The First Trial: Persecution and the Sleepers of the Cave

These are a few young men, in the time of Decius — so this is in the Christian era. They were followers of ʿĪsā (peace be upon him), it appears, and they were in a region whose people were idolaters, persecuting the followers of ʿĪsā (peace be upon him). Many probably changed their belief under the pressure.

These young men, to avoid it — and they were of prominent families; the tafsīr, if it is consulted, says these young men were of prominent families, so they were men of influence, it appears, which is why they were particularly singled out. On the one hand they were promised high positions and great wealth and everything of that kind if they would become idolaters and turn away from — the word Christianity is best avoided here, since it carries another sense now, but in those days it meant the pure belief. On the other hand, if they would not agree, they were warned of deadly consequences, of being killed, and the rest. So at length they resolved to depart.

Outside the city, outside the region, where they came at last to rest, they found a series of caves, and said: let us stay in the caves a while. They stayed in the caves and fell asleep; and subḥān Allāh, Allah gave them a sleep. As Allah (swt) mentions, wa labithū fī kahfihim thalātha miʾatin sinīna wa izdādū tisʿā — a remarkable way for Allah to put it: three hundred and nine years that they slept.

And the way Allah describes it is remarkable, even from a scientific point of view: fa-ḍarabnā ʿalā ādhānihim fī al-kahfi sinīna ʿadadā — We struck upon their ears, so to speak. It is almost as though to say that We set headphones upon their ears; that all they could hear was white noise, in the manner in which sound cancellation works — literally so, their ears being closed off. For if the eyes alone are closed, and a man is used to the light outside, that will not wake him; what wakes him is sound, sound being probably the greatest means of shifting and shoving a man out of sleep. So their ears were closed. And at length they woke.

They supposed that only part of a day, or a day, had passed, as in ordinary sleep — there is no way for a man to think he has slept so long unless he consults the time or a clock, and they had no clocks. So now they felt hunger — after three hundred years a man will feel hunger. So they gave some of their coins, which they had with them, to one of them and said: go, quietly, and buy us something; be careful.

This is verse 19. Many copies of the Qur'an write it larger, or set some mark upon it, because those who have counted the words of the Qur'an say that this is the absolute middle word, the peak, the middle word of the whole Qur'an. Allah knows best — it has not been counted here independently, but that is what those who counted it say.

So he went out and bought something, perhaps noticing a difference already; and when he tried to give his money he was told: what kind of money is this? This is old money; it is gone now; it does not work. And, to his glad surprise, the people were all believers now.