Use of 'Sama' in Qur'an & Shooting Stars | Mufti Abu Layth

another tree another another use of you know Heavens as an atmosphere would be verse 23 Surah sorry Surah 23: 18 where it clearly means atmosphere so that is so apart so apart from meaning our universe as in s or just s or meaning the Multiverse as and our universe situated in Multiverse is always called the lower Heaven which is also a quote to show that there is there is no the geocentric model of Earth is not correct un the word samat is also used for atmosphere which is fine because you

know if you send a rocket the first thing it will touch is I mean of course we are all living in atmosphere but then you would get to different layers of atmosphere and then leave our solar system and then our galaxy and if it's traveling faster than light hopefully universe and then if it you know if it is made up of purely like if you can the only thing that can leave our universe in a Multiverse sense is gravity other forces are constrain to be in our universe but separate matter gravity can leave our universe yeah yeah that's that's an explanation for why it's so weak brain bulk models will come to that one day even okay even though isn't

gravity just a curvature of SpaceTime thought I don't know that point the fluctuation of graviton the graviton we talk about in string theory the small small fluctuations that I talked about can be represented by something called closed strings so they're like this they're not attached univ can keep go from something called brain brain into bulk whereas the other particles are replaced are represented by open strings which are like this and attached over Universe

the pretty straight let's come to this that part was just pretty straightforward let's to this so so in Surah 23 verse 18 you you know God talks of sama as as the atmosphere when but that's fine like that but you know this usage of should not be confused with the universe when it's talking of the universe and universe should not be confused with Multiverse it is this this so what we're saying is that in the Quran the term s which could which means I guess it's translated as Sky Heavens uh

above as in cosmologically above not just like above me but like up there Beyond above so what we're saying is that these words have to be understood by their context um yeah so they can mean either of these differently at different times it can mean universe as well at certain times yes yeah but it it can have one more meaning and this is a meaning that many people get confused about you see a central theme in Quran is that Quran uses physical phenomena for as a spiritual metaphor and that is throughout Quran physical phenomena for

a spiritual matter okay that's a structure in Quran you know if you take it literally it just means death D blind but here you can see that Quran is using physical you know physical people might say why is Allah speaking about disabled people but it's not it's not it's not a it's it's metaphorical metaphoric that's the whole thing it's not physical it's metaphoric so the idea is that you know but the idea is that you know this this metaphor has its root in in in some physical phenomena and that's how that's how language works that's how language but you know the verse you

mentioned about ra Surah 2 verse 74 now there is something really interesting about this verse if you see what what the structure here it says there are rocks which break out which burst out to bring out water which burst to bring out water which is both physically true as well as metaphysically true because physically I told you water from came from Thea when Thea collided with Earth but that's also metaphysically true because you know sometimes if you hard-hearted and you you cry and then you might you know that might soften your heart so it's physically true metaphysically too yeah

but but then it Go the verse that we're speaking about is in Surah Bak that their hearts had hardened or your heart Allah is addressing them had become hardened so they are like stone or more severe that there are certain rocks from which rivers kind of burst

forth and there are certain Stones which will kind of break apart and water emerges from them and some which drop uh from the um consciousness of Allah or realization of Allah but yeah sorry carry on so this is really beautiful because what this verse does is see the first part of it is both physically true and metaphysically true there are Stones which break out to which Clow a slander to bring you know to which Clow a slander and what comes from them yeah K collided with earth and water came from that that's both physically true and metaphysically true

because you might cry and your heart get often but the second part sorry the last part of the verse when it says they you know they fall down because of the god Consciousness that part is only metaphysical so it takes some physical phenomena one to one metaphysical analogies but then describes a metaphysical phenomena which is purely metaphysical you cannot trace it back and Draw Something Draw a physical analogy for this so this is a structure which is repeated in Quran Quran over and over again and again at least the way I feel that there are physical phenomenas which are used as spiritual

metaphors so the question is is the word Sama also used as a spiritual metaphor the idea for that is yes Sama is used at the SC and you you can see that here where when it talks of you you know we will open the gates of heavens and they will climb thereof and they will still not accept so it's not talking of physical Heavens there are there are no physical it's talking that even if these people have spiritual experiences they will still not accept it if they are so bound oning the truth that they might not even accept their own spiritual experiences

but so clearly Quran is talking about Sama in terms of a as a spiritual metaphor but I like one particular I mean I like everything in Quran but one thing that really strikes me is this particular usage of samay the lowest Heaven if you look at it in terms and then there being stars in the lowest heaven now if you look at it there are star physically there are stars in our universe that's fine but if you look at a metaphysical interpretation of this verse if you look at World civilizations MH confession in China talks of

sanan zor RA in Iran talks of Mazda you know in India we have the tradition of ishwar and Brahman you know in Semitic traditions we have that in Christianity we have God the heavenly father and in Islam of course we have Allah and in Judaism we have yahwah like if you see World Civilization they they stand on the banks of these on the back of these people who are like stars and who have been talking about Divine and doing of good but this is the lest realization in Sufi sense this would be the lowest realization this would be the lowest structure the apparent law apparent you know moral structure of the world lies

