Tafseer of The Inevitable · Al-Waaqia · 56:55
And will drink as the drinking of thirsty camels.
Important: The Arabic source text is always authoritative. This translation is a study aid and has not been verified by scholars — do not use it as a basis for religious proof or for deriving rulings (ahkam). When in doubt, always consult the Arabic text and a qualified scholar.
And His word: فَشَارِبُونَ شُرْبَ الْهِيمِ ("And they shall drink as the thirst-stricken camels drink"). The Qurʾān-reciters (al-qurrāʾ) have differed over its reading. Most of the reciters of Medina and Kufa read it شُرْبَ الْهِيمِ with a ḍamma on the shīn (shurb), while some reciters of Mecca, Basra, and Syria read it شُرْبَ الهِيمِ [with a fatḥa: sharb], (1) relying on the fact that the Prophet ﷺ said concerning the days of Minā: "They are indeed days of eating and drinking (sharb)."
And the correct view of the judgment on this, in our opinion, is to say: they are two readings, and learned men among the reciters have read according to each of the two, while the meanings of both lie close to one another. With whichever of the two the reciter reads, he is correct in his reading, for that, with respect to its fatḥa and its ḍamma, is comparable to the fatḥa in their expression "al-ḍaʿf" and "al-ḍuʿf" with its ḍamma. As for al-hīm: it is the plural of ahyam, and the feminine is haymāʾ. Al-hīm are the camels that are afflicted by a disease so that they do not become sated with water. And some of the Arabs say: hāʾim, and the feminine is hāʾima, and then they form from it the plural hīm, just as they said: ʿāʾiṭ and ʿīṭ, and ḥāʾil and ḥūl. And it is said: al-hīm is the sand, in the sense that the people of the Fire drink the boiling water just as the sand drinks the water.
* Mention of those who said that by al-hīm the thirsty camels are intended:
ʿAlī related to me, saying: Abū Ṣāliḥ related to us, saying: Muʿāwiya related to me, on the authority of ʿAlī, on the authority of Ibn ʿAbbās, concerning His word: شُرْبَ الْهِيمِ , he says: the drinking of the thirsty camels.
Muḥammad ibn Saʿd related to me, saying: my father related to me, saying: my uncle related to me, saying: my father related to me, on the authority of his father, on the authority of Ibn ʿAbbās, concerning His word: فَشَارِبُونَ شُرْبَ الْهِيمِ , he said: the thirsty camels.
Yaʿqūb related to me, saying: Ibn ʿUlayya related to us, on the authority of ʿImrān ibn Ḥudayr, on the authority of ʿIkrima, concerning His word: فَشَارِبُونَ شُرْبَ الْهِيمِ , he said: they are the sick camels, which suck up the water without becoming sated.
Ibn Ḥumayd related to us, saying: Yaḥyā ibn Wāḍiḥ related to us, saying: al-Ḥusayn related to us, on the authority of Yazīd, on the authority of ʿIkrima, concerning His word: فَشَارِبُونَ شُرْبَ الْهِيمِ , he said: the camels that are seized by thirst, and that keep on drinking until they perish.
Ibn Ḥumayd related to us, saying: Mihrān related to us, on the authority of Sufyān, on the authority of Khuṣayf, on the authority of ʿIkrima: فَشَارِبُونَ شُرْبَ الْهِيمِ , he said: they are the camels that are seized by thirst.
He said: Mihrān related to us, on the authority of Sufyān, on the authority of Ibn ʿAbbās, he said: they are the thirsty camels.
Muḥammad ibn ʿAmr related to us, saying: Abū ʿĀṣim related to us, saying: ʿĪsā related to us; and al-Ḥārith related to me, saying: al-Ḥasan related to us, saying: Warqāʾ related to us — both — on the authority of Ibn Abī Najīḥ, on the authority of Mujāhid, concerning His word: شُرْبَ الْهِيمِ , he said: the thirst-stricken camels (al-ibil al-hīm).
It was related to me on the authority of al-Ḥusayn, he said: I heard Abū Muʿādh say: ʿUbayd related to us, saying: I heard al-Ḍaḥḥāk say concerning His word: فَشَارِبُونَ شُرْبَ الْهِيمِ : al-hīm are the thirsty camels, which drink without becoming sated; a disease seizes them that is called al-huyām.
Bishr related to us, saying: Saʿīd related to us, on the authority of Qatāda, concerning His word: فَشَارِبُونَ شُرْبَ الْهِيمِ , he said: a disease among the camels in which they do not become sated.
* Mention of those who said that it is the sand:
Ibn Ḥumayd related to us, saying: Mihrān related to us, on the authority of Sufyān: فَشَارِبُونَ شُرْبَ الْهِيمِ , he said: the fine sand (al-sihla). (2)
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Footnotes:
(1) He means with a fatḥa on the shīn, as is clear from his words later in the discussion of the reading. Al-Farrāʾ explicitly mentioned the word "with a fatḥa" in what he transmitted from al-Kisāʾī, on the authority of Yaḥyā ibn Saʿīd al-Umawī, on the authority of Ibn Jurayj (Maʿānī al-Qurʾān: university photocopy no. 24059, p. 324).
(2) In (Lisān: shl) on the authority of al-Jawharī: al-sihla, with a kasra on the sīn, is sand that is not very fine. And before that he said: al-sihla and al-sahl is earth like sand that conveys the water.
