from Yunus: Ibn 'Oumar said: the messenger of Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) stood among the people: praised Allah as He merits: then mentioned the Antichrist: « I signal him to you: and there is no prophet but that he warned his people: Nuh warned his people: but I say to you about him a word no prophet said to his people: you know that he is one-eyed: and that Allah is not one-eyed.

» And this hadith is in the two Sahihs also: from the hadith of Chayban ibn Abd ar-Rahman, from Yahya ibn Abi Kathir, from Abu Salama ibn Abd ar-Rahman, from Abu Hurayra: he said: « Shall I not tell you about the Antichrist a story no prophet told his people: he is one-eyed: and he will come with the likeness of Paradise: and the Fire: that is the Paradise: and that is the Fire: and I warn you as Nuh warned his people. » The wording of al-Bukhari.

When Allah answered his command: to plant a tree to make of it the ship: he planted it: and waited for it a hundred years: then carved it another hundred: in forty years: and Allah knows best: Muhammad ibn Ishaq said: and it was of the wood of sādj: of the pine: and that is the text of the Torah: and He commanded him to make its length eighty cubits: and its width fifty cubits: and to coat its exterior and interior with pitch: and to make for it a prow parting: that cleaves the water: and it was said: « Its length was three hundred cubits: upon a width of fifty cubits: and that is what is in the Torah: according to what I saw: six hundred: upon a width of three hundred: one thousand two hundred cubits upon a width of six hundred cubits. » And it was said: its length was a thousand cubits: and its width a hundred cubits: and its height thirty cubits: and it was three levels: each of ten cubits: the lower for the beasts: and the wild beasts: the middle for the people: and the upper for the birds: and its door was in its width: and it had a lid above it: fitted upon it.

« My Lord: aid me: because they deny me. » « We revealed therefore to him: construct the ship under Our eyes and Our revelation. » That is: by Our command to you: and by Our vision of your making it: and Our witnessing of that: to guide you to the correct in its making: « Then when Our command comes: and the oven boils: introduce therein of each kind two mates: and your family: except him against whom the word preceded among them: and address Me not concerning those who wronged: they will be drowned.

» There came to him by His great: and lofty command: that when His command comes: and His assault befalls: he would load in this ship: of each kind two mates: of the animals: and of all that has in it a soul: of edibles: and other: for the survival of its kind: and his household: except him against whom the word preceded among them: meaning: except whoever was a disbeliever: for the irrevocable invocation had permeated him: and the assault which is not repelled became obligatory upon him: and He commanded him not to plead for them: when there should befall them the great punishment He decreed upon them: the Effective of what He wills: as we presented its clarification before.

The « oven » with the majority of scholars: is the face of the earth: meaning: the earth would gush from all its sides: until the ovens gushed: which are the sites of the fire: « the oven is a spring in India: in Koufa: in Jezireh. » What is meant by the oven: the rising of the morning: its shining and brightness: that is: at that time: load therefore therein of each kind two mates: and this is a strange saying.

« Until, when Our command came: and the oven boiled: We said: load therein of each kind two mates: and your family: except him against whom the word preceded: and those who believed: but none believed with him except few. » This is a second command: upon the befalling of the punishment on them: that he load therein of each kind two mates: and in the Book of the People of the Book: that he was commanded to load of everything eaten seven pairs: and of what is not eaten: two mates: male and female: « two »: were we to make that the object: and as for making it an emphasis of « two mates »: and the object omitted: there is no contradiction: and Allah knows best.

And some mentioned: that the first of the birds to enter was the budgerigar: and the last of the animals was the donkey: and that Iblis entered clinging to the tail of the donkey. My father narrated to us: Abdallah ibn Salih narrated to us: al-Layth narrated to me: Hicham ibn Sa'd narrated to me, from Zayd ibn Aslam: he said: when Nuh loaded in the ship of each kind two mates: his companions said: « And how shall we be secure: and how shall the livestock be reassured: with the lion among us? » Allah subjected to him the fever: and it was the first fever descended upon the earth: « And the mouse spoils our food: and our goods. » Allah revealed therefore to the lion: and it sneezed: and the cat came out of it: and the mouse hid from it.

