« Coran, hadith et savants : la Cosmologie » : différence entre les versions

Les lieux "levant" et "couchant" (parfois traduits en "orient" et "occident") sont souvent décrits en plus de détails dans les hadiths, mais également dans la Sirah. Ces lieux sont littéralement décrit comme les lieux où le soleil se lève et se couche à chaque extrémité de la Terre.{{Quote|[https://sunnah.com/abudawud:4002 Sunan Abu Dawud 4002]|Je me trouvais derrière le Messager d’Allah (ﷺ), qui montait un âne alors que le soleil se couchait. Il me demanda : « Sais-tu où il se couche ? » Je répondis : « Allah et Son Messager savent mieux. » Il dit : « '''Il se couche dans une source d’eau chaude (Hamiyah).''' »}}There is also another version of the hadith in Musnad Ahmad (this time the spring is muddy rather than warm - the Arabic words sound similar and the same variant readings exist for Qur’an verse 18:86). The same hadith is also recorded by al-Zamakhshari (1075-1143 CE) in his commentary on the Qur’an, al-Kashshaf.<ref>For a translation see Al-Zamakhshari, Al-Kashshaf 3rd Edition, Volume 2, p. 743, Lebanon: Dar Al-Kotob Al-Ilmiyah, 1987 quoted in (trans.) [http://www.answering-islam.org/Responses/Shabir-Ally/science11.htm Science in the Quran/ Chapter 11: The Sun & Moon and Their Orbits] - Sam Shamoun, Answering Islam (''The phrase translated “spring of slimy water” is actually, “hot spring” in the Arabic. For the Arabic, click [http://www.altafsir.com/Tafasir.asp?tMadhNo=0&tTafsirNo=2&tSoraNo=18&tAyahNo=86&tDisplay=yes&UserProfile=0&LanguageId=1 here]'')</ref> Even if one doubts that this is an authentic report about Muhammad, it is certainly further evidence that early Muslims understood 18:86 to mean a literal setting place. The possibility that Muhammad ever claimed a different interpretation thus further diminishes.

He continued. God created an ocean three farsakhs (18 kilometers) removed from heaven. Waves contained, it stands in the air by the command of God. No drop of it is spilled. All the oceans are motionless, but that ocean flows at the rate of the speed of an arrow. It is set free to move in the air evenly, as if it were a rope stretched out in the area between east and west. The sun, the moon, and the retrograde stars run in its deep swell. This is (meant by) God’s word: “Each swims in a sphere.” “The sphere” is the circulation of the chariot in the deep swell of that ocean. By Him Who holds the soul of Muhammad in His hand! If the sun were to emerge from that ocean, it would burn everything on earth, including even rocks and stones, and if the moon were to emerge from it, it would afflict (by its heat) the inhabitants of the earth to such an extent that they would worship gods other than God. The exception would be those of God’s friends whom He would want to keep free from sin. […]

He continued. When the sun rises, it rises upon its chariot from one of those springs accompanied by 360 angels with outspread wings. They draw it along the sphere, praising and sanctifying God with prayer, according to the extent of the hours of night and the hours of day, be it night or day. […] Finally, they bring the sun to the west. Having done so; they put it into the spring there, and the sun falls from the horizon of the sphere into the spring.

Then the Prophet said, expressing wonder at God’s creation: How wonderful is the divine power with respect to something than which nothing more wonderful has ever been created! This is (meant by) what Gabriel said to Sarah: “Do you wonder about God’s command?” It is as follows: God created two cities, one in the east, and the other in the west. […] By Him Who holds the soul of Muhammad in His hand! Were those people not so many and so noisy, all the inhabitants of this world would hear the loud crash made by the sun falling when it rises and when it sets. Behind them are three nations, Mansak, Tafil, and Taris, and before them are Yajuj and Majuj. […] Whenever the sun sets, it is raised from heaven to heaven by the angels’ fast flight, until it is brought to the highest, seventh heaven, and eventually is underneath the Throne. It falls down in prostration, and the angels entrusted with it prostrate themselves together with it. Then it is brought down to heaven. When it reaches this heaven, dawn breaks. When it comes down from one of those springs, morning becomes luminous. And when it reaches this face of heaven, the day becomes luminous.<ref>Al-Tabari, History of al-Tabari, Volume 1 - General Introduction and from the Creation to the Flood, trans. Franz Rosenthal, pp. 234-238, Albany: State University of New York Press, 1989</ref>}}The hadith continues with a description of an angel who releases parts of a veil of darkness each night, and how the sun and moon will behave at the end of the world.

 

In volume 5 of the same work, al-Tabari quotes some lines of verse attributed to a Yemeni king, Tubba’ (though seem to be post-Islamic):{{Quote||Dhu al-Qarnayn before me submitted himself [to God], a king to whom the other kings became humble and thronged [his court]. He reigned over the Eastern and Western lands, yet sought the means of knowledge from a wise, rightly guided scholar. He witnessed the setting of the sun in its resting place into a pool of black and foetid slime.<ref>Al-Tabari, History of al-Tabari, Volume 5 - The Sasanids, the Byzantines, the Lakhmids, and Yemen, trans. Clifford Edmund Bosworth, pp. 173-174, Albany: State University of New York Press, 1999</ref>}}