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Chapter 103

Timeal-ʿAṣr ( العصر )

3 verses • revealed at Meccan

»The surah that opens with the oath of the Divine One swearing by the decline of Time and humankind’s absolute loss of every single thing but righteousness, truth, patience, and faith. It takes its name from the phrase “by time” (wal- ʿāṣr) as mentioned in verse 1. The surah shows the way to salvation. The image of a declining day suggests the stage in the day, or in life, when only a short while is left for those wishing to make up for lost time.«

The surah is also known as Afternoon, The Decline of Time, The Declining Day, The Epoch, The Late Afternoon, Time and Age, Time through the Ages

بِسمِ اللَّهِ الرَّحمٰنِ الرَّحيمِ

Mir Ahmed Ali: In the name of God,, the Beneficent,, the Merciful

1
وَالعَصرِ

Mir Ahmed Ali

By1 the Time!I
  • ‘Asr’, i.e., Age, which is the continuity of time. The word ‘Asr’ meaning age or time is used in a mystic use. Commentators say it is a reference to the Age of the Holy Prophet, i.e., a period when the Lord’s Promised Last Reformer and Final Law-giver was sent into the world and stayed preaching the truth and taught men the correct ways and means by which man can rise from the ignoble and the loathsome depth of the material world into the glorious heights of spiritual bliss. Some commentators take the word ‘Asr’ to mean the ceremonial afternoon prayer and the Sixth Holy Imam Jafar ibne Muhammad As-Sadiq says it is a reference to the age when the Last one of the promised Guide or Imam, in the seed of the Holy Prophet who bears the same name Muhammad who is the son of the Eleventh Holy Imam Hasan ibne All Al-Askari, who is titled ‘Mahdi’. Taking the reference to either the age of the Holy Prophet or his Last Deputy on earth, the last Holy Imam, it will mean one and the same significance to say that those who will he benefited by the teachings or the guidance of the Great Teacher, will be the ones guided aright and those who reject any one of these two, the Last Apostle from the Lord or the Last one of the Lord’s commissioned Guides or Imams, is lost.
    ’Asr’, literally means ‘Squeezing’ or the squeezed object. It has been figuratively used for Time—in the sense of it’s becoming—meaning the squeezed of the past which unfolds as future. The other two verses give the justification of this meaning.
    The state of ever-folding and the unfolding ascribed to time in its relation to the events falling within it, represents the state of the Imam as a microcosm and a medium between the Infinite One and the finite ones and as such the Imam has been termed in the language of the Ahlul-Bait as the ‘Madaarud Dahr’, i.e., the Axis of the age and the actuating factor behind it. (A.P.)
  • Lit. Squeezing