It is without chain. « And your family: except him against whom the word preceded »: meaning: whoever of them the invocation was answered: among the disbelievers: and he was among them his son Yām: who drowned: « and those who believed: but none believed with him except few. » This despite the length of the duration: and the standing among them: and their firm invocation: night and day: by all kinds of discourse: and forms of tact: and threatening: and warning at once: and encouragement: and promise at another.

And there was divergence over the number of those who were with him in the ship: from Ibn Abbas: they were eighty souls: with their wives: and from Ka'b al-Ahbar: they were seventy-two souls: and it is said: they were ten: they were only Nuh: and his three sons: and their four wives: except the wife of Yām: who estranged herself: and isolated herself: and followed another path than the path of salvation: she was not fair when she estranged: and this saying about her contradicts the apparent of the verse: rather it is a text that there rode with him: besides his family: a group of those who believed in him: « and save me: and whoever of the believers is with me »: they were seven: as for the wife of Nuh: who is the mother of all his sons: and they are Ham: Wisam: Yafith: and Yām: and the People of the Book call her Canaan: and he is the one who drowned: and 'Abir: who died before the flood: she drowned with the drowned: and she was of those against whom the word preceded: for her disbelief: and with the People of the Book: she was in the ship: it is possible she disbelieved after that: or that she was deferred to the Day of Resurrection: « leave not upon the earth any dweller of the disbelievers.

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« Then, when you are settled: you and those with you: upon the ship: say: praise to Allah who delivered us from the wrongdoing people: and say: my Lord: cause me to land at a blessed landing: and You are the best of those who cause to land. » He commanded him to praise his Lord: for what He subjected to him of this ship: by which He saved him: and decided between him and his people: and comforted his eye against those who opposed him: and denied him: He who created all the couples: « and who made for you the ships: and the livestock: upon which you ride: that you settle upon their backs: then remember the favor of your Lord: when you settle upon it: and say: glory to He who subjected this to us: we could not have harnessed it: and to our Lord we surely return.

» (az-Zoukhrouf, 12-14) And thus one is commanded of invocation at the beginning of affairs: that it be upon good: and blessing: and that its outcome be praiseworthy: when he emigrated: « Say: my Lord: cause me to enter an entrance of truth: and cause me to exit an exit of truth: and make for me from Yourself an authority helping. » (al-Isra, 80)

And Nuh (peace be upon him) complied with this recommendation: and said: « Embark in it: in the name of Allah: its course and its anchorage: my Lord is indeed Forgiving: Merciful. » That is: in the name of Allah: the beginning of its going: and its ending: « my Lord is indeed Forgiving: Merciful »: that is: and Possessor of a painful punishment: while being Forgiving: Merciful: His assault is not repelled from the criminal people: as He befall the people of the earth: who disbelieved in him. « And it sailed with them: through waves: like mountains. » And that because Allah the Most High sent from the heaven rain the earth had never known before him: nor will it rain after him: like the mouths of waterskins: and He commanded the earth: and it gushed from all its valleys: and all its sides: he invoked his Lord: « I am overcome: aid Me.

The flood and the people of Nuh

» « We opened therefore the gates of the heaven: with water pouring down: and burst the earth into springs: and the water met upon an order already decreed: and We carried him upon a vessel: of planks: and of nails. » The nails: « sailing under Our eyes »: that is: by Our protection: Our assistance: Our guarding: and Our witnessing of it: « a recompense for him who was denied. »

Ibn Jarir and others mentioned: that the flood was on the thirteenth of the month of Ab: in the heat of summer: « We carried therefore: when the water rose: you: in the floating vessel »: meaning: the ship: « to make it for you a reminder: and that a receptive ear retain it. » The water rose above the highest mountain on the earth fifteen cubits: and that is what is with the People of the Book: eighty cubits: and it covered all the earth: its length: and its width: its plains: and its valleys: its mountains: and its deserts: and its sands: and there remained upon the face of the earth of those who were upon it of living beings: no eye that blinks: nor small: nor great. The imam Malik said: « The people of that time had filled the plain: and the mountain: there was not a spot on the earth but it had a possessor: and a holder. » Ibn Abi Hatim related both.

« And Nuh called his son: who was apart: O my son: embark with us: and be not with the disbelievers. He said: I shall take refuge upon a mountain: protecting me from the water. He said: there is no protector today from the command of Allah: except He upon whom He has mercy: and the wave interposed between them: he was therefore of the drowned. » And this son is Yām: brother of Sam: and of Ham: and of Yafith: his name is Canaan: and he was a disbeliever: an actor of no righteousness: contradicting his father in his religion: and his school: he perished therefore with those who perished.