on the banks on the backs of these great shining stars which we call prophets and they are throughout they are scattered throughout human history and if there are Ali of course there are aliens I would expect something similar for them but uh you know all the world civilizations had the their own share of profits be it Ram or chrisan be it confusious be it Zorra be it Jesus be it Moses be Muhammad like the World Civilization is spammed by them like all of it like spam in this Vector sense of covering all the vector so the so the whole world's not in this male sense of spam music but like the world

civilizations are covered but this is the lowest of the spiritual realm and then there are higher Realms of spirituality I think in Buddhism you have these Seven Realms of spiritual enlightenment some work should be done on that if Quran is talking of that but then I what I find interesting here is that it also says these stars are used as mles as right okay it can't be talking of physical Stars being used as physical missiles against the physical sh that would be strange but it is definitely like just like the rocks break down

because of fear like God Consciousness here the verse now shifts to a totally metaphysical un and in a way this is true because you see what happens is that uh World in world if you see there are prophetic systems that have been established there are these great people who have come throughout world civilization and they have geared the World Civilization towards morality but then these these these structures in course of time have got corrupted and when they have got corrupted a new star comes and hits these corrupted shtin in a certain in a nice way and shtin here means people

like like the system of Moses had got corrupted by Pharisees Jesus came as this Burning star and hit them you can look at it in this way and the idea that you you can use shtin for people is also clear from Quran itself because Quran says I think in what does it say in Sur bakar that when they go back to their sh here it's not referring to you know I mean the Quran clearly does use the term shim to mean human beings it does you know it says uh clearly I mean it uses that in several locations y yeah so so

uh so in this sense the way I would look at it is that the world the the moral structure of world the moral structure of world civilizations stands because of these bright starlike human beings be the ram Christian be it confus be it Zorra be it Jesus be Muhammad who drive these civilization to moral truths and then if if these systems get corrupted for example the Jewish even though Judaism is a great religion all due respect and love for Judaism that I [Music] have because of Pharisees it had got corrupted Jesus came as a burning star

and hid those phes and brought back the spiritual message of T and became a walking T so what what you're saying is these verses to do with uh you know like sh that these are kind of like a stoning or sh they're like Flames that attack the shtin uh is is it's allegorical in the sense that it's a metaphor for these luminary personalities and figures throughout history like zarathustra other people prophets uh people like Buddha but also

Jesus Moses the prophet Muhammad sallallahu alaihi wasallam these these are these bright stars that Allah says this yeah okay so especially especially people like confus Rah Krishan Zorra Jesus Muhammad I think for my understanding of Buddhism Buddha was a Mystic but not a prophet but we'll come to those distinctions someday when we discuss the differences between them but Zorra clearly was a prophet confusious clearly was a prophet I mean anybody who has studied a bit of Chinese religion tan and Shand are all like when Quran was

translated into Chinese was used for God and shende is clearly doesn't have but that's interesting because isn't I'm pretty sure that isn't Tian is also for sky as well like the abstract sense not in a literal because tan has a will so it's it's this idea of Brahman in Hinduism it's very similar to that because Tian has a will and it's ENT identified with shind which is which means the high Lord if I remember correctly but which has this idea of you know a God because if it's not this abstract idea of you know an abstract impers because confusious says

I am implementing the will of the heaven and I H will not let his servant suffer till he completes his mission it's almost prophetic like it's so beautiful when you read these things like I'm so mood when I read conf writings of confusious or Zorra like uh mindblowing like you can see like when I this is the thing when you read history you see God when you read science you see God I see God like look right and left wherever you turn your face you shall see the continence of God that is you know that is amazing Professor because one would assume or may assume that as being a professor within science You' probably

be more distant from uh God and religion and uh but you seem to be you know so passionate about and enthusiastic about religion and seeing God and everything this is H I mean it's almost counterintuitive I wouldn't have imagined you to be this way but you are that's it's it's really uh fascinating to see that yeah thank you but yeah let's so so I think point this point is clarified so so the the idea of Heaven in a as a spiritual metaphor should not be confused with the heaven as our

universe should not be confused with the use of Heaven as atmosphere should not be confused with Heaven as a Multiverse the term in the Quran is used in its own context read the context people that's what Professor is saying yeah and if you want to take you know if you want to blame Quran because it you it says that you know stars in the lowest Heaven are used as misiles against devil why go there just say Quran says Quran also says anyone who has been blind in this world will be blind in Hereafter just blame you know you can you can take ridiculous conclusions from this saying that oh blind people will not get their sight in Hereafter I mean if I mean if you want to you know if you want to if you want

to stick to literalism like that any text can be made and just to be clear that the people in the past when they would have read that you [Music] know they wouldn't have they would have understood it for what it meant they wouldn't have been trapped in the very textualist literal perspective they wouldn't have like they would have understood that this meant that you know here blind who whosoever is blind in this world is not speaking about disable kind of uh disability blindness it's speaking about whosoever is blind to turn away from the

truth true so so that that does I think that