Sūrat al-Anbiyāʾ
Section 15 of 21 · Surah Studies · Mufti Abdul Rahman Mangera
The Call from the Darkness
Then Allah (swt) speaks of Dhū al-Nūn, who is Yūnus (peace be upon him). And his famous duʿāʾ is given here. He calls out in the darkness:
وَذَا ٱلنُّونِ إِذ ذَّهَبَ مُغَـٰضِبًا فَظَنَّ أَن لَّن نَّقْدِرَ عَلَيْهِ فَنَادَىٰ فِى ٱلظُّلُمَـٰتِ أَن لَّآ إِلَـٰهَ إِلَّآ أَنتَ سُبْحَـٰنَكَ إِنِّى كُنتُ مِنَ ٱلظَّـٰلِمِينَ
“And (remember) Dhunnūn (the man of the fish, namely Yūnus X), when he walked away in anger and thought that We would never put him to trouble. Then, he called (Us) in depths of darkness saying, “There is no god but You. Pure are You. Indeed I was among the wrongdoers”.” (21:87)
Lā ilāha illā anta. Consider it: there is no god except You. Subḥānaka: You are pure; You are glorified. I was of the oppressors. That is a powerful duʿāʾ. It contains tawḥīd within it: a declaration of the oneness of Allah, a declaration of His transcendence, and then a declaration of one's own wrongdoing.
فَٱسْتَجَبْنَا لَهُۥ وَنَجَّيْنَـٰهُ مِنَ ٱلْغَمِّ ۚ وَكَذَٰلِكَ نُـۨجِى ٱلْمُؤْمِنِينَ
“So We responded to him and rescued him from the distress. And this is how We rescue the believers.” (21:88)
Fa-stajabnā lahu: again, We answered him. And We delivered him from that grief. Wa kadhālika nunjī al-muʾminīn: and this is the lesson for us; this is the way We deliver, and give success and safety, to the believers.
Then He speaks of Zakariyyā (peace be upon him), and of how We gave him an inheritor in the form of Yaḥyā (peace be upon him). And again, fa-stajabnā lahu: We answered him.
All of this is about answering. Read it, and you will find that if we are in trouble, one of these troubles will answer to ours — whether a sickness, or a difficulty, or something we want badly and are not getting. All those instances are given here. They are well worth the reading. One must keep coming back to these verses, subḥānAllāh. One must keep coming back to these verses.