3 Preface وَهٰذَا البَلَدِ الأَمينِAhmed AliAnd this Soil Secure,1 The Olive, Mount and Soil Secure are identifiable with the Mount of Olive, Mount Sinai and the Valley of Makkah, that is, Jesus, Moses and Muhammad. From the context of the struggle between good and evil which is perpetual, the Fig stands for the mount of Fig (see Raghib and Taj al-‘Arus) where Noah, the earliest of the prophets, first preached his gospel. Historically the order should have been the Fig, Mount Sinai, Olive and then Soil Secure. Geographically, however, and viewing from North to South, the names would occur as in the Surah. Rhythmically too the order marks a perfect example of the parallelism of words and thought underlining the perfect statement of the unity of outward form and inner meaning that parallelism represents.