12 Preface وَلَقَد خَلَقنَا الإِنسانَ مِن سُلالَةٍ مِن طينٍYusuf AliMan We did create from a quintessence (of clay);1In this beautiful passage, God’s creative work, as far as man is concerned, is recapitulated, in order to show man’s real position in this life, and the certainty of the future: to which he was referred for his reward in verses 10-11 above. For the various stages of creation, seen. 120 to 2:117. Here we are not concerned with the earliest stage, the creation of primeval matter out of nothing. It is also a process of creation when inorganic matter becomes living matter. Thus inorganic constituents of the earth are absorbed into living matter by way of food and living matter reproduces itself by means of sperm. This is deposited in the ovum and fertilises it and rests for a time in security in the mother’s womb. The first change in the fertilised ovum is the conversion into a sort of clot of thickly congealed blood; the zygote cells grow by segmentation; then the mass gradually assumes shape in its growth as a foetus. From the lump develop bones and flesh and organs and a nervous system. So far man’s growth is like that of an animal, but a further process takes place which makes the infant animal into the infant man. This is the breathing of God’s spirit into him (15:29): that process need not be precisely at a given point of time. It may be a continuous process parallel to that of physical growth. The child is born: it grows; it decays and dies; but after death another chapter opens for the individual, and it is to remind us of this most momentous chapter that the previous stages are recapitulated.