« And it was said: O earth: swallow your water: and O sky: withhold: and the water subsided: and the matter was accomplished: and it settled upon the Djoudi: and it was said: away with the wrongdoing people. » That is: when He finished with the people of the earth: and there remained of it no one: of those who worshipped other than Allah (exalted is He): Allah commanded the earth: to swallow its water: and commanded the heaven: to withhold: meaning: to hold back the rain: « and the water subsided »: meaning: decreased from what it was: « and the matter was accomplished »: meaning: there befell them what had preceded in His knowledge: and His destiny: of His making them undergo what came upon them: « and it was said: away with the wrongdoing people »: meaning: they were called at the voice of power: that they be far from the mercy: and the forgiveness: « they denied him therefore: We saved them therefore: and those who were with him in the ship: and drowned those who denied Our signs: they were a blind people.

» « They denied him therefore: We saved him therefore: and those with him in the ship: and made them successors: and drowned those who denied Our signs: so see how was the end of those who were warned. »

« And We aided him against the people who denied Our signs: they were an evil people: We drowned them therefore all. » « We saved him therefore: and those with him in the laden ship: then We drowned thereafter the rest: there are in that indeed signs: but most of them were not believers: and your Lord is indeed the Mighty: the Merciful. » And the Most High said: « We saved him therefore: and the people of the ship: and made it a sign for the worlds. » « Then We drowned the others.

» And He said: « And indeed We left it as a sign: is there then anyone who will remember? How then were My punishment: and My warning? And We have indeed made the Quran easy for remembrance: is there then anyone who will remember? » « For their sins they were drowned: then entered into a Fire: they found for themselves: against Allah: no helpers.

» « And Nuh said: my Lord: leave not upon the earth any dweller of the disbelievers: if You leave them: they mislead Your servants: and beget none but wicked ingrates. » And Allah the Most High answered his invocation: to Him the praise: and the favor: and there remained of them no eye that blinks.

Abu Ja'far ibn Jarir: and Abu Muhammad ibn Abi Hatim: related in their two Tafsirs: by the route of Moussa ibn Ya'qoub az-Zam'i: from Faïd: client of Ubaydallah ibn Abi Rafi': that Ibrahim ibn Abd ar-Rahman ibn Abi Rabi'a informed him that Aïsha: mother of the believers: informed him: « Had Allah had mercy on one of the people of Nuh: out of respect for the mother of the infant. » « Nuh (peace be upon him) remained among his people a thousand years: less fifty years: and he planted a hundred years the tree: which grew great: and went in every direction: then he cut it: then made it a ship: and they passed by it: and mocked him: you make a ship on land: how will it sail? » « You will know.

» When he finished: and the water gushed: and went into the paths: the mother of the infant feared for him: and she loved him an intense love: she went out with him toward the mountain: until she reached its third: when the water reached her: she went out with him until she settled upon the mountain: when the water reached her neck: she lifted him with her two hands: they both drowned: « Had Allah had mercy on one of them: out of respect for the mother of the infant. » And this is a strange hadith: and it has been related from Ka'b al-Ahbar: and Mujahid: and more than one: something resembling this story: and it is more fitting for this hadith to be a mawquf: received from the like of Ka'b al-Ahbar: and Allah knows best.

The point: that Allah left no dwellers of the disbelievers: that 'Ouj ibn 'Anouq: son of 'Inaq: was present from before Nuh: until the time of Moussa: and they say: he was a disbeliever: rebel: tyrant: obstinate: outside of right guidance: his mother 'Anouq daughter of Adam bore him of fornication: and that he took with his height the fish: from the depths of the seas: and roasted it in the sun: and that he said to Nuh: « What is this little seat of yours? »: and mocked him: and they mention that his height was three thousand three hundred and thirty-three cubits: and a third: and other than that of such nonsense: were it not that it is written in many books of exegesis: and other histories: and the days of the people: we would not have engaged with relating it: for its fall: and its shallowness: and then it contradicts the rational: and the transmitted.

