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Tafsir

Scholarly commentary explaining a verse — its context, its meaning and how the scholars have understood it.

An-Nahl 16:10

Word by word

هُوَ ٱلَّذِىٓ أَنزَلَ مِنَ ٱلسَّمَآءِ مَآءً ۖ لَّكُم مِّنْهُ شَرَابٌ وَمِنْهُ شَجَرٌ فِيهِ تُسِيمُونَ

It is He who sends down rain from the sky; from it is drink and from it is foliage in which you pasture [animals].

Ibn Kathir (Abridged) English Ma'arif al-Qur'an English Tafsir Muyassar Arabic Tafsir Ibn Kathir Arabic All sources

Ma'arif al-Qur'an

Mufti Muhammad Shafi

Commentary

The word: شَجَر (shajar) in verse 10: مِنْهُ شَجَرٌ‌ فِيهِ تُسِيمُونَ (from which [ you grow ] plants, on which you pasture cattle) is mostly applied to a tree which stands on a trunk. Sometimes, it is also applied, in an absolute sense, to everything which grows on land. Included therein are grass on stems or tendrils. This is the sense meant in this verse, because the pasturing of cattle has been mentioned immediately after which is mostly related to grass.

The last word: (tusimun) is a derivation from isamah which means to leave cattle to graze freely in a pasture.

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