The Quran

إِنَّ رَبَّكُمُ اللَّهُ الَّذي خَلَقَ السَّماواتِ وَالأَرضَ في سِتَّةِ أَيّامٍ ثُمَّ استَوىٰ عَلَى العَرشِ يُغشِي اللَّيلَ النَّهارَ يَطلُبُهُ حَثيثًا وَالشَّمسَ وَالقَمَرَ وَالنُّجومَ مُسَخَّراتٍ بِأَمرِهِ ۗ أَلا لَهُ الخَلقُ وَالأَمرُ ۗ تَبارَكَ اللَّهُ رَبُّ العالَمينَ

Muhammad Asad

VERILY, your Sustainer is God, who has created the heavens and the earth in six aeons, and is established on the throne of His almightiness.¹ He covers the day with the night in swift pursuit, with the sun and the moon and the stars subservient to His command: oh, verily, His is all creation and all command. Hallowed is God, the Sustainer of all the worlds!

The conjunctive particle thumma which precedes this clause does not always denote order in time ("then" or "thereupon"). In cases where it is used to link parallel statements it has often the function of the simple conjunction wa ("and") - as, for instance, in 2:29 ("and has applied His design...", etc.) As regards the term 'arsh (lit., "throne" or "seat of power"), all Muslim commentators, classical and modern, are unanimously of the opinion that its metaphorical use in the Qur'an is meant to express God's absolute sway over all His creation. It is noteworthy that in all the seven instances where God is spoken of in the Qur'an as "established on the throne of His almightiness" (7:54, 10:3, 13:2, 20:5, 25:59, 32:4 and 57:4), this expression is connected with a declaration of His having created the universe.- The word yawm, commonly translated as "day" - but rendered above as "aeon" - is used in Arabic to denote any period, whether extremely long ("aeon") or extremely short ("moment"): its application to an earthly "day" of twenty-four hours is only one of its many connotations. (Cf. in this respect note 26 above, where the meaning of sa'ah - lit., "hour" - is explained.)