As for the rational: how is it permitted therein that Allah destroy the son of Nuh: for his disbelief: while his father is the prophet of the community: and the chief of the people of faith: and not destroy 'Ouj ibn 'Anouq: who is the most unjust: and most rebellious: according to what they mentioned: and how would Allah not have mercy on one of them: nor the mother of the infant: nor the infant: and leave this claimant: the tyrant: the obstinate: the wicked: the hardened disbeliever: the rebellious devil: according to what they mentioned?! « Then We drowned the others. » « My Lord: leave not upon the earth any dweller of the disbelievers. » And this height they mentioned contradicts what is in the two Sahihs from the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him): that he said: « Allah created Adam: and his height sixty cubits: then creation has not ceased to diminish: until now.

» And it is the text of the Truthful: the Confirmed: preserved: who speaks not of passion: it is only a revelation revealed: « then creation has not ceased to diminish: until now »: meaning: the people have not ceased being in diminution in their height from Adam: until the day he informed of that: and hastening until the Day of Resurrection.

And this requires that there not have existed of the descendants of Adam anyone taller than him: how then is this abandoned: and neglected: and recourse made to the sayings of the liars: the disbelievers: of the People of the Book: who altered the Books of Allah sent down: and distorted them: and interpreted them: and placed them in other than their places: what then do you think of what they take pride in transmitting: or are trusted with: they the liars: the treacherous: upon them the continuing curse of Allah: until the Day of Resurrection: and I do not think this report about 'Ouj ibn 'Anaq to be but an invention: of some of their heretics: and their profligates: who were enemies of the prophets: and Allah knows best.

Then Allah the Most High mentioned Nuh's appeal to his Lord: concerning his son: and his question to Him about his drowning: by way of inquiry: and investigation: « and your family: except him against whom the word preceded among them »: this one was of those against whom the word preceded among them: in that he would drown by his disbelief: and for that the destinies carried him to turn aside from the domain of the people of faith: he drowned therefore with his party: the people of disbelief: and rebellion: « It was said: O Nuh: descend with peace from Us: and blessings upon you: and upon communities of those with you: and communities to whom We shall give enjoyment: then will touch them from Us a painful punishment.

The landing of the ship of Nuh

And the imam Abu Ja'far ibn Jarir mentioned, by the route of Ali ibn Zayd ibn Jou'dane: from Youssouf ibn Mihran: the disciples said to Issa ibn Maryam: « Will you send to us a man who saw the ship: that he tell us of it? » He departed with them: until he came to a mound of earth: he took a handful of that earth in his palm: « Do you know what this is? » « Allah and His messenger know. » « It is the heel of Ham ibn Nuh.

» And he struck the mound with his staff: « Rise by the permission of Allah. » And there he was: standing: shaking the earth from his head: he had aged. « Issa (peace be upon him): thus you died? » « No: but I died while young: but I thought it was the Hour: from there I aged.

» « Tell us then of the ship of Nuh. » « Its length was one thousand two hundred cubits: and its width six hundred cubits: and it was three levels: a level therein for the beasts: and the wild beasts: and a level therein for the humans: and a level therein for the birds: when the droppings of the beasts became many: Allah (exalted is He) revealed to Nuh (peace be upon him): pierce the tail of the elephant: he pierced it: and there fell from it a pig: and a sow: who fell upon the droppings: and when the mouse pierced the ship: gnawing it with its tooth: Allah (exalted is He) revealed to Nuh (peace be upon him): strike between the two eyes of the lion: there came out of its muzzle a tomcat: and a female cat: who fell upon the mouse. » « How did Nuh (peace be upon him) know the lands had been drowned?

He sent the crow: to bring him the report: and it found a carcass: and settled upon it: he invoked against it the fear: and for that it does not grow familiar with the houses: then he sent the dove: it came with a leaf of olive in its beak: and clay upon its feet: and he knew the lands had emerged: he ringed therefore its neck with the green color in its neck: and invoked for it to be in friendliness: and safety: from there it grows familiar with the houses. » They said: « O messenger of Allah: shall we not go with him to our families: that he sit with us: and tell us? » « How would follow you he who has no provision? » He said to him therefore: « Return by the permission of Allah »: so he returned to earth: and this is a very strange athar.

