Six Days, and a Small Brush

Then Allah says that He is the One who created the heavens and the earth in six days, and His Throne was under water.^* The Throne was under water. There was nothing else; there was water. According to a hadith, the water was upon air. So the water was upon air, and the Throne was under water. Allah has no need of it to be so; Allah placed it under water, meaning that it was floating, balanced, in whatever manner Allah (swt) willed.

Then Allah created the heavens and the earth in six days. Going into the various narrations, one finds the discussion that there are two days for the heavens, two days for the earth, and two days for the other aspects. There is no space for that here. But one of the chief reasons for mentioning the six days — and throughout the Qur'an various days are mentioned in what Allah (swt) does; and of course there were no days in those days, the sun not yet having been created, the sun coming afterwards, in the course of the process. What, then, is this notion of days? It is in our understanding of days. And the whole symbolism, the whole message of it, is that when a man does a thing, he should do it properly. Had Allah willed, He could have simply said kun. He could have desired it and willed it, and it would have been. He had no need to take six days; He had no need to make it over six days. But many of the mufassirīn explain it thus: that this is a lesson Allah is giving us, that one should do things gradually, take time over them, do them properly, and not all at once.

Here is a simple illustration. Anyone who has watched another — a father, or whoever it may be — painting a wall may well have thought: why is he using so small a brush? Get the largest brush to be had and simply lay it on. With a door especially: when one is using a gloss upon a door, a smaller brush is used, for gloss is not generally applied with a roller, the roller being for the emulsion upon walls. Why not take the largest brush and at least do the middle part with it? That is what the onlooker would have done. And the answer was: no, take it easy. Take it easy. You want everything whacked out at once. Take it easy, because done so it is refined. There is a particular and delicate way of doing things. Not everything can be done with a big brush — let it be put that way. Not everything can be done with a big brush. Allah (swt) is teaching us. And there are several other lessons here, which may be read of in further reading.

So Allah (swt) gives a number of evidences for His oneness, and for how everything relies upon Him and depends upon Him, speaking of the various aspects of it from the heavens to the earth.