And 'Ilba ibn Ahmar related, from 'Ikrima: eighty men were with Nuh in the ship: with their families: and that they were in the ship one hundred and fifty days: and that Allah directed the ship toward Mecca: and it circled the House forty days: then directed it to the Djoudi: and it settled upon it: Nuh (peace be upon him) sent therefore the crow: to bring him the report of the earth: it went: and settled on the carcasses: and delayed on them: he sent therefore the dove: it came to him with the leaf of the olive: and stained its feet with clay: Nuh knew therefore the water had withdrawn: he descended to the lower part of the Djoudi: and built a village: and named it Thamaneen: they rose one morning: and their tongues had become confused in eighty tongues: one of them: the tongue of the Arab: and some of them did not understand the speech of others: and Nuh (peace be upon him) interpreted for them.

They rode in the ship on the tenth day of the month of Rajab: and they sailed one hundred and fifty days: and it settled with them upon the Djoudi a month: and their going out of the ship was on the day of 'Achoura of Mouharram: and Ibn Jarir related a report raised to the Prophet: conforming to this: and that they fasted that day. Chibl narrated to us: the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) passed by some people of the Jews: they said: « This is the day Allah saved Moussa: and the Children of Israel from the drowning: and drowned in it Pharaon: in gratitude to Allah (exalted is He). » The Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) said: « We are worthier of Moussa than you: and we fast this day. » And this hadith has a witness in the Sahih: from another route: and the strange is the mention of Nuh also: and Allah knows best.

It is mentioned: that they ate of the surplus of their provisions: and of grains that were with them: which they had carried: and they ground the grains that day: and kohl'd their eyes with antimony: to strengthen their sights: when they were dazzled by the light: after they had been in the darkness of the ship: and all of this: nothing is established of it: and only interrupted athars are mentioned in it: from the Children of Israel: not relied upon: nor taken as example: and Allah knows best.

When Allah willed to stop that flood: He sent a wind upon the face of the earth: the water stilled: and the springs of the earth were closed: and the water began to decrease: and subside: and recede: and the settling of the ship upon the Djoudi was: according to the claim of the People of the Torah: in the seventh month: on its seventeenth night passed: and on the first day of the tenth month: the heads of the mountains were seen: then when forty days passed after that: Nuh opened the porthole of the ship he had made in it: then sent the crow: to look for him what the water had done: it returned not to him: then he sent the dove: she returned to him: and found not for her feet a place: he extended therefore his hand to the dove: and took her: and brought her in: then seven days passed: then he sent her to look for him: she returned in the evening: with in her beak a leaf of an olive: Nuh knew therefore the water had lessened from the face of the earth: then he remained seven days: then he sent her: and she returned not to him: Nuh knew therefore the earth had emerged: when the year was complete: between what Allah sent the flood: and what Nuh sent the dove: and entered a single day of the first month: of the second year: the face of the earth emerged: and the dry land appeared: and Nuh removed the cover of the ship.

And in the second month of the second year: in its twenty-sixth nights: « It was said: O Nuh: descend with peace from Us: and blessings upon you: and upon communities of those with you: and communities to whom We shall give enjoyment: then will touch them from Us a painful punishment. » « Go out of the ship: you: and your wife: and your sons: and the wives of your sons with you: and every beast that is with you: and grow: and multiply upon the earth. » They went out therefore: and Nuh built an altar for Allah (exalted is He): and took of every lawful beast: and the lawful bird: and slaughtered them: an offering toward Allah (exalted is He): and Allah covenanted with him not to repeat the flood upon the people of the earth: and made the reminder of the covenant toward him the bow which is in the cloud: which is the rainbow: we already related from Ibn Abbas: that it is a protection from drowning: and in it is an indication: that it is a bow: without a string: meaning: from this cloud will not come a flood: like the first time: and Allah knows best.

And a group of the ignorance of the Persians: and the people of India: denied the occurrence of the flood: and others of them acknowledged it: « It was only in the land of Babylon: and it reached us not: and are we not descended: inheriting dominion: elder from elder: from Kayoumorth »: meaning Adam: « until this time of ours. » And that is the saying of whoever of the heretics of the Magians said it: worshippers of fires: and followers of the devil: and this from them is a sophism: and an atrocious disbelief: and an extreme ignorance: a defying of the sensed things: and a belying of the Lord of the earth: and the heavens: and the people of the religions: relating from the messengers of the Most Merciful: with the mass transmission among the people: in all the ages: have been unanimous on the occurrence of the flood: and that it covered all the lands: and Allah left none of the disbelievers in worship: in answer to the invocation of His prophet: aided: preserved: and in execution of what preceded in the destiny: irrevocable.